Hi fellow MINI enthusiasts!

I purchased my MINI in July 2010 and have since put 16,000 miles on it. I have really enjoyed it!

It wouldn't start a few days this week so I brought it to the dealer today. I thought the battery would be covered by the warranty (it's only 15 months old!) They wanted close to $400 to replace it/labor. They charged $59 for diagnostics (although, I knew what was wrong--I brought it in for the warranty, and would have taken it to the local battery shop that does this for no cost).

I am buying an aftermarket battery tomorrow for $75/free install.

I remember asking my SA when I bought it what WASN'T covered under the MINI warranty...his response was the clutch.

Anyone else have a battery go out in this short of time?

 

Wow, that is pretty early. My 06 with ~30k is on it's original battery.

 

I replaced mine when it was about 18 months old. I like to replace the factory batteries on my cars before they give me any trouble. The PC680 has been in my car over 2 years and is still working great. The car has sat at the airport for as long as 3 weeks and it still cranked up. Houston, TX is not known for it's harsh winters however, so I can't comment on cold weather performance.

-JL

 

something doesn't compute

battery is not covered by warranty, but we've seen others here report they did get it replaced under maint' and a 10 with 16,000 is still under maint' coverage . . .

 

I would see if it would get covered. If not get some other kind of battery.

 

Just out of curiosity, where do you live? I'm assuming that the car doesn't sit for long periods of time...just wondering about the weather as batteries don't do as well in extremes... is it the dealer that you bought the car from new that is giving you such service??

 

While we're on this topic, how good is the Braille brand? They're unbelievably small but some people use them in their MINIs.

 

Yes, but mine was from the previous owner's poor use of small trip and not properly giving the battery to charge via the alternator.
Mine died with only 6,500 miles with the car was already 1.5 years old.
* https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...-no-start.html

Smart idea. I went to the dealer and had them diagnose my low-electrical / no-start problem as well thinking something else.
If I had know it was just my battery failed, I would have purchased an aftermarket battery too and put in myself...

They technically are a racing battery as the compact size, weight and good cold cranking amps.
Don't know how they hole to deep-cycling or heavy temperature changes, but several racers in my area run them in their dedicated race cars.

- Erik

 

The small batteries will usually not have much reserve capacity. So when you start the car, you are using a much larger fraction of the battery's capacity, which tends to shorten its life. Also, if you sometimes take trips that are too short to fully recharge the battery, you can risk not having enough power to start the car a lot more easily than with a stock-size battery.

 

http://www.braillebattery.com/index....tteries/b2317/

I have this. Yes the reserve is lower but the cranking amps are almost exactly the same. It has enough juice to power my amp and speakers while the car is running and everything else. I have had mine for 2 months and no problems.

 

Thanks everyone for your responses!

I live in Portland, mild weather. So I don't think that is it. I called another dealer today to ask about a new battery and they told me that a new mini OEM battery has a two year warranty. I then asked about the one in my car...same thing, he said a two year warranty.

I called Portland MINI back and am still waiting with a dead car. The other dealer said that MINI requires a minimum of 1000 miles a month, which I have done. So we'll see. I hope that they honor this and make things right. I purchased this car from them new (July 2010) at MSRP off the lot (not a custom order). The car had been sitting there for four or five months before I bought it.

 

Another thought...
Wife’s non Daily Driver car had the OEM battery go flat and would not hold a re-charge.
Car had several years on it and is still under warranty.
OEM Battery would have been free, but I opted to replace the OEM battery with a yellow top Optima at our expense as the car can sit for a few weeks at the time in the garage.
Two days later, the Optima was dead.
Had the car flat bedded to the Chevy dealer who tested the charging system, found nothing wrong, removed the flat Optima and installed a new OEM style battery.
Here is where good luck kicked in: While a tech was looking at the car, the rear defroster came on and stayed on for a few minutes and then shut off. Car randomly did this several more times.
Seems there was a problem in the module that controlled the rear defroster and it would come on and go off of its own free will. The defroster will really drain a battery.
Module replaced and no problems since.

 

A car does not use the battery when the engine is running.

 

Can you find a date code on the battery? Maybe the battery is older than you think.... swapped out?

What is the date of manufacture of your MINI? It could have been built as far back as Dec '09. Of course the dealer should honor the warranty based on your purchase date.... Just possible that the battery is several months older. Most automakers put in a cheap 2 year battery. If the battery was not charged for weeks or months at a time on the lot then that could seriously decrease the life of the battery.

I am wondering what the 1000/month means? I put less then 500 miles a month on my MINI and barely have 1K a month if I include 2 or 3 long trips. I am wondering if the average trip miles or any kind of data like that is stored in the computer system?

 

Frisbee, I bought my MINI at the same time that you bought yours and fortunately I've had no problems. However, when at the dealers lot, one of the MINIs that we were looking at had a dead battery. I don't doubt that is a common occurrence and it is not good for the longevity of a battery.

I suspect that the batteries in the new cars in stock receive no care until they won't crank the engine.

 

Did you check the electrolyte level? If the plates are exposed, it's toast. I checked mine a year after purchase and 15K and the plates were barely covered.

DOC

 

I inadvertently connected my xm radio to an unswitched power source so my wife could listen to the radio with the motor off. The battery went dead twice within a two month period and was towed to the dealer (under warranty) twice. During the second visit, it was discovered that the xm radio connected to unswitched power would not allow the computer diagnostics to "go to sleep". A quick reconnect to a switched power source rectified the problem and all has been well for a year. The car is also a "short-trip" car and has not had a problem. The dealer would not make the actual wiring switch because the XM Commander module was not BMW/Mini approved electrical accessory, so I did it myself. However, the dealer could have stuck it to me twice due to the fact that both tows, dealer visits, and diagnostic workups were due to my lack of knowledge regarding the idiosyncrasies of BMW electronics. The service advisor, did in fact, tell me that if a load test would show a battery that was incapable of accepting and holding a charge, that it would have been replaced under warranty.

Steve