Hey everybody. I've been a BMW owner for the past 9+ years, and now that my E46 3 series has 235k miles (original motor and transmission) I decided to get something a little newer and with less miles.

I traveled a little over 3 hours to look at this 2008 Clubman S with 84,500 miles... It was for sale from a private party (2nd owner). The carfax was clean and had lots of service records, that were all at MINI dealerships, other than a few oil changes that were performed elsewhere.

Anyways, the guy I bought it from took really good care of it from what I could tell. Everything but the HPFP had been replaced that needed to be replaced thus far. And a few months ago he said he got the half full CEL, so took it to MINI to be scanned. They said his turbo diverter valve needed to be replaced, which he had done and the light was cleared. About a month later he said the light came back on, so he went back to MINI and they said the valve cover gasket (that was previously replaced) had leaked oil onto the vacuum hoses, damaging them. So instead of having the dealership do it this time he replaced the vacuum lines and that fixed the CEL issue, for the time being.

When I test drove the car it seemed to have good power, handled excellent, idled very smooth, no knocks or rattles on a cold start, just seemed solid. We negotiated the price and once the paperwork was all done I began heading home. About 40 - 50 miles into the 200 mile trip home I was cruising along about 70mph and the half full CEL came on. I stopped a few miles later at the next gas station. Killed the engine for a few minutes then started it back up to listen for anything out of the ordinary. CEL was still on, but other than that I didn't hear anything unusual. After getting back on the road I noticed it didn't feel AS powerful as it did when I test drove it. But other than that it seemed to drive exactly the same.

A few days after the light had been on I got in the car, started it, and noticed the CEL was NOT on. I was hoping it was just something stupid that tripped it and now it's gone away. Well I drove it and could tell it's HP had returned! I must have gotten a little too excited and when I turned onto the highway I got on the gas a little bit and when shifting from 2nd to 3rd (around 5k RPM) the CEL came back on. I immediately got depressed and let off the throttle and went home. So, I ordered a diagnostic tool off Amazon.com and received it today... Scanned the car and got the following codes:

P2B64 - INTAKE MANIFOLD, UNMETERED AIR
P2885 - BOOST-PRESSURE CONTROL DEVIATION, PLAUSIBILITY.

The live datastream also read:

Misfire rate cylinder 1 - "511"
Misfire rate cylinder 2 - "2800"
Misfire rate cylinder 3 - "0"
Misfire rate cylinder 4 - "0"

I pulled the spark plugs and they're dirtier than I like, so I'm going to replace those next. But I went ahead and reset the code, went for a test drive and tried getting up into the higher RPMs to see if the CEL would come back on. Sure enough, around 4500 RPM it came on again. This time when scanning the only code it through was,

P2885 - BOOST-PRESSURE CONTROL DEVIATION, PLAUSIBILITY.

I contacted the guy I bought the car from asking if he remember what code(s) the dealership got when he had the CEL come on. He said he believes it was the P2885, so they replaced the turbo diverter valve. He wasn't 100% positive though so I'm going to call the dealership tomorrow and have them confirm. If the code was the same when he took it in, I'm going to see what options they offer since the car has now been sold to me. I know how dealerships often play the guessing game, and may think they're fixing a problem but they only touch the surface and clear a code, but it repeats itself later on and they have to dig deeper. I'm not willing to drive 4 hours just to have them be like, "Yep, now you need XYZ parts replaced to fix this issue and that'll be one arm, one ear and both *********!" (Ok, maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration but you get the idea!)

With all that said, do any of you have any suggestions for what to look for, check, or try replacing next? I did a quick Google search for those two codes but came up with quite a broad list of results. Would it be useful if I listed any live datastream like the Boost pressure, Charge air pressure, etc.??? This is my first vehicle with a turbo so I'm not too familiar with them. Please help if you can!

Thanks everyone! I appreciate you taking the time to read my story of becoming a MINI owner! I hope I don't regret this! :\

 

You sound exactly like me! I have an E36 convertible with 200,XXX miles on it and bought a 2008 Clubman S in August... I have had SO MANY problems with it because UNLIKE you, the previous owner of MY car (An apparently shyster dealer who abused the car and then polished it up and CLAIMED it had had the correct work done on it to maintain it only for me to eventually find out it was 180degrees from the truth... $3500 in repairs later, I'm STILL having problems) my clubman is exhibiting these very SAME problems! Every time my independent Mini Certified Master Mechanic puts it on the scope it presents a little different CEL error and he has to fix a different thing.

About mid November I had full boost having JUST replaced the diverter valve, turbo feed line, thermostat, water pump, water feed pipe, timing tensioner bracket, oil pan seal, valve cover, several other seals and a bunch of trim and smaller parts... I was accelerating, right on the edge of boost as I could feel the turbo spooling up and "doo, doo, doot!" the CEL popped on in limp mode and the engine immediately began to run a little rough and with far less (but still VERY functional) torque throughout the power band. I ran it right to my mechanic. They found the timing was out and did a timing adjustment. No more CEL and back to motoring on, for about 2 days. Then the exact same conditions and sequence of events happened and the CEL limp mode was back.

This time my Mech found the #4 coil was shot and replaced it and I was back to full boost. He admonished me that #3 was probably next. The very next day, it popped the CEL again! All the same conditions you described and I'd experienced previously. This time he came up with a P2885 -BOOST-PRESSURE CONTROL DEVIATION, PLAUSIBILITY problem just like YOURS in the vacuum between the air cleaner box and the turbo cold-side and found a loose and poorly mounted sensor with an air leak in the seal which he replaced. CEL off again. Next morning, back on AGAIN, back to the shop... replaced the air filter and CEL has been off FINALLY for about three weeks now with no more problems at all... Until yesterday when getting on the interstate, "doo, doo, doot!"

Back I head to my mechanic tomorrow morning to find out what's next...

My mech wants to do a "smoke test" of my intake system to see if he can find the source of the pressure leak that seems to be lowering the pressure of the air getting into the turbo. He says it will likely be up to a couple of hours trying to diagnose it, so I've been hoping to put it off.

Interestingly, each time the CEL comes on, I take it to one of three different auto parts stores in my town to have them give me a code, but it never has one and it doesn't display on the center speedo readouts, only the warnings message window in the tach binnacle. the very sophisticated ODB2 reader my Mech has CAN pull codes every time, but we seem to be chasing a gremlin all through the engine bay. ALSO interestingly, my milage when my CEL is ON gets noticeably BETTER by almost 5 miles per gallon! Now maybe without my turbo working, I'm driving a Justa which is KNOWN as a better mileage car.

So, where does this put us? (and by us, I mean if you and I have the same problems) Well it could be another coil, a seal or hose leak in the "several feet" of plumbing before the air gets to the turbo and intake, I've heard it could be the High Pressure Fuel Pump which is SUPPOSED to have a recall on it, but my VIN doesn't come up as needing it, or it MIGHT have something to do with carbon buildup in the intake... Lastly my Turbo oil drain line is apparently ALSO bad and needs replacement, but that's an easily $750 repair because they have to remove the whole front clip to get to it, so that's on my "try to wait" list too...

I LOVE driving this car, I LOVE how it looks and feels. But it is costing me a small fortune to maintain it. My engine bay looks like I have a new engine because I've had so much of it replaced since I bought it in August. I've learned enough about what goes wrong with Gen II Minis to practically build one from parts, but who has the time? I have nightmares that I can hear that awful "Doo, doo, doot!" in my sleep at this point!

People in the Mini world like to name their cars, so I named mine Stitch after the destructive alien in the Disney movie Lilo & Stitch, because it's blue, small & mighty and a broken orphan that needed a family... but it is destroying my wallet!

 

If it was me, I'd go trade the 08 for a newer model. You are going to be sending the mechanics on vacations with your money. Certain years are definitely more problematic and you've hit into one of those years.

If your not an experienced diy type walk away!

 

dkdzyn - Sounds like we do have very similar problems, and I'm not too thrilled about all the time and money you've put into it with no true resolve. All I know for sure that the previous owner did towards this issue was replace the valve cover gasket, vacuum lines and turbo diverter valve. But apparently, like your situation, has not fixed the issue. So how much did you put into the turbo thus far? It almost sounds like it could have been more beneficial to replace the whole thing. But if there is a leak somewhere down the line it wouldnt of solved the problem anyways.

I VERY rarely take my vehicle to a mechanic. I did all my own work on ny BMW E46 the entire time I owned it, other than having the CCV replaced just because I didn't have the time at that point in my life. So I want to try and resolve this myself, but I still have a lot of reading and tinkering to do before I know enough to dive into troubleshooting the turbo and getting rid of this fault code!

Mine IS under warranty for the HPFP according to MINI, but I know if I take it to the Dallas MINI dealership they'll need a code.related to that part in order to replace it. And they will wanna keep it for who knows how long and charge me a stupid amount just to scan it, I'm sure. The dealership the previous owner used was Momentum MINI is SE Houston, a good 4 hours from me.

As far as trading the vehicle in and getting a newer model, I hate dealing with dealerships. Which is why I searched for a good 2 months until I found one I liked. I feel like I got a good enough deal on this vehicle (well, before this CEL came on) and expected to have to put SOME money into it. But I will HAVE to draw the line somewhere. I paid $5600 for this one, and everything including the body and interior is what I would consider very good - excellent condition. But, again, that was before this stupid CEL.

I'm still replacing the spark plugs before I start looking into the turbo issue. Out of curiosity, and a lack of knowledge on my part, what parts would you guys suggest I check/replace on the turbo first?

 

Personally, I DO do a little wrenching myself, but usually only the body and trim because I'm not very mechanical, but I'm good with models and the whole body of a Mini is put together like a big snap together3D puzzle!

So here's my latest update:

I took it to my Mech this morning and he put his diagnostic tool on it. He could find that it had had a "single occurrence" fault, but no stored info on what the fault had been generated by. IN looking back through the car's internal electronic history, there was an initial fault way back at 86,XXX miles (I'm at 108,600 now) that initially caused the condition that was throwing the CEL-limp mode, but no information about what that might have been. Since that point there is no further data on what is going on with it, but all of the other possibilities came up with nothing stored in memory at all.

I asked him about the High Pressure Fuel Pump and he said, Yes, it COULD be an intermittent fault in that component but that it usually logs the error and none was present but he wouldn't discount that it could be a cause. He doubted that carbon buildup in the intake would be a culprit in causing such an intermittent issue and said he'd expect THAT to create a more constant degraded condition, but that cleaning the intake would be a first step before doing a full walnut blast, which is MUCH more expensive and labor intensive. Another bad coil COULD be another possibility, but again, he said he'd expect to see a stored code of a failure, even if it were spotty. So, at this point I have no answers. He cleared the error and code and now I'm off again with no CEL on and boost returned.

More on this as adventures continue, but one thing I had NOT realized until today is that even if a fault occurs one moment in time, once the CEL pops on, the engine STAYS in that mode until you inspect it like this and electronically turn off the code. So, it is POSSIBLE Jpainter187, that you, like me, have an on again off again issue that just pops up long enough to force a code and limp mode, but isn't actually damaging the engine because its not a persistent error, grinding away at some component. That said, SOMETHING is going on and needs to be addressed BEFORE it DOES become a damaging situation...

Owning this Mini is like being William Shatner in a Twilight Zone episode.

 

Jpainter187, it's GREAT that you have the time, tools and where-with-all to do more wrenching than I do. I used to have a garage on my last house where this was a possibility, but not my current one. No room to do the work also limits my willingness to crawl under the hood myself.

On mine, I don't think there is an issue with the turbo itself at all. The turbo unit seems to be operating just fine when the car is behaving normally, although it IS prone to burning a LOT of oil (relative to OTHER turbo cars, Minis are know to have thirsty turbos and a small reserve of oil to draw from, so you HAVE to stay on the oil top-offs otherwise the turbo burning the oil away will deplete it and starve the timing chain and burn up the guides!). It otherwise seems to develop an appropriate amount of boost, makes no odd noises, burns no cooler or hotter than any other unit and I get no codes from it. I can feel it generating boost on the road and when the CEL HAS come on, it was ALWAYS right before the fat section of the torque curve came on as the turbo spooled up. This leads me to believe the turbo is operating normally, but as people have suggested it SEEMS like premature diverter activation. As I said previously, I have had the diverter valve, the whole assembly, replaced just about 2 months ago. Unless it is a bad diverter valve and needs to be replaced under warranty, I think its something else that is "freaking out" in the seconds leading into the overboost coming on, popping the CEL, dumping the boost and then entering limp mode. THAT seems to me to be something in front of the turbo and my Mech agrees, but hasn't been able to ferret it out.

They say the cheapest car you have is the one you already own and with all of the fees, taxes and licensing costs along with additional depreciation of selling a car with a known fault, there seems to be a minimum $1500 in losses to have to suck up in trading/replacing my current Mini with another. Besides, I KNOW what ticking time-bombs I'm dealing with on THIS car. Another would put me back at zero knowledge of what might go wrong. That said, the N14 engine is a known lemony flavored hunk of metal and there MAY be more than an ounce of cure in dumping it for something with the N18 variety of power plant. I WOULD be hard-pressed to get a similarly setup color/trim/options Clubman in a later year and a newer one is still more expensive by probably another $1500 than the 2008-09 models, so I'm faced with a $3K gap to probably jump from where I am now to a more reliable, newer R55S. That means that if I'm happy with my current body/trim/options, I still have a fair amount of money gap to work with before I hit a break-even of a sale/purchase. If I were to trade to a dealer, it'd probably be even more. I may have fewer headaches and lost hours of sleep with a replacement car of course, so there's that on the other side of the scale...

If you DO work on yours yourself and find an issue, I'd VERY much appreciate reading about it so I can try it on mine. Similarly, I'll keep you posted on what I may find. I think this is what auto owner's clubs were initially created for...

-Darin

 

Yes,.I would very much appreciate you keeping me in the loop as to what more you find out about your CEL and it's cause.

And like I said, the one time my CEL went off by itself it came back on when I got up to 5k RPM, and then after I cleared the P2B64 and P2885 codes and teat drove, it came on again but only with the P2885 code.

I'll let you and everyone else know what I discover as time goes on. I'm still driving my old BMW 3 series because I don't even like the idea driving the MINI with that CEL on!

 

#N14 lyfe.

 

Quick update... I spoke to the service dept. at Momentum MINI in SW Houston and asked them to pull the records for the work they did on this car. I have the service history in paper form, and it states "performed inspection found fault charge air pressure control deviation". But they are supposed to call me back once they pull and review the file because I want to know if they got the same P2885 code that I'm getting. The wording is different compared to my scanner but I bet it's the same thing.

They mentioned it could be a faulty BOV, but without having the car physically there it's hard to tell... well DUH! But I don't feel like or have the time to drive 4 hours for you to look at something, thinking it could maybe be whats causing the problem, and pay you to give it a TRY and see if the problem goes away. I think before I do anything I want to do a smoke test...

I know people says stock N14s should produce around 11psi of boost, but since I don't have a gauge installed (they're expensive!) I have no clue how much boost mine is, or shoukd I say, ISN'T producing... Is a boost gauge the only way to read this, and can anyone recommend one to me that doesn't cost a ridiculous amount!

 

My Mechanic didn't seem concerned at all about my driving around with the CEL on because the purpose of it is to protect the engine from "further damage" so to speak. I have noticed it drives perfectly well, just runs a tiny bit rough (which I attribute to it either auto-adjusting timing or allowing bypass pressure to go by the turbo to avoid it spooling up.)

It will be interesting to find out what the dealer finds, because that does sound suspiciously like the error the car is producing. And if yours and mine are both having this issue, there HAVE to be others who have had this as well...

If you have a scanner that can clear the fault, then I'd say do it and see if you can replicate the problem before dragging it to a mechanic. WHat kind of a scanner do you have? I have considered getting a bluetooth one that can stay connected to the car during use and then I could monitor it during driving to see if something odd is going on.

 

I just have the $69 one from Amazon. It seems to do everything I need, for now. And I'm going to clear the code and see if I can duplicate the issue again. Didn't get a call back from the service dept. today so I'm going to bug them tomorrow with another phobe call to remind them that I'm still awaiting their response.

https://www.amazon.com/Creator-C310-Diagnostic-Adaptation-Function/dp/B00WQUWV9K

 

Haven't seen this until now. On when key is in but car is not started yet. It goes off when I start the car. What does it mean? I think it's just some kind of genetic warming and nothing serious. But I didn't see anything in the owners manual so I was curious...

 

I have seen that one too, but as you said, it just disappears. It seemed to only show up when an ODB scan tool was attached.

This is the wireless version I was looking at. It includes modules that were supposedly written specifically for Minis and BMWs:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00652G4TS?ref_=ams_ad_dp_ttl

 

Exclamation point described as I recall meaning car door open while trying to start car.

 

That looks like a good one. I didn't even think about a bluetooth diagnostic tool but I like that idea a lot better! I think I may return my scanner and order that one now! Thanks for sharing that!


*EDIT*

I forgot to mention that after clearing the code last night and test driving (very conservatively) the CEL came back on within about 5 minutes and it was at 3500 RPM this time, NOT 5k and 4500 like before. I have plans to make my own smoke machine (screw buying one) so will update once that is.done and if I can.determine where there might be a leak.

 

I'm not a big high-revving kind of driver and so Im not surprised it was at such a low RPM as mine has popped the CEL at about that RPM before too. Always while under load to accelerate up a hill or up an onramp. I've been kind of babying mine this week since the CEL was turned off, but I've been all the way up to 6K in 4th with nothing yet.... I know it will do it again though. :p

 

I'm going to go out and mess with mine to see if it does this. Thanks!

 

dkdzyn - I was wondering what kind of gas mileage you're getting, both highway and city? I think the highest the car told me it was getting was 28.8 highway and about 24.4 city, which sounds way too low to me. I'm also thinking of doing a compression test once I get my new spark plugs.

 

I find that when my CEL is on, I get BETTER milage. Something like 32mpg city/suburb. When the turbo is fully functional, it is more like 29-30 city/suburb or as low as 26mpg. I don't frankly dare to take it out on the long-haul interstate highway.

 

Too many probs with the N14 engine for me...been there, done that...

 

^^^ +1 ^^^

 

Just suggesting I get rid of the car doesn't get me any closer to solving the CEL/P2885 fault code.

Now, does anyone have an explination as to why the turbos coolant supply hose has a tar-like build up around where the rubber and metal part of the hose are spliced together? This is odd to me...

Sorry for the terrible pic...

 

do yourself a favor get a laptop & cable (bmw K line but get a cable with a dip switch so you can switch between 7 pin and 8 pin operation ) and download ista/d or inpa

both give you a LOT more info than you get out of the generic code readers

 

Any idea where I could buy the cable your talking about? I don't have a clue where to look first...

 

ebay, amazon

there is a mini inpa software set on here or the other mini site, and bimmerfest has ista/d and ista/p threads

ista/d is for diagnostics, ista/p is for programming they replaced inpa