BMW Cup Holder Repair // DIY 

That cup holder looks like it will fit in my ar15

about 4 years and some months later, your video still helping people. sadly my spring was unrecoverable. but i managed to get a normal springs at the back that would just push out the cupholder enough for me to pull it out manually. your video helped me with the teardown and understanding of the inner workings, which was such a huge help!

Thanks for the tips....On mine I drilled the spring and put an M2.5 countersunk screw through it to hold it in place. Had to file down the head of the screw a bit to stop it binding. Better than new.

Those damn cup holders lol I’ve broke a few in my time 🤣 Good idea to make a video on this!

Hey man! Thank you for the great video! I just fixed my cup holder thanks to you! One tip for all the people struggling with the spring (breaking too easily) - use needle pliers to bend it and bend around the tip of the pliers. If the thinned end of the spring breaks- use the cutter of the pliers to trim the edge of the spring and try to bend it with the pliers around its tip (the pliers’ tip). Cheers!

I just bought an E90 so imma have this channel on speed dial 🤣

Great vid man. My spring snapped when I tried to bend it. I drilled and cut another slot at the plate at the back inserted the spring and it worked! Cheers

Wonderful video - complete and smooth. I did disassemble the gear and lube it up and seemed to get back to normal. Well see how long that lasts!

Thank you man,,i have 320d is doing exactly that,thanks,,,,,,,,,,,South Africa

Lmao, that shit like KAPOW give me your cup!! But yea, my cup holder is stuck too...now I know!

Thx Bro !!! i ended up bloting it on the plastic case and leveling down the screw head and nut after fixing it so they can slide tip ... Do all your cutting and sanding down with the screw and nut outside or you will melt the plastic as i did with mine causing more trouble 😀

awesome video man thanks. love the murdered out look on your e90 btw👌🏽

incredibly good video bro

Very good! You explain every step and what to watch out for! Nicely done!

Thanks! I'm going to try this tomorrow on my 328xi.

Thanks you. Great video. It’s important to just note that the metal that you have to bend back can break very easily. Take your time and bend it back very slow. I broke it and then Dremelled it down and bent again, and it broke second time as well. Third time lucky for me.

Thanks man, I have successful fix my cup holder by following your tuts 🙌🏾 #salute

Honestly great video, I was thinning about just replacing them, did not know you can fix them. My bros car none of them work.

just did the e46 door lock repair cuz its a common problem too, good vid! wish my e46 had a damn cupholder lmao

I had exactly same issue, so I did everything like you (thanks a lot for that DIY guide!). I had the biggest struggle with bending that spring ending. I've broke that part 6-7 times, cuz its hard to bend it withoug breaking (reducing length of that spring, and I was afraid that spring will be too short to work). I realized that I have to bend very carefully with the shape of circle, because bending too extremely, more like folding paper was causing break into pieces.. Also tried another way - made hole at the end of the spring, and tried to bind it with bolt, nut, washer, but every bolts had too thick "head" so the cup holder sliding part could not fit (it was colliding). So I had to try your option with carefull bending and ... it works! :) Unfortunately its now working with that slowing down cog, because its just opening like 1-2cm and stops.. so I had to mount without that cog, and its poping out immediately, as yours. I prefer to have nice, smooth and slow movement of opening cupholder, like I have on the passanger one, but... its better to have fast opening cupholder, than not working :P.

The spring is so fragile and its easy to break when u bend it over. I broke mine 3 times and i ended up retrimmed and installed it using a zip tie to tie it up.. better solution.

My cup holders are broken from passengers hitting it with their knees as well as this😂

this is such a useful video. i have a 2006 e90 and none of my cup holders work at all. very annoying

Thanks for the info very helpfull

Ended up taking it apart and the spring was unhinged like yours. Broke the securing clip on the end of my spring, ended up making a new end clip for it to secure the spring. Took about 30 minutes of naughty words and sweating, but it ended up working great! Thanks for this video, I was in the dark about fixing this issue before seeing this. I've seen your videos in the past about the eonon sterio I installed, but this was the perfect video for my issue. Thanks a lot!!!!!

There is some really bad advice in this video. 1) Those are not push tabs on the top 2) the spring does not bend but it just snaps off since the metal is so brittle. Now my cup holder is worse than before.

I agree with Lucas Gonzalez. I had a feeling the tab would snap being spring and it did. Tried to reform a tab and heat it to bend but no help. Where the spring tab inserts there are 2 plastic lips that crack. I should have used my 3D pen to plastic weld the lips. No worries now. Just ordered one from FCP EURO and they lifetime warranty everything.

Thanks for the help dude!

You deserve everything

Would have been great to know that this spring metal material is so brittle that it snaps every time you try to bend it. Crucial mistake leaving out of the video the fact that you need to heat the metal and bend it. Thanks for breaking my spring.

Thanks bro! Fixed my cup holder been bugging me for months was about to just buy a new unit then saw this vid. Tried the bending technique and it would just break (had the same blow out in plastic holding as you) so I just cut a new tab works great. Thanks again :)

my latch on the spring roll broke off :( any thing i could possible do?

What was bmw thinking. Such an over engineered part.

I got the same problem... I will try to fix it

Awesome bro! Gives me the confidence to have a go at fixing mine myself :)

Well broke my cupholder trying it but oh well... worth the shot. Just bending back the metal on the spring and it broke. Wonderful design BMW.

Thanks for the help

Great video bro. I need to do mines.

Very good video

Nice I fixed mine on 328i the rolling spring was out I did same what you did the hole holding the spring roll was broken, Beware if you have same problem when your twist on the metal on the roll it’s very sensitive and it break I had to adjust somehow and remove that plastic hole , now it works like charming nice video dude👍

Exact same issue with mine however when I tried to bend back the end of the spring, it broke off. Ended up shortening it and bending it further up. So far it works. The other thing is the mechanism is super sticky. I removed the slower-gear but it’s still sticky as hell. Oh well. At least I can use without a tool now :P

Great. I've tried to lube mine using WD-40 white lithium grease, but with no luck, it got worse than before. I'll try to clean the grease and use another lube (thinking of graphite).

DON'T FOLLOW THIS BENDING ADVICE! It's much easier and better to simply slide the end of the spring through the broken hole in the plastic and wrap a small zip tie around it to keep it from being pulled back through. The video does not say that the metal can and will BREAK with bending. My spring broke like so many others. It's not enough to only mention in the written Video Description that heat is required. Now I need to figure out how to re-create the notched end so I can use a zip tie. Very frustrating.

I tried this on my e90 and the spring roll broke off. I discovered that if you heat the metal up with some propane it will bend easily without breaking. The spring is very brittle material as most springs are. Just FYI

2024 , I snapped the small metal head like an idiot , then I bent a small part of the rest like a small arrow and put it in the hole and bent it from the other side , it got hooked and everything else worked flwawlessy , THANK YOU

I love quick high quality informative tutorials. Thank you!

My spring is out of place but the right cup holder and idk where to put it HELP

good vid, probably the most dogshit overengineered thing i've seen in the interior yet managed to stuff the end of the metal spring into the hole after i broke off the end part, most likely gonna break again but i'll just replace it lol

How did you bend the metal without breaking it? Mine broke off easily

Thank you. Worked for me too. Metal was brittle but a 90 degree hook worked with the housing holding it in place.

Mine just snapped and now I guess I have to order a new spring roll mannnn I guess mine are just too old EDIT so today i went to a junk yard and got the spring for my cup holder and i came back to this video and i checked the description box and i just realized it said heat up the metal before bending and i feel like such a bozo

Ty for showing how to actually fix it instead of just replacing 👌

Other common problem DIY fix for the interior passenger door handle melting ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-99xhdWOcdOs.html

For such an expensive car too many little fixes, poor workmanship from munfacture

can i buy that little gear

Useful video! Kinda felt hungry for Chinese after though...

You should edit this video o remove it, spring breaks easily!!!

just pushed in my driver and i could just tell it was the final push. ugh now she stuck

Dude I just used small zip tie

Hey thanks I just leave it out used to fish it out with my keys 😂 now I got some to do thank you

Thank you! 👏👏👏👏 my problem was solved 👏👏👏

Home run. Same symptom, disassembled per your video, same broken tang holder, bent over a new piece after trimming with tin shears, ran under hot water to clean entire mechanism, shot a ton of silicone lube over every moving / contacting plastic parts. In and works like new. The only tricky part was separating the internal cover, the outer one came off easy. Worked a big bladed screw driver in and lifted and pried apart.

because of this hook solution I broke that metal thing

Thanks a lot buddy.....I snapped the coil and now I gotta order a new one anyway after wasting an hour

Bro I just snapped my one by copying U.....

Thanks for the tip............. Tried this but the spring broke! It's very hard steel. So I lifted an inch or so of the spring with pliers and softened the last half inch with a cigarette lighter and then bent it into shape. Had to grind off 5 mm both sides or so of the new bend to reduce the width to locate in the slot and to stop it rubbing on the slide but, ok now

the goat im gonna try this

hi, do you know where I could get the 2 blue parts? Both mine broke

Try to lubricate that gear with some oil. Maybe the old one just evaporated.

So how the actual fuk did you get the cup holder out of the housing!!!!????? Those 2 little bumps are not push clips. I cant get it over those bumps.

Very help......stuck on mine as well... Will try to fix it looking at your video...

Great explanation, thank you!

My metal was a bit more brittle than yours, so I had to take a slightly different route, I put the metal roll out piece through the hole (which I had to drill out a bit more first)… I also had to drill a hole through the metal so when I got to the other side, I looped to tiny zip ties threat to prevent it from pulling through. That did the trick. Thanks for the video.

Thank you. This was helpful

Can you make a video on how to repair the passenger side cup holder. My spring roll is unattached from its position.

U have definitely save my E90 320i coffee holder.. BOTH of mine Coffee holder are not working. Thank you soo much

Hey JD - Thanks for the step by step solution. The only thing is, my cup holder problem is a little different. I bought a brand new driver's side cup holder and, once installed, had the same problem as the original one. Uninstalled, the cup holder works perfectly. In its slot with the 2 mounting screws halfway tightened it still works - just a little slower coming out. With the mounting screws fully tightened it does not come out at all. It is rubbing up against something once installed, BUT WHAT? It's almost impossible to get a look at the backside of the cup holders once they are installed so I've had no luck finding the problem. Any suggestions? Please! Anybody?

I don't know how you bent that metal spring...but I tried and it breaks, it's brittle

Imagine getting hit by that cup holder lmao

thanks .... 100 pct perfect !.....cupholder now working again , saved me a lot of money

when i bend it back it broke off :(

Note to self dont buy e90s

exactly what i needed

JD..... WHO IN LA CAN DO MY INTERIOR PARTS LIKE YOURS I CANT FIND ANYONE THANKS ERIC.

u r a gift from god sir 😉😀

I gave it a thumbs up even though it didn't work for me. My spring tab broke instantly when I tried to bend it to make the hook.

My tip broke when I bent it xD

I watched your vudeo, went outside and did this. Done. Took less than 30 minutes start to finish. And you are correct that removing the reduction gear helped. Thanks for the video 👍.

Solid video , thanks

Yet another tiny flaw in design that you wouldn’t expect from a high end vehicle

Thank you! Good video!

My cup holder was stuck I removed the lil heat like you did. I realized my cup holder has a spring but doesn’t have a hole to hold the spring

the spring break every time!! Doesn't work

maaan, that cup holder can give me a black eye. great job man

I want to do this w my 2011 but I’m scared to fuck it up

HEAT! before you try to twist it. It'll break multiple times otherwise.

Reinserting is proving to be a pain, left side won’t sit in all the way.

i hate when my car has a cup holder from a nasa space shuttle

Nice video!!!