Since 3 yrs of ownership the car has only been serviced at the same Mini dealership for routine service and warranty work.

During the cars factory warranty I added a catback, Alta bov spring and a Afe drop in air-filter. The dealership has always taken good care of me and the car and never had any issues. It's been in for temp sensor twice, battery discharge issue, oil changes and brake service. The cars factory warranty expired last month so I'm now responsible for its routine matenince. So with 42K it never gotten a tune up at the dealership. So last week I decided to change the spark plugs, brake check and inspect a few things.

So I decided that maybe it was time to inspect and clean the AFe air-filter I installed just over a year ago. As most DIY'ers who have work on their mini know that the factory air intake cleaner is totally sealed from view. The only way to open it to inspect is to either remove the intake tube from the turbo inlet or use a hex tool to open the entire air cleaner.

So I get it open and what do I find instead of my $70 AFe filter is the cheap factory $10 air filter. I have no idea when it got switched cause my wife's drives it most but I do know that all the repair work done on the car didn't require changing the air filter.

Sadly I have no recourse confronting the dealership for reimbursement but I just want to inform others that if you have a aftermarket drop in air filter to check it if you hire someone else other than yourself to work on your Mini.

 

If it was under "free" maintenance then it was most likely changed when due. Filter either got tossed or went home with someone.

 

Sorry to hear, I held off installing aftermarket filter till after my maintenance plan expired to avoid mistakes.

 

Yes the car did have free maintenance and perhaps I should have ask what all that included but seriously! I find it strange that a Mini mechanic who works only on N14 & N18 engines couldn't distinguish a cheap $10 air cleaner from a better $70 quality aftermarket one.

I'd like to be wrong on this but the Bu**sh*t meter about a mechanic throwing it away is pegged!!! I guess this is partly my fault for not putting the AFE sticker in clear view saying "Do not throw away air filter" on the outside of airbox. I guess I should have one on my catback and my aftermarket intercooler too!

 

I had the dealership fail to reinstall my air filter and housing along with the spark plug covers. When I went back to get my parts it was all dismissed first by saying they couldn't have forgotten to put parts back in, and then two that they were test driving it (sans air filter/housing) but forgot to reinstall after they were done. After saying that the service manager just turned around and walked off on me. So yeah, know how you feel there.

 

Not surprising. I watched as a mechanic opened the air filter box, that had the big red stop sign saying that there was a K&N filter installed and to not discard it, pull the K&N filter out and toss it in the trash. I walked over pulled it out of the trash and told him to not touch the car. Retrieved the manager, told them to push the car out of their work bay. Once it was out, I put the filter back in and drove away. Luckily it was the first thing they did to the car.

 

Sorry to hear this, sounds like they just get in the routine of changing them and replaced it without looking at the brand ? I know some aftermarket normal paper filters have a red tint and orange gasket that look like some K&N, and the AFE dry almost looks like and aftermarket paper filter ( but has wire mesh ) , maybe they confused it with that ?

Did you ask them to replace if with an AFE again after the fact ?


Sorry this happened.

 

Can't do that to my round filter luckily.

 

I posted a side by side pic of both filters. It must just be me but I can clearly see a noticeable difference between the cheap oem vs the AFE. If a mechanic can't figure out the difference then he's either a complete ignoramist to the obvious or a thief.

 

In the heat of battle in the flate rate system if your filter looked like **** when it was inspected he may have not noticed that it was an aftermarket filter.

 

lol... it looks like a cheap brand X paper filter, the filter is too dirty to recognize, mechanic is careless, he's overwhelmed and on time constraints, etc.

I find it humorous with all the excuses as to why any mechanic would throw away an aftermarket air filter. Looong ago I worked in the auto industry as an assistant service manager so I have a bit of knowledge on how auto shops and dealerships operated. I've had to fire employees when certain things kept getting lost or missing. If a large auto shop works on other various brand vehicles then it would certainly be plausible a mechanic could mistaken it for a cheap ordinary filter and toss away but it's a Mini dealership majority of their business is late model Mini's. It's not like I own a rare model Mini few mechanics have ever seen or worked on.

Yeah it's just an aftermarket filter and I've since replaced it already but I'm just a bit pissed that no matter how diligent you think you are somebody will still find a way to screw you over. That's one reason why I usually do my own maintenance on all my vehicles or farm it out to someone I can trust.

I will pay a visit to the dealership and speak to the Service advisor to at least tell him my story. Perhaps this might help shed light on an ongoing issue they are aware of if other customers have reported it.

 

This going to sound pretty *****-ish, but when I have service done to anything I tend to look at the invoice. Maybe if you looked at the invoice back in the day you would have noticed that the air filter was replaced.

Mistakes happen and now you want to go down to the dealer and complain about your filter that was thrown away how long ago? I guess time must be cheap in the 818 area code. I’d partially chalk this one to my ****ing up by not:

Not installing the decal that says the air filter should not be thrown away.

Not looking at the invoice after service to see what was replaced and done.

I’m not condoning what the mechanic did, but to call him a thief is just borderline mental. Yeah I’m sure he just wanted a $70 filter for his own MINI. I’m always reminded when I read stories like this why I left the automotive field.

 

I went through all my invoices from the dealership and there's no mention of replacing the air filter during the cars service.

I might have been a little too harsh in my post stating that some mechanics are thieves and I'll take part blame for not putting the 'do not discard air-filter' sticker on the outside of the airbox. There's plenty of upstanding honest mechanics around but sometimes sh*t happens whether it be because of carelessness or just mistakenly thrown away but bottom line is its gone.

As I stated before I noticed the air filter missing I had nothing but good dealings with that dealership but I'd be very naive to not rule out someone had taken it for resale or swapped for their own personal use.

I already had lined up an independent reputable Mini auto shop for when the warranty had expired so I guess all this is a mute point. I guess lessons learned!!!

FWIW... I've since put the AFE 'do not discard air filter' on the outside the airbox!