2nd Gen R55 Clubman Most liked posts in thread: Clunk in front end

Hah, I like that idea!

Before I got up this morning my neighbor got his snowblower out and cleared my driveway, including where the plow and blocked the end of the drive, so i can get out now.

 

Yeah, I'm afraid I'm not a Seafoam "believer", I don't know what this chemical is exactly, it was described to me as the same stuff they use to clean the bores of the big guns on battleships, cause they get carboned up when they're fired, and supposedly this stuff cleans 'em up like new.

I was going to do it tomorrow, but I won't have the car back in time. Looks like I get another free alignment, and a coolant flush out of the deal tho.....

Maybe next week on the chemical clean.....

 

Picked up my Clubby from the dealer this afternoon, and I'm cautiously optimistic....

I ran a number of errands all over town and it's plenty cold outside, I didn't hear a thing that I shouldn't have.

This last time they replaced the front sway bar bushings, hope that's finally it, cause I reached warranty escape velocity 5 days ago.

They even washed my car, which is kinda funny cause we're supposed to have a blizzard again tonight!

 

With only about a week of warranty left I made an appointment with Baron and dropped it off, it's been pretty cold lately and cold weather makes the clunk in the front end more noticeable.

I also have a couple other niggles that I had them look at. It seems to take a long time to warm up, and lately the transmission doesn't seem to be shifting quite right, although it's pretty intermittant when it does act up, so that might be hard to quantify.

There seems to be a knock in the HVAC fan that's most notiecable at the lowest speed.

Lastly, I'm hoping they can come up with a reason that MINI will accept so they can walnut shell blast my intake valves, last time I asked about it they said if it doesn't throw a code they can;t do it. It hasn't thrown any codes, so I'm not hopeful, but I already built my own walnut shell blaster anyway, so I'm good either way.

Just now I got the call from my SA that they'd finally found the clunk - they said it's the steering rack!

Since the second gen cars have a completely different steering rack setup than the 1st gen (electric steering vs electro-hydraulic) I was a little surprised to hear this, but that noise has been there since very early on, it's just gotten worse and the years and miles have added up. I'm glad they found it as I'm sure it's a pretty damn expensvie part!

They're overnighting a new one in and they'll have it done tomorrow.

They're also replacing the thermostat and the HVAC fan assembly. They think the thermostat might be affecting the way the transmission shifts, keeping it in the lower gears longer because it says it's colder than it is. IOW, it's not the thermostat itself, but the temp sender that's integrated with it, but they replace them both in one assembly.

They're not going to be able to do the walnut shell procedure unless I pay for it.....no codes at all.

All in all, I'm very pleased with Baron, I've never had anything but 1st class service from them since I bought my first MINI from them, a 2003 JCW......

 

I already posted a video of their current state, it looked like you were in a coal mine in there! I'll take vids/pics as I do the blasting procedure too...

I'm also surprised about the steering rack, but as it's been doing it almost from new, I think it's just a case of something that wasn't made right, or a bushing that failed early on, and only finally got bad enough that they could pinpoint it.

I agree with most that the electro-hydraulic steering in the 1st gen cars has better feel, but I also like the lack of complexity and (hopefully) better reliability of the all electric design. As to the difference in feel, it's no biggy to get used to it....

I'm in the process of installing a large window A/C and heater in my garage, once I get it in I'll tackle the intake valve situation....however, we have a device at school that claims it will also fix the carboned up valves, chemically. I think I may try that first just to see if it works......plus, too and also....it's free!

I had noticed that my car seemed to take a long time to warm up on these cold mornings, so I'll be interested to see if the new thermostat assy helps that situation. Man, having gauges sure makes it easier to monitor what's going on, I'm glad for my Garmin!

This is my last warranty freebie, so I wanted to try and get all the little niggles resolved on their dime, from here on out it's all up to me.

Edit: Real OEM says a steering rack for my car is $1500! Yikes!

 

Baron called me this morning, the steering rack came in but the new fan didn't so I get to keep the loaner one more day.

Speaking of the loaner, it's a Cooper S automatic, and boy howdy is it fast! It feels WAY faster than my '09 Clubman S, and I always have been happy with it's performance...up till now.

Now I really wonder if it's the carbon fouling or just the extra 12 hp and overboost that makes it feel so quick - that and a couple fewer pounds than my Clubby I guess.

Giving loaners is a good sales strategy, when you remember how loose and clunky your car feels compared to that nice, quiet and quick new car, it gets you to thinking.......

 

Well, that didn't fix it......I still have the clunk in the front end.

I noticed it almost as I was leaving the dealership, right in their parking lot but since all of the techs had gone home I decided to confirm it on my drive back to my house.

No mistaking the noise. I emailed the bad news back to my SA and got an immediate response asking if I could bring the car back in first thing Monday, he said he needs to get a signed repair order into the system before it crosses the 20th finish line - the end of my warranty period.

I sympathise with them, I haven't been able to pinpoint it either, and I've had it up on the rack at school twice looking for the source of the noise. It's this hollow clunk, it doesn't happen on every bump, or any certain type of bump, but when it does it's very distinct and it's very definitely in the front suspension somewhere. I've looked carefully at the top bearing mounts and they seem fine, I'm wondering if it's inside one or both of the shock absorbers?

 

My poor long suffering dealer still has my car....I took it in yesterday morning and drove it with the tech (a former student of the school I now teach at!) and he and I drove it around the parking lot, and the block and a few other places, I could hear it but he couldn't. Of course, I'm sensitized to it and he isn't.

So they kept it overnight as it's easier to hear it when it's cold out. Monday morning it was 60*, by Monday afternoon it was high 30's, this morning it was barely 20.

This afternoon when I got home from class they called to say the tech heard it but good this morning, but they had no clue what it was and wanted to keep it another day. Since I have an All4 S as a loaner, and we have a huge snowstorm bearing down on us, I readily agreed to leave it as long as they needed it!

By the way, this Countryman has the window switches on the door panel, and a full backseat. It just doesn't seem like a MINI somehow.....

 

The dealer still has my car, although they think they know what's causing the noise. I only got a hurried phone message so I haven't been able to talk to them to see what's going on, they said they had to order parts for the front swaybar - I don't know if it's end links or bushings, although I never found any problem with either of those.

Then the snow hit us. We've got well over a foot at my house and since the parts come overnight from Chicago and the storm was moving that direction, I expect I won't see my car now till well into next week, the dealership was closed yesterday, along with most everything else in town.

The All 4 hasn't moved from my driveway since Tuesday after school, it's still buried in snow, but I'm going to dig it out today as I have some errands to run and they finally plowed our street so I can get out.

The wife's Audi Allroad came thru for her, she works nights in a critical medical field job, so she had to get there. I had cleaned the driveway but the street was still over a foot deep.....the only saving thing was someone had come down our hill and left some pretty good tracks, I told her if she could get the car into those tracks she'd be OK, once out of our neighborhood and onto the main roads she'd be fine. It took her 5 tries, but as expected, once in the tracks she was good to go and made it without incident. Our Audi has height adjustable suspension, by raising it up all the way she was able to get enough ground clearance to not get high centered - yay for Audi!

I hope the sway bar IS the answer, cause there's not much else they haven't tried......more as it happens.

We got some snow......

 

I hope so, I remain cautiously optimistic.......I figure if that didn't do it I know where there's a complete stock 2009 Cooper S front end for sale, all the stuff was removed so he could have JCW stuff installed.