Adafruit: From Ultimate Driving Machine to Ultimate Rent-Seeking Machine: The BMW Logo Screw Patent.
If you haven’t already heard, BMW’s R&D teams have been busy “innovating.” Unfortunately, they aren’t focusing on the things that actually matter—like stellar engine performance or the legendary driving dynamics that gearheads love. Instead, the C-suite execs decided that the best use of their engineering budget was to design a proprietary security screw specifically intended to prevent BMW drivers from fixing their own cars.
As soon as the rollout for BMW dealers starts, Chinese toolmakers will churn out compatible bits and screwdrivers. They might even be on the market before the BMW dealers have them in the mail.
You could almost manufacture it based on this image, granted that’s a 1/4" impact bit. All it would take is one bolt being smuggled to their factory or one photograph of a spec sheet.
that’s not the only issue, it’s also just a plainly worse design that will likely lead to lots of broken screws and bits.
Torqued to spec AND properly aligned.