1st Gen JCW Most liked posts in thread: Refreshing Rufus - 2005 MCS JCW

Back from the Dragon...

 

OK... it's dead of the winter here in Charlotte, NC (lol... that means we get a mild ice storm once or twice... maybe 3-4 inches of snow that melt within a day or two) and it's time to get the last few remaining items done before MOTD 2019. My contract was finally converted to permanent employment so, now I've got my paycheck sorted out, it's time to spend all of that cash!

1. The interior: Man... I've been wanting to refresh the steering wheel and the ebrake and shift boots, but I've had a hard time finding a place that does work that I like. I'm picky about leatherwork and stitching... it needs to look OEM or better and, despite what many vendors say, their work looks like it was done by a 2 year old. I know that a steering wheel has to be a seriously difficult shape to wrap. It takes some mad skills, I'm sure. I found CM Customs (in the Netherlands) and LOVE every wheel I've seen them do. I just sent my cash and ordered a wheel much like the one in this pic:



Mine will have red stitching, smooth leather everywhere and a red 12 o'clock indicator ring (just for a bit of flash). It will have the sport-grip notches at 9 and 3 (as the photo does) and a slightly flattened wheel (as this photo has). It will also be 1.5mm thicker (as the photo is). New leather boots coming as well... smooth black leather w/ red stitching.

2. The clutch: I've been all over the map on the clutch kit. I've finally decided to do the South Bend Stage 2 Street clutch and flywheel kit. New throw out bearing, rear main seal, guide tube, input shaft seal, etc.

3. LSD: I seriously miss the LSD from Jango, my first R53. Since hands will be in doing the clutch, why not pop a Quaife LSD in there?

4. Maintenance: I got the various bits for an oil change and a brake fluid flush (yawn, I know... but you gotta keep up w/ this stuff).

Once I do that, I think Rufus will be officially DONE! Of course I'll putter about in the engine bay... I've been wanting to get in there and change out the coolant / PS tank and maybe do some powder coating of various bits, but that's all just icing on the cake and stuff I'll do just to have some fun... probably next winter, once my wallet recovers from the parts extravaganza I just ordered in the past few days.

 

I love opening up the big boxes of parts! Thank you, Colin.

 

I had a swaybar party once. We did 6 in one day. We had 4 MINIs apart at one time, scattered down the driveway. when my wife went to her mothers for a week, I had people over every night for wrenching! I do miss that.

 

After all of the work done at the shop last week, I decided to pop a wheel off and poke around. The entire front suspension from the axle out is now new within the past 3 years... control arms, bushings, ball joints, drop links, steering knuckle, hubs/bearings, ABS sensors, brakes... it's all shiny and not a spot of rust. GMP Performance seems to have done a good job and all of the nuts/bolts that they touched have been marked w/ thread-marker, so I can see any screws that might have backed out. The steering wheel is now straight, after the alignment. It was always 2-3 degrees off of center. Normally it wouldn't have bothered me that much, but with the red 12 o'clock marker on the wheel now, it was really noticeable.

I need to spend some time on the radar detector mount solution the next time I'm puttering about in the garage. The small metal plate that I attached to the bottom of the detector came loose (I cleaned the detector case w/ Ethanol, but it wasn't enough). I probably need to rough-up the surface and try a stronger glue or some epoxy.

I got Rufus out for a quick trip to pick up dinner the other night... not much, but every mile is fun lately!

 

I didn't like the way the antenna was poking up at the cover... I could just see it wearing away. I used a pair of red iron-on patches for reinforcement, cut a hole and then added a plastic grommet (for a shower curtain, I think).

 

OK... I'm going to go through some iterations of this post (this message will be updated as I collect information and photos), but here are my initial notes that I'm typing up the day that I finished the work. I expect I'll turn this into an article once it's all together. Note: I'm not a mechanic, nor do I play one on TV. I'm just trying to assemble what I did to the best of my ability. I did a bunch of other stuff at the same time, so I might have missed a minor disassembly step here or there, but the essentials are all here.

Timing system service (Timing chain tensioner and front/rear timing chain guide replacement)

Parts needed:
- Front and rear timing chain guides (I'll probably do it every 80k miles or so)
- Timing chain tensioner (IMHO, if you have more than 80k miles on it and you are doing this work, replace it)
- valve cover gasket and 4 spark plug tube seals (some folks re-use these gaskets... after 80k miles, I was due for new ones)
- new valve cover bolts (12 in total, 2 different sizes. Not absolutely necessary, but mine were rusty and one broke during reinstall after 12 years in service. Remarkably expensive for a bolt!)
- spark plugs (if you wish... you will be right there and it's easy to do)

Note: There is an excellent mechanic that I've found on YouTube that has several R53 wrenching guides. In a series of 2 videos, he takes a car that had a blown head gasket (oil and coolant mixed to make 'chocolate milk' in the engine) and does a repair. His video takes you down to removing the timing chain gear (where you need to get to so you can replace the guides) and then goes a few steps further to take the head off of the engine block. I used his video extensively as I stripped things down. Here's a link:

1. Put the front of the car up on jack stands (lowest setting possible) and remove the front right wheel
2. Remove the fender liner of that wheel (sometimes I just undo the front of the liner and flex it up and out of the way if I'm just doing a belt... go ahead and remove the whole thing this time for better access)
3. Remove the intercooler cover (4 #30 star bolts) and the intercooler itself (more #30 star bolts and the clamps on the rubber intercooler boots)
4. Pull the dipstick and set aside.
5. Disconnect the vacuum lines on the left and right of the valve cover.
6. Remove the 2 brackets under the intercooler (one has 3 8mm bolts where you need a wobble extension, the other has 2 8mm bolts).
7. Pull the spark plug wires off of the spark plugs. (take a photo so you get 'em all back in the right order)
8. Put a floor jack under the passenger rear corner of the oil pan and lift it so that it just barely supports the engine.
9. Remove the engine mount (large u-shaped metal bracket just over the serpentine belt). There is a bolt on top of the engine damper, plus 4 18mm bolts that attach the mount to the engine. There is also a 13mm nut attaching a ground strap to the frame.
10. Remove the many 8mm valve cover attachment bolts (you will need an 8mm DEEP socket for this as several are on tall studs and buried in a recess, so a box-end wrench will be hard to use) .
11. Remove the 2 plugs on the side of the head using a 10mm hex (allen) socket
12. IMPORTANT: Place paint marks (I had a paint pen... liquid paper was used in the video I recommend, above) on the timing chain and the timing chain gear so you can make sure they can be re-aligned perfectly when reassembling. In the photo below, you can see the white line I drew on the gear and the chain link (after cleaning off the oil). As long as these 2 marks are aligned when you reassemble, your timing will be OK.
13. Have someone sit in the driver's seat of the car, put the car in 6th gear, take their foot off of the clutch and hold the brake pedal firmly. Remove the bolt holding the timing chain gear to the cam.
14. Hang the timing chain from the bonnet by a bungee cord, so it is always held upwards (It shouldn't be able to slip off of the lower gear, but I'm not taking that chance). I've been told (after I finished the work and published the first draft of this article, so I can't confirm) that you don't have to remove the sprocket from the chain... that once you remove the bolt, you can just wiggle the chain guide rails out in step 19, below. It's probably still a good idea to mark the chain and gear as I did above... just to be safe.
15. Remove the timing chain tensioner from the rear of the engine block. You will need a 19mm socket and a wobble attachment. It's on there VERY tight and is in a poor location. I lifted the passenger side of the engine a bit, using the floor jack, to give me better access from the top (I couldn't get a good angle on it from the wheel well... I followed the advice from the video and got it off fairly quickly. A bit of oil will leak out, but just a tablespoon or so. You won't need to drain the engine oil.
16. Remove the 10mm bolts at the top of the timing chain guide rails (both front and rear) and replace the guides with new ones. You get to the 10mm bolts through the 2 large, round ports on the side of the housing. There is a pin at the bottom to hold the lower side of each guide rail... be sure the new rail sits down on the pin. Replace the bolts.
17. Replace the timing chain tensioner that you removed in step 18. I put in a new one as the work is a bit of a PITA and I don't like to skimp when it comes to MINI reliability, but you can check to make sure that the piston moves freely, wipe it clean and reinstall if you wish. It is oil powered, so it's going to be drippy. There is a very high torque rating on this sucker (over 90-100 ft-lbs, if I recall), but I couldn't get my torque wrench down there anyway, so I just installed it as firmly as my short 1/2" drive would let me by hand.
18. Reattach the timing chain gear, ensuring that the chain and gear marks you made earlier are aligned and the pin on the cam is in the hole on the gear. I got my wife back in the driver's seat to hold the brake w/ the car in 6th gear again when tightening the bolt.
19. Put a new valve cover gasket on the valve cover. I also replaced the 4 spark plug tube seals. The valve cover bolts are tightened in a specific order, starting in the middle and alternating front and then back. Do one set to the left, then one set to the right, then one set to the left... continue until you run out of bolts. Tighten 'em in 3 stages... first just snug, then a bit tighter, then to the final torque.
20. Reassemble

 

My Greene coil-overs should arrive on Wednesday, along with the new fuel pump.

I did a little shopping yesterday evening:

• Rear swaybar
• Inner and outer ball joints for both sides
• Adjustable end-links (front and back)
• Megan racing roll center spacer
• New bracket and screws that were rusted/stripped from the thermostat work of this weekend
• New plug wires (I found some ugly rubbing wear points on the old ones when doing the work last weekend)
• New rear wiper motor. The old arm plastic cracked and left a bushing siezed onto the old arm. I've been soaking it in breakfree and beating on it for the past few weeks with no luck. It's clearly 2 different metals, so they are probably rusted/grown together. Sigh...

I'm about to call Todd Cook at TCE Performance and order up my BBK, then (barring any further unexpected wear item discoveries, which will almost assuredly happen) I'm done shopping!

 

BREAKTHROUGH!!!!

I got new inner tie rod ends to go w/ the new outer tie rod ends (from my first try at a fix for my tie rod issues) and new boots/clamps this morning. The tool arrived at 3pm today and by 3:30 I had both of the inner tie rods loose and one of them approximated for size, greased and bolted up!

You have no idea how happy I am right now. I can now finish putting the front bumper on (it's still off due to the sub-frame drop), bolt up the BBK on the passenger side and I can put the front end down on the ground! I won't be able to touch the car this coming weekend and I was really wanting to get some weight on those coil overs so they can start settling.

I've still got the rear coil overs to mount up and a rear swaybar / lower control arms to do, but the front suspension has been one problem after the other for 3 weeks now and I finally see an end coming. I may try to slip out there tomorrow night to put the rear coil-overs on... I'm so freakin close!

 

Some beauty shots from MOTD.

I've been busy doing some work on my daily driver (A Volvo XC60... brake pads/rotors, oil, plugs & some interior refreshing bits) and paying my wife back for all of the hours I spent out in the garage getting Rufus finished. I finally got out and gave Rufus a good cleaning after MOTD on Sunday morning and it was nice to be out in the garage puttering about without feeling any time pressures or fighting seized bolts.

 

Rufus is back together and running. The exhaust seems to rattle a bit at idle and it looks like the exhaust tips are sticking out a bit further than they did before. I'll get up under there this weekend. I've got to to put 50-75 miles on the clock, pushing emissions data into the computer, so I can get through my annual inspection.

EDIT: 70 miles on the clock over the weekend and I passed emissions/safety inspection today. I'm legal for another year.

 

Progress! As discussed above, I sourced an R56 steering wheel with black multi-function controls from a scrapped car. I stripped the circular buttons off of it and transferred them to my controls. I also wrapped the 3 control covers w/ the same matte carbon fiber look vinyl that I've used everywhere else in the car. I'm quite happy w/ the way it has come out!

My new wheel should be done early this coming week. It will take a while to get to me via post, but hopefully I'll have some photos soon.


Here's the old wheel w/ the newly colored and wrapped MFC buttons.

 

More puttering about in the engine bay. The UPS guy just brought my new Chili Red matched spray-paint, so I can get some color on my smooth-S side scuttle project and my little cold-air intake dress-up!

I placed an order this morning for a new Uniden R7 radar detector (my old one was 15 years old... has been on the shelf for a while... I decided to update tech before I spend time on an install) and got some fresh power steering fluid and some Motul brake fluid to do a bleed. While I was there, cabin fever got the best of me and I ordered a new TSW x-brace for under the car. I love Dr. Mike's designs.

I can see an end to my 'refresh project' in sight, so I've placed that one last flurry of part orders.

Here's my arts and crafts project for the day... getting rid of the last few bits of non-red color in the engine bay. The blue washer fluid caps got several coats of vinyl/plastic black paint and a bit of red from a paint pen for style. Same with the brake fluid cap... a good cleaning and some color for the raised text.

 

The rear bar bolted right in (4bolts... easy install) and looked great. I got it used on eBay, and a touch of metal polish and 5 minutes of elbow grease brought it to a like-new condition. I tightened (shortened) it to as tight as I could go by hand and then tightened the bolts. As I was doing that, I was wondering if it would be better to shorten the bar or lengthen the bar to provide some pre-load. Oh well... probably doesn't matter much where the brace is.

I also found some long J bolts that are threaded for lug bolts. They are made for holding a spare tire down onto a roof rack for off-roaders. I'm thinking that they will work perfectly for holding a spare against the bar while I'm on a road trip (the spare usually only goes in the car for long trips... I rely on slime and a compressor or Uber around town). I've been wanting to get that thing tied down with hard-points as you really don't want a full-sized spare bouncing around the cabin in the event of an accident.

I did a quick test drive and discovered that my radar mount needs some work. It relies on a metal plate adhered to the bottom of the detector so the magnet has something to grab and the metal plate didn’t stick to the detector (I cleaned with ethanol well before sticking it on using the provided 3M adhesive pad). I’ll try some different glue.

I've been trying my best to stay home during the quarantine, but have done a bunch of maintenance stuff in the past few months and wanted to get the engine up to temp and make sure all is well before I hand the car over for the alignment this week. It was sunny and 72-74 degrees here in Charlotte yesterday. It was SO nice to be in the car with the windows down, hearing the engine rev, even if it was just for 20 minutes. The motor really does pull nicely.

 

I had an afternoon off and I finally got out into the garage. Rufus got a magnet upgrade to help hold the radar detector in place (I added a couple quarter-sized [as in 25 cents] neodymium magnets) between the detector and the little Z-shaped mount and that sucker's really on there! I can still pull it off, so I can easily remove and hide the detector when I wish, but I'm not worried that it's going to bounce off when I hit a pothole.

I polished out the paint with the PCDA, a soft-ish foam pad and a light-weight polish (paintwork is in good shape, just needed a deoxidation and stubborn-bug-gut removal). I made the rounds 2x with Gyeon Prep (a panel-prep solvent) and Rufus is ready for a few coats of Gyeon MOHS (hopefully this weekend) and a coat of Gyeon Skin (a 2 part ceramic coating). I just got the email that the car cover has been made and is on the way (from Portugal).

Update: 1st coat of MOHS is down. The shine was already solid from the polishing yesterday... only getting deeper now.

 

Note: I updated the timing chain guide rail replacement post, above, with some photos and new formatting. I should probably look up the torque values and add 'em.... After that and a few more edits, I'll turn that post into an article.

https://www.motoringalliance.com/threads/refreshing-rufus-2005-mcs-jcw.29878/page-13#post-400327

Oh yeah... I just heard back from Mr. Greene. My new coil overs are almost done and should be on their way to me by the end of the week! I might as well get myself in gear and order the rest of the suspension bits...

Another 'oh yeah' moment... I forgot to report back in on my success/failure of the timing chain service work (plus crank pulley, crank seal, plugs, idler pulley, tensioner, belt, engine mount)! I got everything put back together and it started right up and ran smoothly. Unfortunately, I had a small leak in the valve cover gasket (due to a broken bolt... parts on the way) and the oil was dripping down onto the exhaust, so I shut Rufus off fairly quickly. I'll call it a success... gotta start planning the supercharger service next.

 

Well... I spent the day out in the garage, trying to wrap up several jobs that got started then stalled for parts.

1) New thermostat and thermostat housing were installed, including a new bracket for what I'm guessing is a coolant temp sensor (the bracket is attached w/ 2 of the 3 bolts that hold the thermostat housing in place). The old bracket had rusted out and the screws holding the sensor in place had fused to the bracket.

2) I had a valve cover leak after doing my work a few weeks back. I found that one of the valve cover bolts had snapped and another had been 'fixed' by someone with fix-a-thread that had crumbled. I found a new bolt for the fix-a-threaded one and I bought a new set of valve cover bolts (they were hella rusty anyway... probably a good idea to replace 'em before the heads round off.

3) I replaced the rear wiper motor. The original rear wiper arm had broken and the ferrule that holds it to the shaft of the motor had fused itself to the shaft, so I couldn't fit the new arm. An aftermarket motor wasn't too expensive, so I just replaced it and mounted the new arm.

4) While I had the coolant out, I replaced the coolant tank w/ a cool stainless unit I found cheap on NAM.

I put everything back together again and tried to start the car. I got no turn-over at all. Lights came on, fuel pump energized but no motion from the starter. I walked up to the front and could hear something pressurized leaking. Sniff... uh oh... fuel leak. I pulled the intercooler back off and saw fuel leaking out from around the top of a fuel injector. I pulled the rail to discover that an o-ring at the top of one of the injectors was missing! Grrrrr. I must have done something stupid a few weeks back. Luckily, you can buy new o-rings and don't have to buy all new injectors. I've got new o-rings and clips coming (just in case) and I'll re-mount all of the fuel injectors next weekend. Hopefully it was the fuel system not holding pressure that was stopping the car from turning over.

 

The day went surprisingly well. The supercharger lobes looked almost perfect (a few nicks, but no wear on the coating, so the bearings are good. It felt nice and smooth after a few oil changes and a fill up. The old oil looked much cleaner than that in my first MINI, so I think the supercharger is good for another 80k miles! I spent an hour scraping and cleaning oil and dirt from the front of the engine... looks like the crank sensor seal has been leaking for a long time. A new o-ring and some RTV should help.



I still need to drain the oil, change the oil pan gasket, reassemble and refill the fluids... work for another day.



EDIT: Aw crap... I was clearing up the workbench and found the electrical component that I need to replace to return the 2-stage function to the cooling fan. One more job to do before I button everything up.

 

That was a rough day out in the garage.

I got the Detroit Tuned bypass valve installed. I think it fixed the throttle surging, but had no effect on the cold engine stalling. I put on the new valve and went out for a test drive, but the car stalled and, unfortunately, the battery was still a bit flat and it didn't have enough juice to restart! I pushed the car into a spot, got the windows up and locked the doors. I was about to pull out my phone and call for an Uber when I looked up and saw a yellow cab making a u-turn about 20 yards from me! I ran over and he had time to run me the couple of miles back to the house. I took my daily driver out, jumped the MINI and drove it home w/ no issue. I changed the gearbox oil and wrapped up my maintenance plan.

I decided to get a start on the suspension, so I cleaned up the garage, sorted through all of the parts, got organized and started stripping down the front right wheel. Almost every bolt is a struggle... I doubt much of anything has been done to the suspension in the past 12 years. I stripped the head off of one bolt already (I can drill it out and replace it with a thru-bolt) and the inner ball joint is seriously frozen onto the control arm (the outer joint came apart with a crack that sounded like a gun shot). I was hoping to avoid it, but I think I'm going to have to drop the subframe to get that inner balljoint loose. I bought myself a new breaker bar a few months back and I'm very glad I had it. I needed it for 1/2 of the bolts I removed. I hosed everything down with penetrating oil and called it a day.

I did put these stickers on, which are cool:

 

I got the bumper back on, the second tie rod end mounted and the other front brake caliper mounted up. It was so nice to see the car on the ground for the first time in a month or so.



This isn't the final ride height... I've got to let the car settle for a bit. If it settles another half inch, it might be perfect. I am loving the pop of the red brake caliper behind the wheel spokes.