1st Gen R53 Cooper S Most liked posts in thread: Battery Light On / No Power Steering

Crank pulley failure....might explain it....
That is WHY the battery light turned on, the car overheated, and made odd sounds...
Check it out...but that's what my bet is!!

 

How old is your battery? The OEM battery is well known to "check out" ok but still be bad.

 

A dead alternator won't cause your car to overheat.

My alternator went dead at 100,000 or so. I managed to drive about 50 miles before the car started misfiring & finally shut down. No overheating happened. The power steering was one of the last things to shut down.

 

Sounds like a bad alternator is a strong possibility. The electric power steering pump will shut down when the system voltage drops too low. The same exact symptoms happened to a friend at MOTD this year, a new alternator was the fix.

Jason

 

Check the positive power stud (connection) located on the firewall, driver's side in a small black plastic box. These have been known to come loose on the R53 and create the problem that you describe.

 

Both alternator and power steering pump are run off the serpentine belt. Check the belt, belt tensioner, and crank pulley, too.

 

On the R53 the power steering pump is actually electric, not belt driven.

Jason

 

Oh, right, my bad. I've been working on the other car too much lately.

 

Have the battery checked before going to the expense & agro of swapping the alternator. Always check the easy stuff first.

 

Guess if the fellow at Autozone knows what he is doing. Personally I like the folks at Interstate batteries.

Missed the battery checking in the first post. Bad me no donut...

 

I was the guy Jason talked about, sounds exactly like my alternator failure... at the overlook on the Dragon. Try driving the Dragon and hellbender in a Mini with no power steering! Our steering geometry is designed for p/s, so every turn was a chore... but with Jasno's help and a VERY late night (and a large amount of money), it all ended well.

 

Just baffled why MINIs commonly eat up Denso alternators. They seem to be bulletproof on Toyotas & other Japs. :confused5:

 

Probably cause of the enviroment.....not a lot of room in the engine bay.

 

I'm inclined to think the placement exposes them to extra heat in the mini...that and rapid rpm changes seem to play havoc with the built in voltage regulators, and be tuff on the bearing....afterall my wifes toyotda with 200,000+ miles on the denso sees pretty steady rpms....
Also wonder what the effect of having to "push" the current (increased resistance) all the way back to the battery, and the extra load of the electric ps on the s does....

 

How common are these failures actually? (this is an honest question) With any make/model of car you are going to have the occasional alternator failures. I had just assumed that with the nature of internet forums, we are only hearing about these occasional failures all in one place. Knock on wood, but I'm at 125,000mi on my alternator, maybe I'm just lucky!

Jason

 

Good luck Jason. Hope it continues for you & me. Kim is now at 145,000 on her non-supercharged alternator.

 

I'm inclined to say not very common...(much less common tha ps pump failure).
some folls do have 2or 3...usually after having used a cheap lifetime warrenty'ed one...rebuilding an alternator properly can be $$ (denso remanfactures their own, sold on some web sites, only about $50 cheaper than new)...i suspect most aftermarket lifetime alternators, regardless of band tend to be rebuilt, and tested...cheap partd, good warrenty....so labour and relilibility becomes what you save spending the extra $$.