After 6.5 years of blissful ownership, 7 sets of tires, and almost 80,000 miles of very hard driving with mods, I think my engine has finally lost the battle.

The car had been slowly burning oil for about a week previous to the incident. I raised the car to see if there were any leaking gaskets or seals, but everything was dry underneath. I added almost a quart of oil to return the dipstick oil level to factory spec.

Fortunately, on the day of the breakdown, I was out driving with about 15 other Mini friends from the Mid-Ohio Motoring Club. I checked the oil level before the drive. The dipstick was almost dry except for a tiny spot on the very bottom. Added almost another full quart of oil (pure synthetic of course) and continued driving somewhat cautiously.

After about 100 miles of driving through the Amish country backroads, I heard a slight knocking noise coming from the center of the car (I thought it was a sign of the clutch/throwout bearing beginning to fail). The knocking only occurred around 2500+ rpm and disappeared around idle and would only happen if the car was in gear. There was no vibration in the gearbox and no change in throttle feel.

10 miles later, the engine oil pressure light flashed on and off several times and I conveniently pulled into an Advance Auto Parts store that I happened to be driving by. The dipstick was dry this time, making my heart sink. I purchased another quart of oil and added it to the car.

Tried turning the car on, wouldn't start. Cranked it for about 10 seconds before I gave up. A few minutes later, the car started first try and this video was filmed.



A flatbed towed the car 88 miles away to my car shop in Columbus (thank god for AAA gold). I will probably tear open the engine sometime later this week and assess the damages and decide where to go from there.

I knew this day would someday come, unfortunately it happened about a year too early. I'm in my last year of mechanical/industrial system engineering and wish I already had an 80k salary helping me rebuild this.

Probably leaning toward a custom twin-charge setup; I think with the help of my shop and friends I can handle the hardware install, but might be a complete nightmare to properly tune without spending a fortune.

Please give me some insightful feedback .

 

god that's awful . you think you burned all that oil ? sounds very bad indeed . at least a .020 over . you may have to go with a new block if the rod got to the walls . hope it's not that bad . maybe jans got a need to help with a 1.8 or 2.0 l .

 

Yeah... That sounds like a connecting rod.

 

Sorry, but I agree it sounds like a rod knocking, but bad bearings don't cause oil consumption, they're the result of it. I'd be wondering what happened to your rings?

Also, you should have been laying down one heck of a smokescreen, didn't anybody notice it or tell you?

 

how come only adding 1 quart at a time and not topping it up?

 

Very sorry to hear this. You have a great looking MINI and some excellent mods.

Just wondering as poster was above....With that much oil consumption, your mini should have looked like a detroyer at Omaha Beach on D-Day...so you must have been driving at the back of the pack ?

 

I added enough oil to get the dip stick level back to factory spec. It wasn't precisely 1 quart each time, but close enough to say a quart and make the story flow easier.

Despite the extreme oil consumption, the exhaust gas was still normal, at least to the visible eye. No smoke clouds pouring out the back.

*Also, keep in mind that pure synthetic oil doesn't burn white like most standard oil, so its more difficult to detect an internal oil leak running a synthetic.

 

that. sucks. just in time for summer too :(

i agree with the others... sounds like a rod

 

Have you checked what you coolant looks like? While that much oil in your coolant in your oil would almost certainly cause you to overheat it is worth being thorough.