I have a 2004 MCS with the following suspension mods: Vorshlag camber plates, koni FSDs, Powerflex CABs. Of these modifications the most recent are the camber plates and FSDs. Shortly after the install I noticed a vibration coming from the front driver's side area, a VERY loud vibration while driving. after feeling around I noticed that the spring had started rubbing the strut tower on the drivers side. I have zero noise coming from the drivers side. I have tried to re-orient the spring so that it no longer makes contact with the inside of the strut tower with no luck whatsoever. The symptom is reduced/eliminated during right turns/curves and more dramatic (slightly) on right turns.

Can someone please post some pics of their stock drivers side spring installed with specific attention paid to the lower spring seat so that I can try to match the orientation?

 

This happens sometimes making your struts lean in with those plates is the cause. My MINI is using IE fixed camber plates & has 1.9 degrees of negative camber. I do not have those issues.

Have you had your MINI aligned since you installed the camber plates? If so how much negative camber are you running. If it is a lot you might try backing the camber off a bit. You can also remove the strut, take a BFH & give the tower a couple of whacks to clearance it.

 

I have had the car aligned 2x. The first time was adding ~1.5 deg of negative camber, which was when I first noticed the noise. I brought it back a week later to have the negative camber removed and the rubbing did not go away.

I would prefer to save the use of a BFH on the strut tower as a last resort. Other alternative would be to find a spring with a smaller diameter coil that do not lower the car at all and work with my Koni FSDs. Unfortunately I don't think that anyone makes such a beast.

 

You are correct there's no smaller diameter spring that fits onto those struts. I agree with the BFH being the last resort. If you do have to resort to it at least you will have a witness mark to tell you where to clearance the tower.