Hey everybody,

I purchased my '02 Mini back in april and have put about 9000km's on it so far and to my surprise I think I have a wheel bearing problem AGAIN!
When I purchased the car, it was making noise when increasing speed and my mechanic determined that it's not one but both front wheel bearings.
I went to dealership and to my surprise paid $500 for 2 new wheel bearings and when we replaced them the noise was gone.
I was already a bit dissapointed because I owned a few vehicles so far and haven't really run into replacing both front wheel bearings (especially not at this price...)
After the replacement I have driven about 5000km's and the noise is slowly coming back. Same noise and day by day it's getting worse. These are symptoms of wheel bearing going and now I gotta see if it's both of them again or what is going on?
Is this an issue with '02 Mini's?
Also, do you think BMW would replace these free of charge being that I only got them about month and a half ago?
Is there a way of getting these cheaper?

Thanks guys!

If it was a MINI/BMW dealer that did the work, they should warrant their work. If you;ve only driven 5k km's, I'd think they'd stand behind their repair.

Like you, I'm wondering why they failed the first time, as well as again. Something's not right...........

Thanks for the input.
Unfortunatelly the work was done by my local mechanic so that BMW guarantee fails. The guy has been fixing cars in his shop for 10 years. Hopefully that should count for something.
Those who tried to replace these bearings know that it is not really all that hard to do. How wrong can a guy that's doing it for ten years go?
I still have to take it back to shop and see what's next.
I wonder what could possibly be wrong to make bearings go so fast?

The only thing hard about changing the bearings is breaking the bolts free
and retorquing them back in correctly. Four for the hub, one for the
axle nut, and taking the brake caliper disc on and off.
So BMW said your mechanic did that incorrectly and caused the part to fail???
They can say this, and they can stand firmly behind this, because they can,
but it doesn't mean they're right, and it doesn't mean they're fair or just in doing so.

BMW didn't say anything yet because I didn't go to them yet but I agree that they can stand behind that claim.

Back to the situation though.

I went to see my mechanic today after work and we did a checkup.We discovered that left rear bearing is shot and that's what's making all the noise in the cabin. We also discovered that weights on the right front wheel have fallen off and it needs to be rebalanced.
Combination of these things is cousing the noise to be greater and that is why I feel a bit of a shake in the steering wheel.

Left rear bearing is really making a loud noise when lifted and wheel is spun.

On the positive note, I know that front is fine and reassures me a bit that everything is ok there. I've seen wheel bearing kits on minimania and that is where I will probably get mine because rears are only $50 for one side and that beats dealer by 5 times...

Thanks guys,

I'll keep this going to let you know how it turns out.

If your going through wheel bearings that fast something is out of wack in the Have you noticed ant odd tire wear? Also if you bought the car used you should check the history for an accident.

We're going to be seeing more of these posts. I recently replaced both drivers side wheel hub assemblys due to vibration/noise on my '02 MCS with 42k miles. Parts guy at Classic MINI says they are seeing more and more '02 and '03 MINI's coming in for this problem. That's life in the MINI city.

....Les

Now, I'm off to see some fireworks!!

I had both rear bearings go around 32k miles, dealer replaced both for free under warranty.