I had a faulty thermostat housing on my 07 mini S.

I purchased the replacement thermostat housing and put it on the car today, but once we had the car running for a bit, there was still a coolant leak from the bottom of the thermostat housing.

Is this due to the seal not being in the correct place?

I believe that is the problem, but didn't know if someone had an idea for why the bottom of a brand new thermostat housing would be leaking, or if maybe there is some other place under the housing that coolant could leak.

 

Did you buy a true OEM thermostat, or a cheap knock-off?
If the latter, that's your answer.
If the former, did it come with new blue gasket? I suppose you could have buggered it during installation.

The best possible answers are:
- you did not torque it enough, so do double check those 3-4 bolts holding it to the engine block.
- one of the coolant hoses you touched is loose, and needs to be re-tightened.

Otherwise, you are looking at getting anther t-stat and redoing the job.

a

 

I purchased the housing from my local Mini dealership, so I hopefully it is not a piece of junk.

We are going to redo the job today to see what happened to the seal.

 

+1 on what afadeev said.

Sounds like you did not torque it down evenly, made the gasket slipped out ? I have even seen crude get on the old bolts and then reinstalled and it prevents bolt it down all the way in the hole. Also the connect at the back/ between the water pipe and the thermostat, if the thermostat is not inserted into the water pipe all the way.


Pull it off and check the gasket and that back pipe section so its ll the way into the water pipe.

http://www.ecstuning.com/Search/SiteSearch/11537534521KT/






Good DIY thread here:

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...hermostat.html

 

With the new one make sure you tightened it down to spec, which according to the Bentley Manual is 8 Nm (71 in-lb). Let us know if it leaks!

-Luccia

 

After numerous small issues that compounded this repair: Hood release broke, snapped a screw off in the engine block, busted pipe from water pump to thermostat housing, it is finally working!

The trick was my new neighbor who just moved in happens to be a mechanic at the local mini dealership (godsend!)

We found there was gunk built up on the engine block where the housing is suppose to seal. Once we cleaned all of that off, then snapped a screw in the block and had to take care of that, the housing is not leaking any longer.

Now to fix my hood release...

 

Good news! And lucky that your neighbor is a MINI technician! This NAM thread might help with the hood release issue. It seems to be a common thing popping up.

-Luccia

 

That's what I guessed , crud on the bolts or head. Glad you got it fixed

The hood release thread here:

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...atch-talk.html




Now you have a tech you can tackle more things.