[alentje]

As many E90's here in europe come with no PDC I decided to do a near factory looking install. This car had the business CIC so I was first wondering if an older revision of the PDC module pre CIC wouldn't work, but it looks like the revision doesn't matter as I got an unit from a 2005 E90.

I acquired all the parts from a local bmw junkyard cheaply, you will need the following.

PDC module (junkyard price ~50$)
PDC module holder if you don't have comfort access or a trailer hitch.
Power and sensor connectors for the PDC module, I got the connectors from an E60, they are the same but need to be repinned, as the pin assigment is not the same.
PDC sensors and holders for the bumper. (I bought 4 OEM sensors in titansilber for ~50$ used, the holders for my e91 were ~30$ from my local dealer)
One double leaf spring contact for the fusebox connector ( 61131378906). You can also find this pin in a relay housing, I got mine from the wiper relay housing from an E46


First remove the glovebox so you can have access to the fusebox. Remove the fusebox by unscrewing the 4 torx screws holding it in. The two left screws will be a pain to remove but can be done with a flexible extension. Unplug the top connector from the fusebox so you have access to the back.

For an LCI E90 you want to unplug the left connector X11001, it will be blue, for a pre LCI you want the right connector X11003. Now take the leaf spring pin 61131378906 and pin it in pin number 7 for the LCI or pin number 8 for the pre LCI model. On my car that pin was already occupied and I figured I could pin it in another free place as I have already acquired it. Don't forget to put a fuse in the correct place where you put the pin in



Now route the cable from the fusebox connector you pinned to the back of the car. I ran my canbus wires directly from the junction box, from the big left connector X14271, pin 10 and 46. The junction box is the module that is part of the fusebox.





The power wire from the fusebox goes to pin 7 of the PDC module connector X300, ground to pin 12. Can high pin 8 and Can low pin 2. Can high will be the orange/green and can low green. With the schematics provided you will figure this out very easily



I routed all the wires through this braided cable sleeving making an OEM look.



My PDC sensor harness that I found was cut immediately after it comes into the car, so I had to splice it into the sensor connector with help of the diagram that I will provide in the attachment.



The chassis will have a hole capped off near the battery, remove the cap and route the sensor harness through here.



The bumper drilling is explained in many videos you can look up, I won't explain this in detail, but I have done it with a special PDC sensor cutting tool. It leaves a clean hole like factory.




The bumper is already pre marked for the holes on the inside, but you need to look very good as you can barely see it, atleast on my bumper. The PDC holders are different for each side, they will say HAL for rear outside left, HAR for outside right, HIR center right, HIL center left. The left and right side is looking into the bumper as it would be on the car. When you stick the holders on to the bumper you need the connectors to point towards the center of the bumper like in this example:


These are the holders that you will stick on the bumper. It comes with double sided tape preapplied, it is very strong.





The PDC will possibly work without coding but you won't have the visual display on the CIC. What I did was I coded the CIC module via NCSexpert, changing option MACRO_PDC to aktiv and PDC_SENSOR_HINTEN to 4 sensors.
You will also need to change the vehicle order, adding $507, and FA_WRITE the CAS and NFRM.


The result is perfectly working PDC, the total price for me with used parts and self made harness came out to about 150$ which is pretty cheap.

[FaxData]

Very nice work! Do you have any plans to install the button to turn it on and off? If not, is there another way to activate or deactivate it?

[alentje]

Originally Posted by FaxData

Very nice work! Do you have any plans to install the button to turn it on and off? If not, is there another way to activate or deactivate it?

There is no real need to deactivate them, as they only come on in reverse. Factory fitted rear PDC doesn't have the button at all, you only get the button with front PDC.

If I decide to install the fronts, I will get the button for sure

[FaxData]

Ahh, gotcha. Now you have me thinking about this retrofit...

[pysical]

The pdc censor button works for the rear as well.

[alentje]

Originally Posted by pysical

The pdc censor button works for the rear as well.

Yes it does ofcourse turn off both front and rear PDC, but what I was trying to say is that the button is not part of the rear PDC, cars with only the rear sensors don't have the button.

It does make sense as the PDC turns on in reverse and works until a defined speed, if you got stuck somewhere after reversing it could be annoying, so they made this manual switch.

[g8mail1216]

Originally Posted by pysical

The pdc censor button works for the rear as well.

Could you please advise how? thanks.