"While I'm At it" Maint. Suggestions?
 

Our Mini has had a minor oil leak for a while now and I'm ready to pull the trigger (i.e. spend all weekend) fixing it. After lots of insight from various threads I'm fairly convinced it is the crankshaft sensor o-ring that is bad. This looks to be no easy repair, requiring a lot of work just to get at the thing. While I'm at it I figure I'll take care of some other things. The car has almost 90K miles so I figure i will change the front brake pads, change the brake fluid, change the coolant, replace that o-ring and clean up the engine, and replace the serpentine belt. Any other recommendations of things I should do while I have the front end loosened up? While we're pretty handy we don't have a full workshop of tools and we're not willing to do things like "replace the clutch". I want to be efficient but I also need to be realistic in what I can accomplish.

Thanks in advance.

all rubber breaks down over time, heat, shaking around, etc.. so you could do:
- gaskets - valve cover (i just did mine), oil pan is also a good one
- Check your control arm bushings - a little more involved
- Supercharger fluid - at pulley and waterpump size - good preventative
- radiator hoses and thermostat
- .. have to think more..

phil.

If it has never been replaced, change out the radiator fan because it will crap out. The low speed fan will stop working ---

Since you're describing the oil weep around the crank sensor O-ring I'll assume you have a 1st Gen MINI.

+1 on the front control arm bushings (but not a trivial thing to do on your own)

Are you still running the original Electro-Hydraulic Power Steering Pump? Many fail at mileages much less than what you have on the clock (some evidence). If it's the original, I highly recommend you remove, inspect, and clean the electric motor side of the pump. You're likely to add tens of thousands of miles of additional life to the unit. You can find several good online DIYs that will give you the confidence that you can do this.

Thanks for the responses. Seems like we're at the point where lots of things need to be replaced, even if preventative. I guess I need to evaluate costs for all this and triage what we can pull off in one weekend.

If you are going to order the cooling fan, this is where I bought mine ---
http://www.rockauto.com/catalog/rafr...?a=G-autoparts
Rock auto parts

This seems too good to be true. The cost is $67 versus over $300 elsewhere. Is it new? Can't tell form the descriptions.

Yes, it looks and operates like an OEM - identical. Just be sure you order the correct fan for your car by manufacture date. 02' and some 03' MCS's have two fan plugs and the later just have one plug. I have had mine for ten months without any problems.

Depends on what year he has. 05-06 had the resistor moved into the fuse box, it's not hanging out on the fan.

He posted this in the First Generation (2002-2006) Coupe Talk forum....

If you're looking for a good site with a lot of information on it, check out Bill's Site.

Bill's 2005 MCS

You can replace the ignition pack, wires, spark plugs, air filter, serpentine belt, look at the condition of the upper & lower engine mounts, oil filler cap o-ring, fuel filter replacement, etc. etc.

Also, check out Super Cooper Info for a lot of links to DIYs etc.

Out of Surgery
 

We dove in Friday and started tearing the Mini apart. Made such good progress I was really starting to get nervous. It went so well we decided to go ahead and replace the oil pan gasket while we were at it. Had a bit of a delay with the gasket not getting in when promised so we tried our hand at removing and cleaning the power steering pump.

That's where things took a turn. No matter how hard I tried we could not get the pump out of the car. I could not get the hose that runs from the fuid reservoir off the pump. I tried everything short of simply cutting it off. The top electrical connector didn't want to cooperate either and the high pressure line was disconnected but wouldn't get out of the way. After getting fluid everywhere and using two rolls of shop towels to clean up the mess under the car, we simply secured the pump back down and gave up for the night.

We got the oil pan gasket this morning and got everything (amazingly) back together and running. I'm waiting for the inevitable disaster (my luck seems to go that way) but so far so good.

Thanks for all the advice in this and other threads. We got a lot done considering our experience level and we learned a lot along the way:

New power steering fluid
New coolant
New oil pan gasket
Thorough oil change
Crank sensor o-ring replaced (original reason for doing anyhting)
Cleaned TONS of oil and gunk that had collected EVERYWHERE
Learned a lot about our Mini
Got some cool pics inside the engine of the piston rods and camshaft

Did your oil pan gasket really need replacing? Seems to be a major undertaking simply because 'you were in the neighborhood.'

We're not entirely sure where our oil leak was so we replaced it to be sure. There was simply too much oily gunk all over the place to be sure of the source. Seemed to be up higher and LOTS of gunk around the crank sensor so I'm fairly sure that was a source, if not the only one. The o-ring was more flat than round like the new one. As for the oil pan gasket, it's hard plastic with rubber insertson both sides. The rubber on the old one was flat, virtually flush with the plastic bits. It looked to be in good shape otherwise but it seems they do have a tendency to go bad at some point. So, we replaced it. In turth, going ahead with the oil pan gasket only added about an hour and a half to the overall time. Once you are in a position to get it off, which we were, it was pretty straightforward. I figure it was worth the extra time because the gasket is cheap and getting to it again later owuld have been much more work.