hi everyone, this is my first time posting on a forum so I'm a bit new to this, but I was wondering if any of you could help me solve a problem with my Mini Cooper. My Grandfather recently replaced the super charger and clutch with factory parts. Unfortunately he passed away before he could start it up. But we've recently started tinkering with it and when we went to turn it on it took a very long time, eventually after we got it to start, it sputters and misfires like crazy and has absolutely no power what so ever. It barely stays running and it won't rev up very high either. We scanned it for codes and we got P2300 as an error code which means "ignition coil 'A' primary control circuit low." And we can't find anything on that. Any ideas? Again it's a 2002 Mini Cooper S. It's also a manual transmission.

 

Please any input at all would be very helpful. We are hoping not to have to bring the car Into a mechanic.

 

take the leads off of the ignition coil and check for corrosion. might just be dirty, causing a bad connection to the lead wires.

from the looks of it the ignition coil is bad.

 

would also check the connector that goes into the coil pack its self.

 

We did both those things, everything looked fine, from the looks of it the coil pack was never taken off in the first place, we checked for all of the connections and they seem to be fine. And we also checked the fuses but they were all good. Thank you for the input though.

 

Did you try new coils? Worked for me.

 

The thing is, of my knowledge you don't need to take off the coil when replacing the clutch and super charger, and prior to the replacement the car was working fine except for the super charger. So this problem occurred after the repairs.

 

Here is a way to check your coil pack:

1. Set your ohmmeter to the 20000 ohms range. Turn on your meter and touch the spark plug wire terminals on one of the coils with the meter leads. You may get a reading between 5000 to 15000 ohms, depending on your particular model. This checks the secondary resistance.

2. Set your ohmmeter to the 10 ohms range, and touch the terminal B+ (usually the center prong on the coil pack electrical connector) with one of the meter test leads, and touch the corresponding coil prong on the electrical connector with the other test lead. You may get a reading between 0.3 and 1.0 or more, depending on your particular model. This checks the primary resistance on each coil.

3. Repeat step 2 for each coil in the pack assembly, and compare your resistance readings to the specifications given on your vehicle service manual (see "Tips"). If your readings are out of range, replace the coil or coils as necessary. Additionally if the Range readings vary it is a good indicator that the coil pack is the issue.

Just as a reminder if this is the original coil pack, it is about 13 years old now... and non BMW packs run as low as $11.00 and High Performance packs run about $100.00.

Best of luck.

Motor on!

 

I will try this next time we see the car. It's not at my house, can't try till the weekend. Thank you so much for your help, will get back to you.

 

We replaced the coul, it seemed a little better but it still just isn't happy, we have to go full throttle for it to go anywhere, but we are able to rev it up now, we bought a high quaility coil as well, any help please?

 

Any help at all? We really need to get this fixed, I've had great help so far, does anyone know where the cable that goes into the coil goes? We are guessing straight into the computer but we can't tell. Please let me know asap, thanks!

 

Check the connector on the coil, sometimes the pins will become loose or even pull out. Lol, while the car is running try jiggling the wires from the DME to the coil and see if misfire persists.

 

hahah, I will give it a shot, but I wanted to know if there is any connectors in between the coil and the DME? Or does it go to any sensors? I dought it, just hoping for a loose connection. And thanks:P

 

Might have to take a trip to the dealer I'm sure they will find it.

 

I had similar roughness after engine work - mine was the inter cooler boot. Check for tears in the boots or the boot not seated (I had to use a mirror to find the bottom half of one boot was folded over and leaking). Other intake leaks will also cause that sort of roughness. Check all the little tubes, too

 

thank you, we are definitely going to check that out, was your engine light coming on too? We had the code saying our primary coil is low as you can see I wrote, anything similar? Thanks again. Big help.

 

I did get the check engine light. Mine sounded so bad I didn't pull the code, just started checking everything again...

Hope you find it.

 

Oh that's awesome, really good news, we are going to see the car again next weekend, so we will look at the gaskets then, as well as the hoses, so out
symptoms were the car was only revving up a little bit, and had no power at all with the pedal to the floor. We're yours the same?thank you so much, this is really helpful, hopefully this is the same problem.

 

This is where I would start too. It really does sound like there is some kind of air leak. Its the only stuff you really take off to do the sc and clutch that would make engine run like that. Unless he missed one the electronic plugs, but those should be pretty easy to check

 

yeah my dad was saying it feels like a vaccum leak. We are gonna check out all the seals and hoses to make sure it's all good.

 

The quick and dirty test for vaccum leaks is to start and shut off the motor, and listen for a sucking sound for about a half second after the ignition is turned off. It doesn't beat smoking the machine, but in a pinch, you can sometimes chase down those leaks by following the sound.

 

Hey guys I'm checking out the car later on today, so if you guys have any quick suggestions on some good places to look for a vacuum leak that would be awesome, we are gonna check for the sound too, but any suggestions at all, or pictures would be great! Thanks.

 

This how to shows the first couple of steps -


http://new.minimania.com/MINI_Cooper_Valve_Cover_Gasket_and_Tube_Seal_Repla cement

I would remove the plastic inter cooler diverted (4 torx screws) and check the boots going in and out of the intercooler real good. Check the clamps are in place and tight.

After that, check the hose on the Pcv valve (on the valve cover) and the other breather hose on the other end of the valve cover.

Look for two small vacuum hoses under the intake manifold, check they are connected.

Finally, it's a little harder to see, but look for the grey ~3/8 inch hose coming from the front middle port of the super charger (port is a bright red push to connect fitting). They come off and the special fitting is very hard to get.

For that last hose see figure 6 and 7 here: (this is a long how-to which doesn't apply, but has pics.

http://www.pelicanparts.com/techarticles/MINI/22-WATER-R53_Water_Pump_Replacement/22-WATER-R53_Water_Pump_Replacement.htm

Figure 19 in that page is the Pcv valve

 

We listened for any sound and checked all of the hoses for a leak and we didn't find anything so I don't know where to go from here. Any other ideas? I think we're just gonna take it to the shop..

 

We brought the car to ur mechanic and he looked at it for 2 days and found a vaccum hose that's not connected. It's gonna take a few days to reconnect it because its buried inside the engine. So I think it's all good now. Thank you AGAIN for everyone's help on this. All the stuff I've learned will be great for any future problems.