Hi Everyone, 2010 r56 owner here, 1.4l petrol manual @ 98k miles and had timing chain replaced and I am absolutely at my wits end with this car.

Car has some serious issues, the most prevalent is the fact that it often stalls when idling, or if clutch is depressed (it will literally stall at 70mph when changing gears and depressing clutch). Gave up with trying to fix it myself and had a mechanic take a look to no avail so back to square one.

One other issue is that the cooling fan is constantly on, checked and swapped relay for R3 (cooling fan relay) in the under-bonnet fuse box and that has not fixed the high speed fan problem (my mini does not have low speed fan). Heating was cold so I replaced the thermostat housing and that’s fixed the heat problem as thermostat was stuck open (thought it might fix the fan but it has not). Cooling has been topped up but only about 10 parts water to 1 part coolant (bad I know- going to do 50/50 mix later on).

The mechanic has said that the engine is reading hot and this is causing the stalling and the fan, they’ve tracked it down to a tensioner in the drive belt/water pump system, however they have had the car a week and have not managed to fix it which means it’s back to me.

Few problems with this diagnosis though: mainly, the car has been running VERY cold for months (highest at 60 degrees Celsius) so the overheating code I think must be due to the coolant mix and thermostat housing change. So I’m back to square one with the stalling and the fan.

I believe it’s electrical as the fan will literally turn on if you just press the start button without actually turning the engine on, so it CANNOT be due to a high temperature reading as it comes on after being left on the drive overnight, and obviously the engine hasn’t even started to warm up if only the electrical ignition is on.

Seriously starting to give up on this car and I’m hoping someone out there can guide me into the right direction with the cooling fan and if possible the stalling which is so dangerous- I don’t think it’s the same problem, I believe there’s probably several dozen problems with this Mini (ugh!).

Just a few more pointers if anyone fancies a challenge:

Car stalls more on inclines/declines especially (have cleaned fuel system with cleaner).

When coming to a stop, the revs will drop down to about 200rpm, sometimes recovers, most of the time stalls out.

Car is jittery when pulling off, no matter how slow you are releasing the clutch, it’s like being on a bumper cart ride at the fun fair.

Stalls even worse in stop start traffic, 7/10 times will stall when pulling off in this situation.

Has been getting progressively worse, start off with just stalling over a speed bump, now it stalls unless in gear and off the clutch when at low speeds.

Any help i would very much appreciate!!!
thank you

 

After draining the coolant from the radiator hose and the thermostat and refilling with 50/50 premixed blue coolant, and replacing fan relays in the fuse box, it seems to have fixed both the stalling and the fan!

 

I had a brand new 2010 R56 that during my first week of ownership had a similar issue with the cooling fan. Came home from a drive and went inside for a while. I came back outside about half an hour later and fan was still running. I did a quick internet search that said to pull the relay and fan stopped. After plugging the relay back in I tried starting my car and battery was too drained and I had to have a tow back to the dealer. I told the dealer what happened and of course they couldn’t replicate it. After I got my car back it never did it again.