I own a 2008 Clubman S automatic. A few years after owning it, it began to burn oil. No drips on the garage floors and no smoke out the exhaust. I learned of the oil burning after needing to replace the tminig chain. The dealer and Mini have been useless. A trusted mechanic that services Minis cannot determine the cause. I check the oil level every fill up and need to add 1-1 1/2 qts. This is very unusual for a car and very frustrating because Mini does not have any indicators on the dash signaling low oil, like every other modern car does these days. Has anyone else experienced this and been able to solve the problem?

 

"like every other modern car". Unfortunately this is not true. I've worked for several car manufacturers over the years and very few have this. Now, just about everyone has a lower oil pressure light that can come on. But for those lights to come on you have to be over 2qts low in most cases.

Now, that being said, an 2008 engine burning oil is not surprising. The N14 engine is known for this. Usually caused by people changing oil every 10-15k (as MINI recommended back then). What happens in most cases is the oil breaks down, gums up the PCV system. Also the intake valves get coked up and start building up large amounts of carbon which in turn slowly degrades the intake valve guide seals on the cylinder head allowing more oil to pass and get burned in the process.

I have switched to 0W-40 weight Mobil1 oil to help. Its not a fix all, but my burning rate has decreased. I also put in an additive everyother oil change from LiquiMoly called MoS2. Its an anti-friction additive.

The actual fix for most people is to have the cylinder head valves checked and seals replaced. An expensive repair. In rare cases the piston rings are at fault. Thats a whole other ball of wax.

Good luck with your endeavors!

 

In most cases it means you have ZERO or close to zero oil pressure. It doesn't mean anything about oil level, it means that you are relying solely on the film strength of whatever oil wound up on your bearings to keep them from grinding each other away. Basically means you are rubbing the metal bits on each other with minimal to no protection. By the time you notice the light, some damage has already occurred.

MINI tells us that using 1 qt every 1000 miles is "acceptable", and from other posts around here it sounds like that is a lot more common than any of us would prefer!

You're burning the oil, though. Just because you're not seeing smoke doesn't mean you're not burning any. The smoke can be visible only in certain circumstances (e.g., very high manifold vacuum, or only on WOT, or whatever) that make it difficult to look at your tailpipe, and the smoke can be thin enough that it's hard to notice even if you can get out and look.

To cure the oil burning, you would have to troubleshoot and possibly fix:
- Turbo seals and bearings
- Rings and cylinders
- Valve guides and seals
- PCV system
- possibly some other stuff as well

I would look at the PCV system, and see if I could get a scope into the intake to look at the backside of the intake valves. You might need a walnut blasting.

 

I totally understand what you're going through...on my 2008 MINI Cooper S...at ~35,000 miles the oil consumption issue started. Because the stock dipstick is junk and gives false readings...my first real indication of a problem was a check engine light.

All I can say is the problem only got worse...I eventually did a trade-in and got rid of the car.

Good luck to you.

 

Mini Cooper S models with the N14 a well known to burn through oil even when new, the oil gets hot in turbo cars and the oil turns into oil vapor and because the N14 doesn't have anything to convert the oil vapors back into the oil pan it gets injested into the intake manifold to be burned in the combustion process. Mini realized their mistake and created a revised engine that doesn't allow oil vapors to enter the engine, coat the intake valves and combustion chambers, the N18 which came out in middle of 2011, the N18 doesnt suffer major oil consumption or carbon deposits throughout the engine.

Thanks to some Mini dip sticks you can get a false reading if you don't follow certain rituals which means having to wait overnight to even check your oil. If your low on oil you don't have time to wait! It's typical to buy a used MCS to where the first owner didn't read the manual and assumed no oil needs to be added or checked every time you gas up and run it until the next oil change to find out by the dealer you only have 2 quarts of oil. There goes your warranty and a good reason to sell your car and pass it on to someone else.

This is the reason why I strongly believe that when interested in buying a Mini Cooper S from a dealer they always refuse to show you the service history for the Mini, their excuse is that the previous owner's deserve privacy or something to that effect. If the dealer shows you the service history it will show that the previous owner ran the engine very low on oil voiding the warranty. You going to still buy the Mini now, hell no! It's Mini dealers who are dishonest (not all), no one cares for the names of the previous owner's, it's a big smoke screen and you should take a hint and walk away.

I've head this story a thousand times especially when the oil change interval used to be every 15,000 miles and is now 7500 miles, if you're burning oil at a rate of 1 quart every 800-1000 miles and you are unaware of this fact and you find out your super low on oil, the first thought that enters ones mind is should I sell it now that I have accelerated engine wear...

Then after you bought it you noticed oil burning started to ocurr, either your dip stick gave you false readings or your engine had already suffered substantial engine wear. Your not the first and not the last to come here and find this out.

It's why I would NEVER buy a used Mini! It's just not worth the high risk in my opinion! You have to ask yourself why would anyone sell a low mileage Mini, I can think of many bad reasons, but not any good ones. Mini's have the highest owner turnover rates.

Mini gave up on dipsticks, their new F56 Mini's don't have dipsticks.

 

+1

The best (and cheapest) way to solve the oil consumption problem...offload the problem onto someone else.

To the OP...You should take your 08 MINI Clubman S to CarMax and see how much they will give you.

 

When I originally came to this thread I read the OP post and clicked reply without looking at anyone's posts, how funny as this makes you my example of what I wrote in my reply!

I think the OP needs to read his manual even after a few years of owning the Mini, I doubt the previous owner read the manual either. What's unusual is when someone buys a car they don't bother to read the manual. By the time the oil light comes on it's already to late, poorly designed like 99% of the car!

On page 97 it states,

 

I believe it.


CardinalsRule: How many miles are on the car?

 

^^ Conspiracy Theorist Unite....It's ok, just take the tin foil off your head Mog.

 

gRay rAvEn,

...question for you:

Have you ever owned a MINI with an N14 engine?