'88 750il Reverse Problem

[jmhuot]

I just purchased an 88 750 il. Nice clean car in excellent shape with 179,000 miles, but the transmission will not always go into reverse. All four forward gears work fine, but will not engage reverse all of the time. Sometimes it will go into reverse gear and when it does, reverse works fine. Any help will be appreciated. Thanks.

[shogun]

First thing I would do is to check the trans oil. Enough oil, how does it smell? If it is nice reddish, then fine. If it smells and looks burned, not that good.
I would try first a trans oil change and a filter change.
Then you can also check if the bowden cable under the shift stick is properly adjusted on it's way to the trans.
Do a search for online ETK or spare parts catalog (search on top here). Then type in your VIN and you will have all the nice explosion drawings of each part. Go to transmission main group and then the subgroups to see all the details. Also on my website below with tech tips there is a link to European transmissions with a trouble shooting manual. That might help too.
Also see the other links on my webiste, the most important E32 repair pages are linked there. Also online wiring diagrams.

Usually the 750 trans has no problem, but one never knows how the previous owners handled the car and if they ever changed the trans oil. Use only approved transmission oil!
On the other hand, used transmissions are available nowadays at competitive prices. But let's hope that you can fix it with some maintenance work.
I would also recommend you to visit your dealer and invest the money to connect the car to make a diagnisis check on the DIS system. That will help you to find out what's wrong on the car.
The repairs you probably might DIY, and there are enough people here with knowledge to help you.

[ve39]

Not trying to scare you but one mechanic told me that Reverse is the first thing that's going down when the transmission is going bad. but let's hope transmission oil change would work