Another month gone by....As fishbert stated, I would also love to hear a first hand report from someone who had pulled the intake....Surely a MINI tech somewhere has some info for us....

 

Anyone have any updates on this?

I think I'll call the dealer to try and see if this carbon issue has been handled with these N18's.

Someone has to know

 

I asked several people in the service department at our MINI dealer, and only got corporate answers. Nobody had pulled one yet. I guess that in itself is telling us that the problem is at least better than before because they are not having to do rashes of walnut cleanings like before. So, is it just "better", or is it really FIXED. We continue to wait.

 

If anyone near San Francisco has an R55-thru-R59 MCS with an N18 engine that has 10K miles or over, I'd love to pull your intake to take a look-see.

If we find a problematic amount of carbon buildup, we'll install an N18 OCC on your car free of charge in exchange for help with our BSH product advertising.

Drop me a line if you're interested.

-Clint

 

It is telling us nothing because the N18 hasn't been out there long enough for enough people to rack up enough miles for a carbon buildup issue to present itself. Wake me up in another 1-2 years, unless we get intake port photos in the mean time.

 

I have 7,500 miles and I've only had my 2012 for 2 months, at that rate thats almost 48,000 a year.

I'm pretty sure there are 2011 N18's with high mileage out there by now.

 

Some? Sure.
Enough? Probably not.

How long was the N14 engine out before carbon buildup became a known issue on these boards? That's why we are looking for a 'mid-to-high' mileage N18 to look at; some certainly exist by now, but it takes more time (and larger numbers of candidate vehicles) to hear about these sorts of things organically.

 

The fact remains that the carbon didn't just appear magically overnight! It was a slow build up process. There will be signs if there is an "unusual" amount of buildup on the valves, long before they create running issues.

 

Keep us posted, I don't care to wait til after its a problem, I believe in preventative maintainence!

 

Thought that we had a volunteer for pulling that N18 intake manifold, but it seems like he bailed.

As mentioned above, drop me a PM or email if you are local to SF and are interested in letting us pull your N18 intake manifold and take some pictures. If you have the carbon buildup we're expecting, you get one of the new, lower cost, better fitting N18 oil catch cans we're developing in conjunction with BSH.

-Clint

 

Why does all the good stuff happen on the west coast? Damn

 

Automan, this could be the trivial excuse you need to take 2 weeks off and drive across the country in your MINI. Just sayin.....

Have fun,
Mike

 

Lol yeah that run should definitely prove if there's any real carbon build up. If someone does volunteer their mini please let us know what's found when the intake is opened up.

 

35k miles on a 2011 but on the other side of the country!

I agree about all the cool stuff happening on the west coast automan

 

There may be good stuff happening on the East coast too if we show that Peugeot & BMW have not quite resolved the carbon buildup issue on the N18. If it's an issue, we'll offer introductory pricing on a new, lower priced BSH N18 OCC.

DoS has some great design ideas for improving the already great BSH N18 OCC while saving some coin for our customers. We just need to determine if this OCC is a must have for the N18 Engine.

We shall see . . .

-Clint

 

I have 35K on my 11' already. I am on the east coast though:-/. I will be in San Fran sometime in January probably gonna drop my lady off since she's moving out there. I might have to stop by and see if my car has any build up(hopefully I don't).

 

Yay!

We have a fine gentleman volunteer who has an N18 equipped MCS with about 13K miles. He is coming to the shop on Wednesday of next week (8/29/12) for an intake valve inspection. We shall see if there's any carbon buildup.

Will post pics after the intake manifold is pulled.

-Clint

 

Awesome!

 

Great now all the questions will be answered. Who's in for minimal carbon build up?

 

 

Okay so I am excited to see this tomorrow!

 

interested.

 

Clint, where in hell are our pics and your analysis?!!! :p Hurry up!

 

Quick update for everybody waiting: Clint looked at the car yesterday, and he's gonna have pix to show you what we found. Wait for it!

 

can't wait any more!!!