My 2005 MCS convertible was another victim of a flawed Mini design. After changing the oil, all I wanted to do was to check the oil level. I pulled out the dipstick, and snap! - the stick broke in two. After trying every known “fix it” on the internet, I finally cried “uncle” and decided that a surgical procedure was in order. The surgery was going to be putting the car into “service mode”.

Service mode allows you about 4 – 5 inches of space in front of the engine block (and behind the radiator) to enable access to that area. In my case, I needed to have better access to the area where the dipstick guide tube enters the oil pan. I needed to remove the guide tube and take out the broken dipstick stuck inside.

So herewith is my tutorial on how to take off the bumper, bumper carrier, and put the Mini into “service mode”. I put this together by consolidating everything I could find on the various US and UK Mini forums. There were several nice write-ups I found that listed the steps - but none had pictures. In addition, most of them were obviously written by folks who do this all the time, and already know where everything is, etc., whereas it took me a bit of time and patience to locate all of the necessary bolts, etc. I felt that a very basic step-by-step guide, with pictures, would be helpful. I should note that this particular tutorial does not involve removing the wheels - I found that I could access the wheel wells just fine by turning the wheel as far it is would go on each side.

Note that I did not write down the various sizes of the bolts and screws – if I recall correctly, I used 8 mm, 10 mm, 13 mm and 16 mm sockets to remove them. I also used the socket extension.

Similarly, I did not list the torque settings used when replacing all of the bits. Consult a Bentley’s manual or post a query for the answers. If someone wants to list all of the torque settings used in the tutorial and send them to me, I would be happy to insert them.

As with any DIY procedure, be careful, and do it at your own risk!!!

I hope that you find this helpful - it sounds daunting, but really is not bad at all - just be organized!


TOOLS YOU WILL NEED:

1) Metric socket wrench set – and a 3 or 4 inch extension will be very handy for this particular task.

2) Jacks and jackstands/ramps.

3) One size 30 Torx bit and driver.

4) Phillips and slotted-head (the regular kind) screwdrivers.

5) Two M8 x 100mm hex-head bolts, or a set of the Mini engine extension pins.

6) If you are removing the dipstick guide tube, a new O-ring.


Not absolutely necessary, but very helpful:

1) A second jack.

2) Needle-nose pliers.

3) A miniature-sized slotted head screwdriver.

4) Short-length/stubby-sized Phillips and slotted-head screwdrivers.

5) A sheet of paper upon which to rest the various bits - labeled under each with the location and side.

6) Masking tape and a pen.

7) Red fingernail polish.

8) A helper or a cardboard box that can fit under the front bumper of the car. It doesn’t have to fit exactly - if it’s up to 6 inches shy, that’s OK.

9) Several NEW expansion rivets/screws. These can be purchased from a Mini dealer for about $2.15 apiece. Since it is very easy to ruin the screws (and rivets) in the process of removing them, new ones would be good to have to replace the buggered-up ones!

10) Your favorite after-the-job-is-done vice!






REMOVING THE BUMPER:


STEP ONE:

Jack up the front of the car, and place jackstands under the jackpoints of the car (there are two, located towards the front of the car and visible under the door sills). It is a good idea to leave the jacks in place as well, in the event the jackstands should fail.

Put the key in the ignition, and turn it so that you can turn the front wheels all the way to one side, and the other. Turn the front wheels to the right first. Looking under the driver’s side wheel well, you will see that there are several plastic screws holding the well to the car. You are going to remove these four at the front of each well:




These are plastic expansion rivets. Removing them is a hassle, because the plastic screw heads easily “cam out”. One relatively easy way to remove them is to use a slotted head screwdriver or needle nose pliers and place the tip in one of the two slots on the top of the rivet. Using the Phillips screwdriver, carefully begin to remove the screw. Once it is a bit loose, use your fingers to unscrew it the remainder of the way – this will help preserve the screw. Once the screw is removed, you can simply pull out the rivet. Do this on each side of the front wheel wells.



STEP TWO:

Remove the plastic engine shield. This is located directly under the engine on the underside of the car. It is held in place by a Phillips screw at each corner towards the rear of the car. The front part of the shield is sandwiched between the spoiler and the bottom of the bumper.

Remove the three silver-colored hex-head bolts located in the center underneath the spoiler. After you loosen/remove these, the engine shield will slide back for removal. Set it aside.





Remove the two Phillips screws (one per side) located on the underside of the corners of the bumper.



STEP THREE:

Locate the little “window” cut in the front of each wheel well. Looking in, you will see two screws at 90 degrees to one another. These are the vertical and horizontal bumper adjustment screws. Remove both of these on each side. The 3 or 4 inch socket extension facilitates the removal of the screw that is pointing upward.

















Now face the car. Ready your helper, or place a cardboard box, etc. under the front and center of the bumper. Remove the two #30 Torx screws located on either side of the radiator. These secure the bumper to the modular front end. Once these are removed, you can carefully pull away the bumper by tipping it upwards a bit and sliding the tabs at the center of the bumper out from the slots. Have your helper hold it up, or rest it on the box.






STEP FOUR:

Locate the three wires in the headlamp socket. One goes to the indicator light, one to the fog light, and one to the headlamp:





I wrote the locations (“fog”, “head”, etc.) of each of the three lights on masking tape, and taped them to the wires, so that I would not plug the wrong light during re-assembly.
Remove the indicator bulb holder by twisting it 90 degrees anti-clockwise and pulling it out. Remove the fog and headlamp bulb holders by using the miniature slotted-head screwdriver and pressing down to lift up the clip, as shown below:






Locate the temperature sensor at the bottom right (as you face the car) inside the bumper. This just slips out from its holder.






Once the wires and sensor are removed, you can pull the bumper from the car. Set in on a blanket/safe area.



REMOVING THE BUMPER CARRIER

The bumper carrier is made of aluminum. It holds the bumper to the modular front end.





STEP ONE:

There are only a total of 10 screws that attach the bumper carrier to the modular front end, five on each side. You will need to remove all of these:




The socket extension comes in handy to remove screw #3.



STEP TWO:

You will need to unbolt the crush tubes (one per side) from the subframe, and remove them. I had to use a breaker bar to free mine. If you do not remove these tubes, the modular front end cannot be pulled away from the engine block. The crush tubes are located off to the sides under the front of the car:





Lift off the bumper carrier and set it aside.








STEP THREE:


Screw the 8M x 100mm bolt/engine extensions into the hole shown in the photo. Once secure, pull the entire modular front end towards you.










CONGRATULATIONS, YOU ARE NOW IN SERVICE MODE!


THOSE OF YOU WHO NEED TO REMOVE THE DIPSTICK GUIDE TUBE, READ ON…


Finally, I thought - home free! Ah, but not so easy…the next step was as time consuming as everything I had done to this point.

In my 2005 car, the guide tube is held by two brackets to the engine block. The uppermost one is obvious, and held by one bolt. The lower one is much further down. Even being in service mode, the bottom of the guide tube was out of sight for about the last 4 inches. I could feel the bolt holding the bottom bracket, and was able to access it by using the socket wrench. I unscrewed it, and found I could not seem to pull the bracket away from the block! Turns out that there is a clip of some sort attached to the bracket. It holds two hoses together that run in front of the engine! I had to use a hacksaw blade to cut the clip at its attachment to the bracket.

As if that weren’t enough, once this was all completed, I found that try as I might, I could not remove the guide tube. It swiveled, and teased me into thinking I could just pull it up, but no go. I had to place visegrips on the bracket, and pound away with a dead-blow hammer for about 15 minutes. It came unstuck slowly, 1/16 of an inch at a time!

At long last, I was able to free the end from the block. After I twisted it free, I looked at the bottom end, and sure enough – there was the lower part of my dipstick!!! I inspected the O-ring that seals the tube to the block, and it looked fine – no cracks, etc. Had I anticipated better, I might have thought to order a new ring and just replace the old one – but I didn’t, and used what was there. I will have to monitor for any new leaks at the point.







REASSEMBLY:

This is basically the reverse of everything you have just done. Before I began, I used a cable tie to tie the two hoses whose clips were cut, to the bottom dipstick guide tube bracket.

Please refer to the Bentley Manual for all torque settings.

Push the modular front end into place and remove the extension bolts.

Push the crush tubes back into place, and torque the bolts to spec.

Lift the bumper carrier and set it back into place, taking care with the wires and temperature sensor. Carefully line up all screws and holes. First, replace the to #30 torx screws that hold the carrier to the modular front end. Fasten the remaining bolts and torque all to spec.

Have your helper hold the bumper while you reattach the temperature sensor. Carefully reattach the wires to their respective lights, either twisting into place (as in the case of the indicator and fog wires), or pushing into place (the headlamp wire).

Lift the bumper and tilt it, to carefully reinsert the tabs at the center into their slots. Lower the bumper into place. The bumper ends go over the flat black plastic adjustment mechanism. Using the socket and extension, replace the two adjustment screws on each side and torque to spec.

Replace the Phillips head screws on the underside of the spoiler at the ends of the bumper and torque to spec. Position the plastic engine shield so that its front edge tucks in over the edge of the spoiler, and replace the Phillips screws that hold it to the subframe. Reattach the three hex bolts under the spoiler and torque to spec.

Finally, replace all expansion rivets/screws in the wheel wells, using the new ones where necessary.

Remove the jack stands and lower the car.

Celebrate with your favorite after-the-job-is-done vice!

 

I read this a few times before I took mine apart the first time. It was a big help.

Since I have no nail polish, I wanted to point out that the lamp plugs don't really have to be marked (meaning the two similar ones are both marker lamps,) so they only fit in the proper light (sort of.) One of the marker lamp cords is shorter than the other. The short one goes to the front, the longer one goes to the side marker. If you get these messed up, you won't be able to get the cover on and wonder why (until the plug pops off).

So, marking them will work, or just paying attention to the length, either way reassembly will go smoothly.

Thanks again for the pictures.

 

I disagree with the section on 'bumper adjustment screws.' The vertical screw is only for attachment, not adjustment. The horizontal screw does control the alignment of the bumper skin (e.g. the gap between the skin and the bonnet) but does not need to be removed when putting the MFE in service mode.

 

where do you find the m8x100mm bolts (extension bolts) ???

Do you need to buy them

thx and great writeup !!!

 

I found them at Home Depot!

 

thanks

 

I used this to get to my coolant pipes. Thanks

 

i just broke my dipstick. can the car be driven with the broken dipstick or does it need to be inoperative until a new one is installed?

dapblain

 

I think I'll use this guide to take off my front bumper and fix a fog light that's broken. I think the bracket it was attached to broke when I t-boned a old person who pulled out in front of me.

 

Awesome info, It made it a breeze to do. Just keep track of all your bits and pieces. I did buy extra expanding rivets from the BMW dealer for $1.32 each as I did mess up a couple.