Well curious as to what the opinion of you guys on rebuilding a n14? You hear so much bad talk about them. Trying to see if it can be made reliable on a full rebuild, what do you guys think?

 

N14 reliability issues are more than internals, consider ---
HPFP
timing chain, guides, and tensioner
thermostat housing
water pump
plastic pipe between water pump and t'stat housing
aux coolant pump
turbo wastegate
DV
valve cover leaks
PCV
vacuum pump

and probably other often reported failures. These are just the ones that come to mind first.

You want reliability in a Mini, get an N18 or later engine.

 

I guess another question is if all the parts that normally cause all the issues were replaced with new parts are those parts still probe to issues? Is it the parts themselves or just the overall design of the whole engine setup that causes the issues?

 

I know a guy with an 08 N14 that has over 240k on the speedo. Would appear he may never hit the lottery but he did get a good N14.

 

Some of these failure-prone parts have been redesigned and may be less likely to fail again, i.e., aux coolant pump, HPFP, and chain tensioner. Valve cover / PCV has also been redesigned, but it's still a POS! It's still a crap-shoot for whether or not you get a good N14. Then there's the inconvenience for when parts fail --- troubleshooting, finding replacement parts, labor costs, down-time, etc.

All this from a guy driving one of, if not the baddest N14 in the country. I bought my '07 in late '10 with about 37K miles on it. Still running OEM coolant pump & vacuum pump, but that's about it (OK, alternator & A/C are also OEM). Engine has been completely rebuilt from bottom to top and currently has 95K miles on it. Not a lot for an '07, but its been on blocks for at least a year, mostly of my own doing, but not all. Currently, it's running as sweet as can be --- I just don't trust it. Fortunately, it's a "toy", not needed as a DD.

So, I guess it comes down to --- why do you want to rebuild??? For the cost of a complete engine rebuild, plus the cost of replacing failure-prone "bolt-ons", you could get a really nice N18 or later equipped Mini.