I did try searching for this but could not find anything really related to what happened to my MINI.

Mileage on my GP is 50,1XX.

Before I tell what happened, I want to explain what happened before this problem occurred.

I went to an event yesterday with my local BMWCCA Club. They held a Advanced Driving Skills Course, where you go through some drills. I didn't stay for the whole day due to a bad stomach ache after lunch but anyways, before I left, I did the Straight-Line Braking drill (you get your car up to 30 MPH or higher, maintain that speed and when you reach a certain point, hit the brakes and let the ABS kick-in and then had to stop sooner without ABS kicking-in), then we did Brake and Turn, then we did Single Lane Change, then Double Lane Change before having lunch.

Before I shut my GP off, I was hearing this pretty loud fan/humming sound. I shut the GP off, and got out and I was still hearing this noise, which almost sounded like a small jet plane. I open the hood and I noticed that air was coming from underneath the area where the Air Intake Box is because one of the tags on a electrical wire was flapping around. I shut the Hood and went and had lunch, which was about 30 mins, then went back to the GP and the noise had stopped.

Let me point some things out here...I was not running the A/C or even the Cooling/Heating Fan before this happened. The Temperature Gauge was where it should of been, which was in the Middle.

This is the first time I've had this happen.

Any ideas of what may have happened and ideas on what to do about this problem, would be helpful

Thanks.

 

Sounds like your high speed fan was cooling the car. Without a steady speed, the car gets hotter then at constant highway speeds. The gauge is useless, it stays in the middle for like 50F range. Really it is a idiot needle.

As long as your low speed fan works, having the high speed come on is normal.

 

+1 on just the High Speed Fan just running to cool the engine after the car was shut off. It will run for a while. Since it did shut off on it's own I do not think there is any problem.

 

Okay thanks for the info. It was the first time I noticed it and so I wasn't quite sure if it was normal or not but now I know that it is normal.

The speeds at the event were not steady at all either.

 

Yeah....pretty normal....car is driven pretty had...little or no airflow...the fan will run a bit. As long as it turns off, all is fine.

 

My 06 MCS has 98,500 on the clock. I have owned the car since I took it off the lot on 05/13/06 with 17 miles on it. I can say, with out a doubt, that today was the first time the radiator fan has ever come on after I have turned off the motor. The garage door closed behind me and I heard a humming start. Went back into the garage, looked at my car and then slowly started looking around the garage a Chupacabra.....Gotta watch out for those F******..... looked inside my car and the keys were on the passenger seat so I popped the bonnet and she was sucking away. Again, first time ever!!

 

09 MCS and mine seems to do it for a little while all the time (I notice it every night when I part it in the garage, but have never been patient enough to stand there to see how long it runs before shutting off).

 

My wife's car does the same thing. After coming home from work, about 25 miles, the fan turns on high and runs for about 4 minutes or so. It never used to do that. It's a new thing. Her car has about 39K on it now. My car does not do it at all. Never heard it on before. Her car is auto mine is a 6 speed. My car only has 26k on it as well. Seems as the car ages the cooling system changes the rate or how it cools the car. I doubt I will have my car long enough to see if it will start doing the same thing as it gets more mileage on it.

 

As i stated before, this is normal on a gen1 (r50/52/53) mini...
you gen 2 folks, i cannot speak for, but if you make a gen2 post i'm sure somebody can let you know.
Heck, i remember a '79 VW RABBIT that had an electric fan....ran just like the gen1 mini....for a few minutes when off if driven hard, or hot without a cooldown if shut off....so this behiviour is nothing new in the automotive world....

 

So I have the same cooling fan issue mentioned here. Every time I turn off the car, no matter how it was driven or the ambient temperature, the cooling fan comes on for maybe 3-4 minutes after I shut the car off.

I thought it was the R3 relay or the fan assembly. Replaced both. No change, fan still runs for 3-4 minutes after shutting the car off. Even if it's 35 degrees outside.

So... any ideas? This didn't happen earlier in the car's life (it's an '05 with 114,000 miles). Must have started around 90k miles. Is it a thermostat issue? Some other sensor?

 

It's normal to have fan on when car has been driven hard. Check if you still have your low speed fan when you turn A/C on. After restoring mine thru the famed resistor bypass, I have yet to hear the high turn on after shutting engine, no matter how hard it was driven. My scangauge shows pretty consistent operating temps.
If you lost your low, restore it by reading the stickied thread:
https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...lution-32.html
Page 32, post777 is a basic summary.

 

I still have my low, since I just replaced my fan assembly. Also I stumbled upon the fact that when I pull the R4 relay (fourth one back in the engine compartment fusebox) while the fan is running it switches from high speed to low speed.

I just tried the pulling the relay thing after I shut the car off. Next time I run it will be the first time with a new relay in R4, I'll see what it does then.

 

Sticking High speed relays are common for the earlier models w/ the 2-plug harness. Not so much w/ yours. You can wire a manual switch thru the harness on the fan side, rather than pull the relay. It'll be more convenient. If your coolant temp retains your high upon shut down, try cool down before turning off. As long as you're not overheating, you should be OK.

 

So, I've replaced:

• The fan assembly
• R3 relay
• R4 relay

And I have no change from before I did all of this. Whenever I run the car for more than a few minutes the high speed fan kicks on for 3-5 minutes shortly after turning the car off. No matter what conditions - running very lightly, running it hard, or fairly cold temperature outside (mid 30s Fahrenheit).

It seems like any time the engine gets up to normal steady-state operating temperature the high speed fan will kick in after I turn the ignition key off.

I guess I'm not too concerned, since the fan obviously works and I don't think anything is getting overheated or otherwise damaged. But it's just a little annoying to have the car sound like an F-18 spooling up the engines every time I turn the thing off.

 

I had this problem before. The high speed would keep running after engine shut off even if I never really drive the car hard.

It went away when I changed my coolant expansion tank with an aluminum one and avoided running the engine hot, by having the AC on when I drive, as this was before I fixed my low speed fan resistor. Turns out I was slowy loosing coolant through the expansion tank seams. It was slow enough to go undetected as there were no drips on the garage but when I did my bi-monthly fluids check, the coolant would be low.

So if you have the high speed fan running even after an ordinary drive, I would check for coolant leaks too.

 

^+1. The R53 cooling system is pressurized together w/ the reservoir. check your thermostat too.W/ leaks, efficiency will be affected. If you have a scangauge, you can monitor your coolant temp. If readings are erratic & inconsistent, your coolant temp sensor near your thermostat may have ran its life out. Cheap & easy part to swap.

 

Ok, thanks, I'll check this out.

This, too. Don't have a scangauge but may be something I'll look into, as well as the coolant temp sensor.

Appreciate the help.

 

An ultra gauge works too and is a bit cheaper. It has the same functions as the scan gauge, but I prefer the screen size.

 

That looks really nice. Unfortunately it's on backorder for about 2-3 weeks, so looks like the MINI will continue to sound like a jet for while yet.

 

My UltraGauge arrived a few days ago, plugged it in, and have been monitoring my coolant/engine temperature. And what I've found is that after warmup my steady-state temperature is 225-230. Is this hot? From other threads it seems very warm. Ambient has been around freezing the last week, so it's definitely not being driven up by the outside air.

If this is hotter than normal, what could be causing this? I don't believe I have a coolant leak. I topped off the expansion tank a few weeks ago, and it wasn't even that low. Could I have a faulty thermostat? Air bubbles in the coolant system?

Oddly enough, the fan running after shut off has only happened sporadically since installing the UltraGauge. This morning it came on after the car had been driven a while, and the coolant at 230 for ~10 minutes. Didn't come on after a short trip to the grocery store where the coolant temp only got to 180 or so, but on the way home it got to 225 or 230 and didn't come on.

 

That's on the high side for short trips. Mine hovers around 192-198F on normal driving conditions. Rarely beyond 220 on aggressive drives after fan resistor was bypassed. Try bleeding your system, check thermostat, waterpump.

 

Almost positive it's your low speed fan resistor. Check out the long thread on the subject titles "Low Speed Fan Resistor, we need a solution". I fixed this on my 2004 S this weekend, about 20 bucks from rock auto for a new resistor and 2 hours to get it installed. I opted for a replacement similar than the DT resistor for less than half the price and did not want an external resistor as others have done.

YouTube has a video on checking the fans operation using a voltmeter which in my opinion is the easiest way.

 

Or your coolant temp sensor is faulty. Giving the ecu wrong readings.

 

If it is, it went back within days (or maybe hours) of installing a new fan assembly in December. I seriously doubt that's the issue. In fact, a few posts back I mentioned that if I pull one of the relays the high speed fan switches to low.

 

I suppose my way ahead is this (obviously stopping if any step fixes it):

1) Bleed the coolant system.
2) Replace coolant temp sensor.
3) Replace thermostat.
4) Replace water pump.

Is that what you'd do? I'm trying to step up through what's easiest to do, most likely to be causing problem, and least costly.