Ah, another noise post. I'll try to be as brief, specific, and succinct as possible, if that can be done.
2011 Mini Cooper Base, Manual, 145k miles on it. 90% highway miles, maintenance kept up, I am easy on the clutch (i.e. don't ride it to the stop light or down a hill and don't downshift coming to a stop, etc.).
Noticed a noise that has been there for awhile but recently either got much worse or I noticed it more recently and am now focused on it.
Def. coming from the drivers side motor/wheel area. Here is my best explanation of the symptoms:

First, the sound. Best I can describe is that is sounds like a "smooth" consistent rattle...basically, if you are old enough to remember putting a playing or baseball card on your bike so that it flapped against the spokes..that. That is exactly what it sounds like.

After start, sitting still/idling:
- Neutral - no noise
- Clutch pressed - no noise

Driving:
- 1st gear it is either hardly noticeable/drowned out by the engine noise no matter RPMs. (More on this in a minute)
- 2nd gear is about the same, I may be able to hear it starting slightly.
- 3rd gear - really and seemingly suddenly makes itself known.
- 4th+ more of the same of 3rd.
- In higher gears, it seems as though when I let off the accelerator at the top of it's travel, it gets quieter for a second and then goes back to the same level of sound. Meaning, if I were going downhill, in gear, right as I let off the accelerator, it quiets for a second and then carries on again shortly after. There is a bit of "play" in the noise at the top of accelerator travel, meaning I can sort of make the sound "bounce" if that makes any sense if I tap and let go of the accelerator pedal.

Here is where it gets weird. Let's say i am in 6th gear, highway speeds, I can definitely hear the sound. It is consistent and constant. It tracks with SPEED not RPM. I bolded this as I know this is important. I am only about 90% sure of this as the entire time I thought it was tracking with RPM, which of course had me focused on transmission/gearbox related issues. (But wait there is more coming up). Anyway, when I press the clutch in and hold it, sound is gone. When I press the clutch and put it in neutral, I thought it was gone...but realized today when trying to record the sound that it is NOT going away completely when I do this. It's just getting quieter.

I discovered this symptom this morning while driving at about 20 mph behind the factory where I work, where it is super quiet. Going 20 in 3rd gear. I hear the noise pretty well defined, I press the clutch in, drop in neutral...I can still hear it...it is quieter, but I can definitely hear it. Here is the thing, as I let it roll to a stop, the noise doesn't get quieter, it gets slower as the car is getting slower until it stops. This is what is throwing me.

No other symptoms at all to speak of. Plenty of power, no codes, no clutch slipping, etc. Anyone have any ideas? As mentioned, I thought for sure it was transmission/flywheel/clutch related somehow, but the noise being present when in neutral coming to a stop and seemingly tracking with wheel speed is really confusing me.

No standard CV noise clunking or really no other noises at all and I cannot feel anything, no vibration or anything on the floor, in the pedals, in the steering well, nor in the gearshift.

(This car has a history of making me thinking something completely different than what is actually wrong. I once thought for sure I had a spun bearing, but it turned out to be a belt that had a few spots of ribbing that had fallen off and the tensioner wheel was vibrating on it!)

I have not yet had a chance to jack it up to inspect the wheel and shaft yet.

Mike

 

OK, so as an update, I think I may be getting closer to a correct understanding of what may be going on here. That being said, I still haven't had the time yet to get it into my garage to physically verify anything, but hope to do so in the next couple of weeks or so.

So I have verified that I can hear the noise in 1st and 2nd gear. However, the noise is quieter and since the car is moving slower and, as I "speed up" RPMs ramp to the point where it drowns out the noise.

Another thing I noticed is that when I am moving forward at speed and I hear the noise, when I engage the clutch, the noise is there but quieter, as soon as I disengage, letting it out slowly, there is a specific point where the noise seems to get amplified. Then it hit me and I think this is a correct assumption: when the clutch is engaged, there is a disconnect between the half shaft, the end of which has the bearings, of course, and the rest of the gearbox, right? So, when the clutch is disengaged, there is now a more metal on metal connection between that half shaft and - the gearbox, so I believe the sound is being telescoped and amplified by the metal - very much, well exactly, like a bit screwdriver will telescope noise through to the end where you can listen to it. Meaning, if you hold that screwdriver just above the metal you are trying to listen to, you won't hear much, however, once you make that connection, it gets louder and more prominent. So, that all said, I do think I may be lucky to be dealing with just a bad wheel bearing on that side. Fingers cross that is all that the problem is. I will report back what I find.

 

Talking to myself it seems, but surely there will be lurkers over time who may find this helpful. I was finally able to get the garage sorted out in the new house we bought and got the Mini pulled in to start diagnosing better. This, plus it's been nearly 2 months and I miss driving the Mini and commuting in my F250 is killing me in gas!

Firs thing I did was get it up and run it. Here is a video of me in 4th gear getting up to "speed" then letting putting it in neutral and letting off every pedal. Note, I did press clutch in and let out several times when testing the same way and nothing changed. I will say that this does now sound more like bearing noise and is coming from the distal left side. Crazy how a more enclosed space can help you hear the sound better...I will say that when driving it didn't really sound like this, which is why it was throwing me. I have ordered 2 hub's and will be replacing them as soon as I get them.

 

That the noise is tied to speed and can be affected by being on throttle or off (depressing the clutch which removes the load) and thus changes the noise level to me points a finger at the CV bearings. But a wheel bearing is not out of the question either.

A tech would lift the car by its body lift points and check for excessive wheel play (wheel bearings) and rapidly try to turn the wheels first in one direction then the other to check for excessive CV joint play. Under the car he would check the shafts for excessive radial or axial play.

 

Well that wasn't the problem...at all. Swapped the wheel hubs/bearings and there is no change at all with this sound. It sounds a lot different in the car driving than it does on the video but it is surely the same cause. The only 2 real options are the half shaft axle on the drivers side or the transmission somehow. The issue with either of these is that I have no other symptoms related to either at least not any that are obvious. Clutch operates well, no slipping gears, no power loss, just nothing. My brother who is a mechanic and tow operator gave the advice to jut turn the radio up and drive it till it breaks, then I'll know for sure. All things considered, not a bad thought really. Sure, if it breaks, I'd get stranded, but I mainly use this for commuting, so wouldn't be far from home. That just doesn't sit right with me. I solve problems for a living, and so just letting this problem fester grates my sensibilities!

The noise is there in 1st and 2nd, but quite faint, but as soon as I let the clutch out in 3rd, it is much more prominent and louder through the rest of the gears. When I press the clutch in (and subsequently put it in neutral), the noise reduces significantly in volume but it is still there (though the video shows the external noise is the same even when I push the clutch in and put it in neutral. To me, this seems to be evidence that the noise is telescoping to the cabin of the car via metal that is in contact; however, when I engage the clutch and put in neutral, it seems almost as if whatever the metal connection was is now disengaged. This is why I was thinking external to the transmission, which really is only the hubs and axle. This is a tricky one, for sure.

Another thing is that if I am driving in 5th or 6th at the lower end of the speed range for these gears, and I sort of let off and tap the gas pedal a few times, each time I do, it sounds like the noise cadence is "bouncing" if that makes any sense at all. If it is the transmission, I haven't a clue what part it could be.

Nevertheless, I will have to resolve this issue. I don't want to buy another vehicle. Even if I had to replace the transmission and pay someone to replace it, that is still FAR less than the cost of another, even older used, vehicle. Considering the fact that there is nothing else at all wrong with the car, I can't make that justification. I have enough confidence to work on the transmission myself, but don't have a lift (I know not required if I use my 4 jack stands), and honestly don't have a ton of time. I may throw an axle at it just to see. That is pretty easy comparatively and not super expensive. Hate to throw parts, but feel it is about as educated a guess as I can have.

 

@shelzmike ,

Sounds like either a pilot or the throw-out bearing in your clutch system is starting or have gone bad.

 

From all your posts and descriptions, I am leaning toward a gearbox issue. The sound changing when the gearbox is loaded and unloaded (clutch in and out, on and off the accelerator pedal) would correlate to the gears loading and unloading, or shaft bearings in the gearbox…

 

I was hopeful this wasn't the case for obvious reasons, ur I think you are right at this point. I think I will change the gear oil to see if there is a lot of metal in there (not an indicator of anything but could make it more definitive if chunks come out!). Axle is not that expensive so I may change that also bc I'd hate to do all that transmission work for it to be something stupid simple. This has been a pervasive problem. I won't pay $4k+ for a reman transmission so most likely I'll get a relatively low miles used transmission as mentioned above and rebuild the one I take out.

 

I think one think is for sure, I have listened to the noise so much it is bordering on obsessing, that the noise is definitely a bearing I think. In the video I posted, at the 14 second mark is when I push clutch in, let it out, and am in neutral and let the wheels naturally slow themselves down. It has what I call a high pitched growl that slows as the wheel slows, and sounds pretty classically like a bearing...somewhere. No idea what bearing though. I may look into testing the axle a little more on that side. Though, I think this is wishful thinking since there is a pretty significant difference is prominence of the noise between 2nd and 3rd gear. (In the video, I was in 4th gear). 2nd gear I can hear it, but there is a sure increase 3rd+.

I think this is a very real possibility and would lean toward shaft bearings as I think the sound is unmistakably a bearing noise.

Here is another interesting tidbit of diagnostic info. I went to a place where there is a really steep hill that is about 1/2 mile long. I stopped fully at the top. Put it in neutral, let off the clutch and brake and as I started rolling down the hill, I heard the sound..the faster I started going, the louder and faster the noise was. Same exact sound.

I do plan on looking at getting a late Gen 2/Early Gen 3 Countryman S ALL4 (Maybe even a JCW if I can find one I like) but not until March or April of next year. I plan on keeping this one as well. I have not yet taken the transmission off, engine out, or even had to service mode the R56, but am not shy about it and Mod Mini's vids are excellent for this as well. I think what I am going to do is take Axle off to inspect it and the shaft bearings further. Change Gear Oil while I am at it. If axle is sus, then I'll change it out. Wishful thinking, but hey this mini has had me thinking terrible things before and it was something super simple. If this does nothing (which is likely the case), I plan on going ahead and changing the clutch, TOB, etc. Since I have it out, I am not sure if I'll crack the transmission open or not. Seems it may make sense and can't hurt really?

 

@shelzmike ,

Once again, please check the “PILOT & THROW-OUT” BEARING before you go any further

 

There is no pilot bearing on these and the throw out bearing will be replaced when I replace the clutch, take apart the gearbox, and check everything else. It has 140k so even though I don't need a new clutch (still works great), it's quite a bit of work to get the transmission out might as well change all those things.

 

It's frustrating when I find posts that effectively never resolve and are abandoned, so wanted to come back and conclude what happened here.

This issue has been ongoing for quite some time now. Initial post was from September, but problem has been around, at least noticeably so for a few months prior to this. I do everything can to not fire up the parts canon when working on any of my vehicles and this one certainly gave me a run for my money.

Turns out, I did have 2 problems at the same time that made noises quite similar to each other. I did have wheel bearing noise (as can be heard in the video), but replaced them; however, (a) noise still remained. Tried to diagnose and came up empty but I, as well as others who heard it, could not pinpoint it. It seemed like it could possibly be related the clutch in some way (my mechanic brother's guess was a broken spring in the clutch which wasn't a terrible guess. No way of diagnosing without looking though, so since I had 145k miles, and the clutch had never been replaced, I figured I'd open it up to replace the clutch which is, let's face it, a maintenance item. Got in there and found nothing except a clutch that was still OK, but thin and ready to be changed for sure. No obvious issues, wasn't a broken spring either. Replaced the rear main seal while I was at it.

Since I didn't see anything and I know the noise is coming from the transmission at this point, based on all the evidence, I decided to crack it open to see if I saw anything. I was already here. Once I got it apart, I still saw nothing at all. In fact, the magnet barely had anymetal on it at all. Still super puzzled. I did not open the differential. I checked all the bearings I could see without tearing the transmission down all the way and the rollers on the shafts themselves. I hoped that maybe the clutch and a fluid change would maybe make a difference, but that was wishful thinking.

Put it all back together after deciding that the rebuild kit was hard to find, and too expensive, and I didn't have enough evidence to justify it at this point. First test drive after was disappointing. Not only was the noise still there, it was far worse. Interestingly, the MINI drove great because of the new clutch.

Finally decided that I am definitely dealing with an internal transmission issue and was trying to decide between a rebuild or just a used/new-to-me gearbox. Refurbished ones were out of the question due to cost. As it so happens, I came across a local salvage yard that had a getrag 6 speed out of a 2014 coupe with only 47,000 miles for only $264!! I wish I had seen this before I put it all back together as, at this price, I probably would have just replaced it simply due to the amount of work it takes to get the transmission out and back in.

Obviously purchased that one and picked it up a couple of days ago. Worked most of the weekend to get the replacement transmission installed. That subframe is a huge pain in the rear to get out AND back in when on jack stands in a fairly skinny garage. I was able to do it though...2 times, still the longest individual step each time. First time, I completed it after having put it in Front End Service mode, second time I didn't. I'd say it is worth not putting in FESM.

Got fluid in, everything buttoned up and....problem solved! The issue was 100% in the transmission, not sure where, and that sucks, but I am moving on at this point. It is so quiet in the cabin now. The drone of the noise was so loud but I hadn't realized how loud until I fixed this issue.

Based on how rock solid the Getrag 6-Speed is, I am kinda shocked this was the problem. I could have pushed it too hard doing something and broke it off, but, while a lot of work, I am glad to have been able to finally get the issue resolved.

Just wanted to give an update and thank everyone who offered advice along the way.

 

Glad you found the issue! Stinks that it took a replacement gearbox to find it. Bearings are the worst! Visual inspections are often inconclusive, and the noises can lead to insanity. But now that it’s taken care of, you should have a few more years of enjoyment form the car.