91,000 miles. No oil problems. KOW!

 

Adding a quart every 1000, no leaks - will try the CCV/valve cover fix mentioned in this thread.

Aggravating - having spent 3000.00 + recently getting her all squared away at a Mini/BMW only independent shop (valve cover gasket replaced among other things), I find it hard to believe they would be unaware of this oil consumption solution. Pisses me off to no end.

 

If it came to it, and no other causes of oil loss accounted for the consumption, how would one invest in the engine? Is there an upper engine rebuild that would be cost effective over 80k miles or so? For example valve seals, or new valves altogether ? What about rings or other more expensive things below the valves?
Do I start with a compression test?

My N12 has been babied with frequent oil & filter changes (good 5-30 synthetic and oem filters, moderate running except for one day at the track, and she still burns through a quart in under 1000 miles. The rest of the car is almost like new.

115,000 miles & 10.0 years

 

If the CCV fix doesn't cure mine I will assume it is the valve seals. I have a new valve cover gasket, new main seal, new timing chain, etc., etc - I took the car in with the mandate to get everything not in optimum condition up to snuff and made them aware of the the oil loss. 1 quart every 1000 is not optimum.

 

I love the car but am not investing in an engine rebuild - will go find another for not much more than the cost of the job.

 

 

 

Hi all.

My wife and I both have 2012 Justas.

Her car goes through a qt of oil every 700 miles or so. Mine is starting to consume more oil as well (about 1 qt every 1500 miles)

I decided to do the membrane replace on both of our cars and placed an order.

Since most of the talk has been for n12, has anyone done this on an N16? Should be the same right?

I mistakenly ordered 2 of these:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Membrane-va...72.m2749.l2649

I received 2 membranes with no replacement covers. I saw N16/N18 and thought this would be correct.

I've checked the replacement valve cover number and might go ahead and do an order of this:

https://vanos-bmw.com/product/111276...ini-repair-kit

Any thoughts?

Thanks and hope everyone is having a great holiday.

Joe

 

 

I used to burn a qt every 1k. Then I switched from Mobil to Castrol. Now I only burn a qt every 5k.

 

 

Mobil 5w30 syntheticto Castrol 0w40 A3/B4 synthetic (black jug) ymmv

 

Thanks for the reply.

Neither of our cars has smoke from the exhaust at idle.

I'll order a replacement membrane (with cover this time) cross referencing the valve cover part #

Thanks,

Joe

 

It is a lifestyle that I have grown comfortable with. My cars are either burning oil, leaking oil, or doing both. I drive 2K+ miles a month so frequent checks are required.

Whenever I read that other owners have zero oil consumption, I am skeptical. First of all, the dipstick is impossible to read, mine (2011) always shows full no matter how I check it. In that case, consumption can only be measured when the current oil is drained into an empty container. Most dealerships and shops drain the oil into a large communal barrel that does not measure or show the level of contents. I have experimented with short and long intervals, adding varying quarts of oil in between. I have never had an oil pressure light come on, even when I drained a meager 3 quarts out. Maybe 3 quarts is acceptable per the manufacturer's design, but is it good for my daily driver? I don't think so. Back in 2012 my service adviser told me it was perfectly fine when my first oil change indicator came on at 16K miles. Nah.

There was a rear main seal leak that left a few drops my on my driveway for many years. I was told by my indie mechanic that it can wait when the clutch is to be replaced. I kept waiting and my clutch kept working. I experimented with some oil stop leak products and one of them must have worked. Bottom of tranny has been dry and no oil droplets on the driveway. She still pulls strong and shows no sign of stopping. :-)

 

Sorry for the late response. Stepdaughters Justa that the valve cover fixed consumption was at about 100k miles

 

Since I had the head off to replace a burned exhaust valve July 2020 at 100,000 miles, I've been tracking our Countryman's oil usage very closely. I found this thread (sorry to post to such an old one) and thought I'd add my experience FWIW. I'm using 1L every 2,800 miles. This is with a 6,000 mile OCI, using MINI 5W-30 oil exclusively. Exhaust valve seals, cover gasket, and "PCV" diaphragm all replaced recently.

 

From my experience of rebuilding an N12, the biggest culprit for the excessive oil consumption with the Prince engine, is the factory fitted 'one-piece' oil control ring, fitted to each piston. Before the rebuild my partner's N12 was sucking 1 litre of oil out of the sump very 800 miles. After replacing the oil control rings with '3-piece' oil control rings, oil consumption went to zero. Now I did replace the valve guide seals previously and didn't really see a whole lot of improvement. therefore the conclusion I have come to is that you have to get the head off, sump off, piston assemblies out and replace stock rings for a better set.

This justa started burning oil around the 45k miles mark, what changed I am not sure, but it went from zero oil consumption to 'drain the sump' over night. From memory we had a major service, was suffering from a coil pack issue and I drove it for 30 minutes with a lot of enthusiasm. Guess before that this mini hadn't really had to work for its living!