Ok so i was so excited that I picked my car up yesterday from the shop where it was being upgraded for a week and a half with a stage 2 head, cam, M7 OCC, Nology wires, spark plug, sway bars front and back.

Total cost? $5,866. More than I had expected. I ended up installing a throttle body as well and a new cpu tunning to work well with all the upgrades that cost me about $500.

I drove the car off the lot and went home through regular street driving last night. This morning I took the car up to San Francisco where I had an appointment during which I called the shop to tell them how fast and aggressive my car has become and how glad I am with my new found power. At this point I'm checking all the warning light and any signals including my oil pressure which was normal, engine heat which was at half (normal) and there was nothing indicating that there was something wrong with the car.

As I get to my destination and as I pull up to stop the car I see a small amount of white smoke coming from the front of the hood. I put the hood up and there is oil everywhere, under the car, and I mean ALL UNDER THE CAR, from the top of the header going down and all the way back to the exhaust and even to rear hatch window and on the ground. My rear window is basicaly covered with oil as it travelled there due to the air diverting it back. I can easily say that the amount of oil on the ground was a good 1/2 of a qrt. if not more.

At this point I'm looking for anything out of place and strange. I look closely at where the head work had been done since there was good amount of oil on the top of the Vavle cover and a good amount of oil just to right of the head close to the K&N CAI which sits just in front of the driver . As I look through all the possible places that a naked eye can find a probelm with I see a part of the gaskect sticking out from the side of the top head cover and sure enough it ended up being just that. I call the shop and explain what I had seen and as it happened it was exatly what I had suspected. I had to tow my car all the way back to San Jose and drop it off at the shop.

While at the shop I met a gentleman that is a member here as he knew about my car and he had seen the upgrades I had been doing during that prior week. He was very nice and offered me a ride to my home if I needed one. I ended up getting a rental since the shop is picking the tab and all the cost now with the fixing of the problem.

So back to the shop is my car AGAIN after being there for almost 2 weeks.

I'm glad that it wasn't anything other than a blown gasket which is easily replaceable.

Just wanted to share this with everyone here. I have to conclude though by saying that the car drove strong and the top end feels much stronger and responsive. It has certainlny found a new power.

 

Did they replace the head bolts with new ones?
Jim

 

Sorry to hear about your car. I do feel worse about how much money you spent. $5866 for that is just plain wrong. People are charging Porsche like prices for this.

 

It sounds to me like it was the valve cover gasket...

and not the head gasket...

There is a big difference in the two.

It's probably a good thing you didn't mention which shop did the work, as your MINI would have been the last one they would have done.
There is no excuse for this happening, the car should have never left the shop until it was run, warmed up and double checked over.

 

And the head bolts re-torqued.

 

Yes, that too. Thanks Bilbo.

 

There is no re-torque for these head bolts, they are stretch bolts and need to be replaced whenever removed. I am confused, if you saw part of the head gasket sticking out, then they used the wrong type of gasket. The proper gasket is multi-layer metal, and does not blow apart like a fiber/composite one will. I am glad that they took responsibilty and fixed it though.
Happy Motoring
--Dan

 

ditto....

those bolts only get 9 ft lbs...

 

This same thing happened to my buddies car motoniki, right after he installed the OCC. From what you have said, I would guess it is your valve cover busted and I bet it has to do with the way the OCC is hooked up. Do a search on Beanth the Bonnet and look for motoniki, it will be like a on page 2. When the guys put your car back together I would have them return OCC mod back to stock.
Good luck and yes you paid a ton for the mod. I paid around $3100 for the same thing.
Mario

 

what a shame. hope it gets fixed pronto and you have more fun

 

Partsman- you are correct it was the valve cover gasket. Now, is this normal?? Could something like this have been nothing more than a random and a back luck of an event? Did I drive the car too strong? Could it really be the OCC?? As for test driving the car? They did test drive it and made sure everything was in order few times. They allways do that after any mods.

Gosh so many things to consider.

As for the shop that did the work? I honestly do trust their work since they have been in business for a long long time and have been working on high end BMWs and such. Their shop is a very well known place. As I mentioned before that one of the members from NAM here goes to that shop as well and knows about the owner and the kind of work that they do.

Mario- You made me feel like I did spend too much money
Did you consider the new tunning I had to do along with throttle body AND sway bars both on front AND back??

Thanks everyone for your response. It's a blessing to be part of such a great forum with knowlegable members that you can converse with and constantly learn new things every day.

 

So you're back together and cleaned up?
Check this thread from motonikki812. He had a similar issue just after installing an OCC - the possible causes are discussed in the thread.
Sounds like you just had the gasket blow out, which is better than the cover grenading! Be sure to let us know the outcome.

 

ok ok it's 4am and I just found this... I thought of this thread... and well I hope you know it has no melicious intend... I jsut thought of yer tragety...

 

Tuls, don't be a fool - he blew a gasket, not a seal...

 

This statement reminds me of that one joke.....

 

Just called the shop, it was the OCC and the way it was installed. From what they found was that it was twitched!!?? Now I know most of you well informed members know what that is, I sure don't.

But in any case, Dr-O was gentleman and a nice guy to sent me a message late last night, actuay after midnight, to let me know he was sorry that had happned to my car and gave me his advice as to how the problem could be rectefied by installing it correctly. Well I related his advice to the shop and they were one step ahead of me and found the probelm as it seems and have fixed it . Now they just need to CLEAN MY CAR.

Thank you again DR-O and everyone for responding and caring. I love the spirit of this forum and it's members in how everyone cares. I honestly feel like my Mini is just as much as yours as it's mine and vise versa.

 

dood when you blow a head gasket your car will start to miss and hiss.

thats oil leak from their botch job, either rocker cover gasket not seated properly or OCC installed the wrong way.

Also... your belief that their numerous years of experience on BMWs automaitcally means they know what they doing on MINIs is very wrong way of thinking. People says this of DINAN all the time, and DINAN really not as good as a lot of small time MINI tuners.


Sorry bout your car problems. You need to be very careful when it comes to letting people touch your MINI. Goodluck getting your car fixed.

btw my WMS head cost less than $2500 fitted.

p.p.s. You need to keep your rpm below 4500 for the first 500 miles for the head to accustom itself it's new home.

 

Assuming that they hooked up your OCC using M7 instructions - I doubt that the OCC is to blame.

NOW, If they connected the return line from the OCC to the grey vaccum line and the tubing was not high pressure quality - it could collapse not permitting the engine case to exhale.

 

 

You were fortunate the valve cover didn't grenade as someone else's did recently. Your gasket gave its life & went pop to relieved the pressure build up.

 

I think he's got that covered.

 

Well just picked up the car and it was the OCC hose that went under the IC where it got pinched and put enough pressure that blew my Valvle cover gasket. It's properly done now.

The car runs great with loads of power and it's been completely presssure steam cleaned top to bottom. I'm happy with it, I just can't tell you fellas how fast the car gets to 60, it's amazing. My next upgrade is going to be the WATER TO AIR IC which is put together by hand in England.

About the 1st 500 miles driving under the 4500 rpm, do I really need to do that??

 

That will be a very "cool" upgrade but this time shop around a bit for price. You should talk to ISELLEM from AZ about it. He just installed one about 3 weeks ago and had some very good results. Glad your car is back on the road.
Mario

 

Can't find an American built part?

 

Mario- I'm allready sold on the IC from England. They are going to show the part when it's installed in one of their client's car for me to see. This thing happens to be a state of the art so to speak. It's supose to be a 2 way water to air and air to air IC which is a 2 peice unit that one peice mounts just behinde the front grill where the radiator is and one on top of your head where the current one is.

Does that make sense?!

It's said to add about 8-10 whp. "it's tested by the way".

The cost on it is about $995 not installed. I will wait untill the weather gets a little hot before I do that and then on to Bilstein coil overs and neg camber plates.