Hey Everyone,

I have this very troubling problem. So my car (08 MCS) makes a sort of uncomforting noise and some insight as to what it could be will be appreciated.

My car sounds and runs fine during start up, and ever after a while of driving. But after a certain amount of time passes while driving, my engine seems to make some kind of "rattle" from the engine.
Thats the weird part, it only occurs after about 25mins of driving and it only really shows it self at 3000 RPM and up. Ive tried driving my car aggressively and conservatively to see if either or will help, but nothing. The car idles and run fines up until that RPM, then **** hits the fan.

There are no mods on the car, its a stock R56 MCS that has traveled close to 200k KM now, and runs fine (minus the noise). My engine oil is always topped up and I even do my own oil changes at regular intervals. Ive recently went in to MINI to get my HPFP changed under warranty and mentioned the noise to them and asked them to check it out, but they came back empty handed.

Any insight would be helpful! Im worried my engine is slowly taring itself apart and would like to nip this in the butt before it bites me.

 

A video with sound or a sound clip would be extremely helpful.

 

Hey,

Thanks for the reply.

I would like to post a vid of the noise, but my car hasn't been making it recently.... It has gotten significantly colder here, could that be reason why there is an absent of sound? I herd that the timing chain can gain some slack when warm, but could temperature really create that much slack as to generate a noise?

 

Timing chain/tensioner issues commonly occur at cold start-up, that doesn't mean that it couldn't be the cause.

 

So would the cold temperature effect the tensioner in a positive way reducing by reducing the noise? Ive read on the forums that there are faulty tensioners in the early r56 models and im starting to think that is the culprit. Any insight?

 

The tensioners act up in cold weather more often than not, warm weather seams to lessen the rattle in the morning. If you believe it to be the timing chain quit driving your Mini, if the chain jumps the teeth on the cam gear you could be looking at a new engine. This is of course the worst case.