[mjr24]

I ordered this from IND (as they are 30 miles away) and tried installing it today. Removing the old part was easy....I used a straight edge razor blade to remove that top piece that has the gears and M symbol on it (and lights up). Was real careful with it and pried it out perfectly. Once that was off, I removed a torx screw underneath and the shifter lifted right off.

Installed the new shifter and re-screwed the torx screw in. Took the adhesive backing off the new gear thing in the box (they give you a new one with the carbon shifter....although it's the exact same one that was on the normal silver selector) and stuck it on. To my surprise, the piece sat way down in the carbon fiber shifter....the lower part was literally lower than the cutout (meaning there was a gap)....leaving it quite susceptible to debris, stuff being spilled down onto the circuit board behind it.

Of course, at this point, it's recessed down so far it's almost impossible to remove again. I tried a razor blade again and it actually broke off 2 small pieces that were stuck in that crevice. I tried a tiny eyeglass screwdriver with a flathead end....and of course when I tried to pry the adhesive-backed piece up, it cracked a piece of the carbon fiber off the shifter. Nice, eh?

Anyone else had this issue with the OEM CF selector? After I removed everything, I tested the new adhesive backed piece on my old shifter and it sat perfect. I then tested the old adhesive backed piece (that was on my silver shifter) and put it on the CF selector and it again sat way way down. Thus, there is no doubt the issue was with the CF selector. Is this something BMW will replace? I can't believe they intended that to sit way further down than the OEM piece. It would be impossible to ever take it back off without damaging the shifter.