[delmarco]

DIY Time - 10 to 20 minutes

DIY Tools - Breaker bar or long handle ratchet with a 16mm socket and a small screw driver or skinny pry tool

DIY Skills - If you can turn on your computer and read this then this DIY is in your realm of expertise. Also can you unplug a car battery? You said "yes" then proceed.

DIY Equipment and How I sourced what I got: Go on eBay right now and search for Z4 E89 Heated Steering Wheel. You will see several wheels going from $150 to $400. Get the shift paddle and heated combo or just one or none. i did the combo special because I'm greedy. LOL

Now the Airbag is really hard to source. One may come up on eBay once in a blue but if you browse the Z4 E89 forums you may see a member these parting their car out. If not the Dealerships sell this airbag for around $900 to $1,000. Make sure you get a dual stage two plugs-into airbag if you live in the USA.


Anyway the rest is easy peasy once you get your parts!

DIY Video:

My Explanation Video of the BMW Airbags - Single Stage vs Dual Stage:

[delmarco]

Here is another look with the stainless steel pedals in the background below the steering wheel.

It is a great upgrade that makes you feel like you driving a $50,000 sports sedan and not some Eastern European taxi cab!

[fatjoez]

Looks great. Is the Z4 steering wheel pictured same thickness as m-sport e90?
Or does Z4 have m-sport / non m-sport variants

[fatjoez]

Can you explain how the steering wheel heat turns on and off

[delmarco]

Originally Posted by fatjoez

Can you explain how the steering wheel heat turns on and off

My car has the cold weather package that included an original heated steering wheel.

BMW Steering Wheels tend to be plug and play across all platforms and series of the same generation (years) -with the exception of the 7 series and some M models.

So for my 2011 non-sport package E90 all I need was a 2006 to 2011 era BMW sport steering wheel. Any model series that overlaps this time frame shares a plug and play steering wheel with any E90 vehicles.

By plug and play I mean all the wiring between the steering wheel/air bags and the clock spring in the receiving car is identical even if the donor car is vastly different. Say a 2013 X1 SUV will have a steering wheel that is swap-able with your E90 from 2006-2011. Because the X1 of 2013 has a production time line that parallels the E90. But an F30 2013 3 Series Sedan will NOT have a plug and play matched steering wheel that can swap into an E90 even though they are the same 3 series cars the generation and time frames are different. I.E E90 is 2006 to 2011 and the F30 is 2012 to 2018.

A simple way of checking is looking at the multi-function buttons. If they match up between the cars then they will have steering wheels that work between the cars.

In regards to the heated function. For my car all I need was an incoming wheel to be from a car that had cold weather package hence the heated steering wheel.

All functions including the heated functions and shift paddles are plug and play provided both the donor car and the receiving car have the same features I.E heated steering wheel, shift paddles, multi-functional buttons-that-are-the-same, and in ALL cases single-stage (European) airbags on the steering wheels must be only for single stage air bag cars and dual stage (American/NA) airbags must go on dual stage cars.

[HerrGruyere]

My car has a whole ton of heated stuff except a heated steering wheel. I have a 2007 328xi wagon. Is there a heated steering wheel for it?

[delmarco]

Originally Posted by HerrGruyere

My car has a whole ton of heated stuff except a heated steering wheel. I have a 2007 328xi wagon. Is there a heated steering wheel for it?

yes all E90/E89 steering wheels will physically fit in your car and work in regards to multi-function buttons and the horn but a heated steering wheel to get the heat to work is not a plug and play installation for a car that did not originally leave the factory with a heated steering wheel.

[HerrGruyere]

Gotcha. Then maybe I won't end up doing this mod.

Great video, though!

[Hearf]

Did you initially do a retrofit for paddles? I'm wondering how difficult it is to wire up the paddles if I'm switching from a non-sport steering wheel.

[Grant8311]

I know I'm bringing this back from the dead, but it wasn't clear if this fit Pre-LCI or LCI cars or both. So far, it is not working on my pre-lci e90.
Has anyone verified fitment on a Pre-LCI e9x? The OP's car is a LCI N55 E9x

I have the e89 m-sport wheel on a Pre-LCI e90. Late 06 build. Paddles are not working. I figured there were two scenarios.

One scenario could be due to they are LCI paddles. I have yet to take apart the pedals yet, but I'm assuming they will need to be modded like E9x LCI paddles. I originally assumed they would work since the E89 has an N54. However that is not the case for me(i.e. the 335is DCT still uses the non-m lci paddles).

Another possibility is that the car is an early build (pre-08). Is there anyone with an 08 model year that has successfully done this swap? (I'm gathering this information based on the info the BMS website provided and what I can gather through searching). If the E89 LCI steering wheel works on an 08 e9x w/ the LCI paddles, then basically the it's missing the common ground signal to the paddles (which is why it required a specific set of MFC switches).

Any input would be appreciated, thanks.

[Grant8311]

Ok, here is an update.

I got it to work on the '07 335i after what seems like decades

Definitely wasn't the easiest thing for me to attempt. Especially with no background in electrical engineering of any sort lol. Was rather frustrating at first, but once I was able to figure it out where everything went, it wasn't too bad (The frustration more of figuring out what to do vs doing the actual work).

The idea in theory is like the E90 LCI paddle mod (turning them into simple switch that closes a circuit). My problem was trying to figure out what goes where on the circuit boards for the e89 paddles. There was even a write up on how to make M3 Paddles work on an E90 LCI, but little to no information on the E89 (much less E89 to E9x) except for what the OP posted.

All I had for reference the E9x LCI paddle mod to Pre-LCI write-up. After all said and done, I suspect this might have been a lot easier if I had a set of E89 Pre-LCI paddles to take apart and salvage parts from.

I've attached some pics of the process. Maybe someone can check if there might be a simpler / better way to do this by looking at the circuitry.

[Grant8311]

And here are the final pics of the whole process