Beware, I'm wordy. Skip down to the if you want to skip my whining about my current car!

So I'm tired of throwing $3000+/year into my 2000 Audi b5 a4 avant 2.8 to keep it moving - and i've only got 90k miles on it! Just this past year, i've replaced power steering rack [$1500], one downpipe [$600 + 150 for a new o2 sensor since old was seized], driveshaft [$700, thanks to great parts scrounging by my shop!], various seals and gaskets... all that on top of normal maintenance (plugs, oil changes, etc.). On top of that, with a nearly 70 mile round trip commute, the 22mpg avg (epa says 18...) gets old real fast. And this is with a fantastic Indy shop that does great work and is always fair - if I took it to the dealer, this would easily have been double.

I love the car, and the way it drives (although I could use a bit more "oomph" and a bit sharper steering), but it's gotten to be too much. In just the past 12 months, I've spent over $4000 on maintenance for my car. That's WAY too close to the bluebook value, so it's time to get out!



So, I'm looking for something fun, reliable, "sporty", decent gas mileage, and that won't cost me an arm and a leg, without being completely impractical. My budget is around $20k or so - but obviously the lower it is the happier I am

MCS coupe seems like an obvious choice here. (for the curious, my other possibles are subaru WRX, legacy GT, 350z, mazdaspeed3... any other suggestions here?).

So, here's the barrage of questions:

1. what should I be on the lookout for in a used R53? Besides the obvious - PPI from indy shop, service logs, obvious crash damage, etc. Likely failures?
2. Any specific things that should have been fixed?
3. Any things that, if fixed, point to abuse?
4. Any super expensive scheduled maintenance I should watch out for (for example, my TB job at 65k cost over $1200 at the indy - dealer wanted $2500!)
5. Also, i've heard some iffy things about the cost to repair - is an '06 or so going to cost me more than 1k/year to maintain, on average? I understand there's always the odd bad apple (lemon?), and some of it is luck. Is CPO worth the extra cash?
6. Is there any good reason, besides lower mileage, to look at the R56s instead of the R53? Is the turbo superior/inferior to the R53? I may do some light modding (chip/intake/exhaust) at some point, but nothing too serious or that would risk reducing reliability.
7. Any "year specific" issues to look out for? I'm looking towards '05-'06 specifically.

There's one local one I'm looking at, but I think it's against the rules to post up links - let me know if I'm incorrect and I'll post, or let me know if you're willing to take a peek and I'll send you a link.

cheers!

 

Do you have a somewhat local or regional MINI Cooper Club in your area ? That is where I would make my start in looking for a low mileage 05/06. And while you are at it, find out who their club's Mechanic is.......

I had similar issues with my Jaguar you had with your Audi. It soon became apparent that my Jag service dept was actually racking up needless repairs in my car as my bills were satisifed by an extended service warranty........

 

R53 till i die, or until i cant find another one after this one, but i think the 53 is superior and more enjoyable to drive. IF you can i would get an 05 or 06, just has a bunch of little things they figured out after the 02 04 era. If you want oomph try and find a jcw. I have an 03 with 69000 miles on it, the only required maintenance thing i have had done is changing brake pads, and i had to replace the front control arm buchings, they tend tyo go bad on my year. this still only cost me like 225$ and autoxcooper hooked me up putting the bushings into the brackets before i got them.

Other than that the only things i have had to do have been mod related, and even all of my mods have been pretty cheap, but i do everything myself so that helps i guess. If you do get a r53, an intake, supercharger reduction pulley are a definite no matter what must hav. I would throw an exhaust on there to or have one made some where. Also if you lower the car u hav to get adjustable rear control arms to make sure ur camber is where it should be.

I get like 24 mpg and i do alot of city driving, and i also drive pretty fast and fun so. I also did a rear seat delete because i usually donbt haul a bunch of ppl around and it really nice being able to fit some stuff and throw whatever back their. NOt to mention my malamute can actually fit in the car now.

I can also tell you that i had a wrx, loved it, i had the wagon so it was really practical. The mini is probably more fun to drive but the each have their pros and cons. I had a chance to buy another wrx tho and went with the mini and havnt regretted it at all. I still want a wrx or sti tho so...

Also my buddy has a ms3 and its a pretty nice car, styling is good, especially on the inside. My mini is faster than his but he also hasnt done any modding, and those things can make some power. But i wouldnt want one over a wrx or a mini, that would be the bottom of my list.
The wrx was the **** in the snow man, it could be a blizzard and suvs would be driving like 10mph, and i would be cruising no issues at all. I remeber one time it was really snowing bad and ppl on the highgway were going slow becausae it was really terrible out, i ended up passing people on the shoulder where snow hadnt even been plowed or salted.

Good luck with the choice, and sucks about the audi, they have stepped up their game tho lately really making some quality stuff.
pm me if u have questuons about any of the cars.
Test drive every single one before u buy, but keep in mind that a mini with a pulley and intake is acompletely different car, unless u find a jcw.

 

And the mini destroys alllllllll in the twisties, its not a straight line car, even tho i have a really nice kill list going right now for drag races.

 

All I can say is the more MODs I do to my R53 the more I love it, Even quick trips to the store are fun !!

 

Thanks all. Was looking towards 05-06 anyway, seems like that's the sweetspot for price and mileage.

As for repairs, those were all necessary and mostly self diagnosed. The dealer did try to screw me over once ($175/hr labor when your going rate is 110? Screw you dude), and wouldn't budge when I called him out on it, so I took my car and never went back! My Indy also does some mini work so I'll likely continue with them. I'm an apartment dweller so no place to do my own maintainance :(

 

... I hear you; I just bought an '05 MCS 3 months ago after my '96 A4 got to be too expensive to keep running. I loved the A4, but so far I have no complaints about the MINI.

Given my price range, I only looked at R53s. From what I've heard anecdotally about the r56s, BMW/MINI there are improvements (more durable strut towers, better fuel efficiency, etc., etc.), but some feel that the MINI lost some of its character in the process. I suspect this is largely a matter of personal preference, and would trust the expertise of someone who has owned both cars.

If you haven't see this yet, it might be helpful in your search.

 

I agree '05-06 is probably the better pricepoint at this time. The shorter gearing makes the car feel stronger, IMO. Clutch is a really expensive repair, but if you are fortunate, it will still be in warranty and maintenance will be up to date.

 

Thanks for the link - I found it last night in another thread, certainly seems like the '05-06 is the sweet spot. I guess the only question is whether to spend a bit more on an R56 instead. Guess I'll post in that forum too and get some opinions. Will have to check insurance rates too I guess!

How expensive is "expensive"? This coming from a guy who just spent $1500 on a steering rack replacement this month (would have been $2500+ at the dealer). $1000 every 70k miles is fine - $2000 every 40k not so hot.

 

jroca, i couldnt agree more, and still so reliable to

 

My car was in the shop back in January for about a month, due to a very large crater I happen to run into at 2 Am while heading to work. The dealer gave me loaners for the entire time, I had 1 Turbo S and one None S both of those cars rode nicer, seemed better put together and got better gas Mileage. My teenage kids all told me to trade my car in for a newer one, and yet for me, i will take my R53 anytime. yes it has a few quirks ( like its Owner may I add) but I just love the car and keep doing little things to it to make it more personal, today the Speedo and Tach were sent out to have the Blue LEDs put in, so I am driving with a scan guage for speed and RPMs, but again this car suites me.

 

search under "clutch replacement".

You will find people getting quotes (recently) from $2500 - $4000 from the dealer and $1500-$2000 for independents. Not that it is prone to early failure, but it is a expensive repair compared to other cars.

 

Your clutch will only need replacing if you abuse it.

-The only thing that can really get you is a power steering pump failure, that is about 400-800 dollars for the the pump plus whatever labor is. These can fail pretty randomly, and there is nothing you can really do to predict whether a car will have problems with it. This isnt a very hard car to learn how to do some of your own work on from my experience, so that might also be worth considering.

-The supercharger is also used to drive the water pump, between the pump and the charger is a gear drive with some oil in it. That can leak out over time and cause the gears to eat themselves. If the car has over 50k on the clock it would be worth pulling off the charger and topping the oil off (that is the plan for mine at least). If you catch it before the gears eat themselves the parts are probably like $20 and labor is 3-5 hours. If you dont you are looking at doing an expensive rebuild.

 

I currently own an '03 MCS which I bought with 48,000 miles and currently have 73,000. I'm going on a year of owning it and can say it's a fun car. However, as with any used car you will come across some maintenance issues. My first issue happened about 2mo. of owning the vehicle the driver's side lock stop functioning. Thanks to this site I saw that it was a common problem, bought the lock mechanism from a vender on this site for about $90 and 3 hours later had my locks working again. I was able to find a great DIY on this site on how to do it. Second issue happened 2 weeks ago. I saw a puff of white smoke come out of my hood scoop after I turned on the car after doing an oil change. Figured that I might have spilled some oil without noticing and after opening the bonnet and not finding anything let it be. The following day I go to work and after a 14 hour shift the car will not start. I have a friend give me a jump and go to autozone so that they can check the condition of the batter. They connect the battery machine to it and an error of an open circuit comes up. I take it home put it up on my ramps and go underneath to see what I can find. The power steering pump was staying on and draining the battery. Thanks to this site( I was able to find out that this too is a common problem and that BBA-raman rebuilds them for $200 compared to $600-$700 part at dealer) and the Bentley manual was able to remove. I sent the power steering pump out next day to BBA-raman. They received it on a Friday and I got it back Tuesday. Hope this helps.