BEAWARE
I just had my MINI Cooper S towed in for service because the power steering fan
failed and blow a fuse. The power steering fan fuse is also the fuse used by the cooling fan. Therefore when the power steering fan blew the fuse I had no cooling fan and my car immediately overheated to the max.

I did notice just before I saw the tempature gage go out of site , my air conditioner
blew warm are when set on Auto and LO.

My dealer Hank Aaron in Union City GA was most helpful in repairing my car.

The service dept did say that they have had several failures of the power steering fan with the MINI since the worm weather began in the South.

I wonder if MINI USA is doing anything about this recurring problem or is it going the way of the MINI srevice manual?

 

We have 4 MINI friends that this happened to - over the course of the past 3 weeks. We all just ordered Skid Plates to protect the underneath side because anything can get up in there and cause the problem.

 

Has anyone thought of adding an inline fuse for the power steering
fan that is smaller than the fuse in the fusebox?

That way, you could lose the PS Fan, and keep the radiator fan.

BUT how would you know the PS Fan was not working?
When the power steering PUMP failed???

Maybe this is actually designed this way so you can't burn
up your pump?

 

The 2003 MCS' have a separate fuse for the power steering fan (separate from main cooling fans), so MINI did address this issue (thanks!)

I agree with Trippy, it should be possible to put a slightly smaller fuse inline for the PSF on 02 MCS, but I also agree that then ther eis the problem of not knowing when the PSF fails, or the fuse blows. I may have to check that on my MCS by pulling out the fuse for the PSF, to see if any check light comes on.

Here are two posts where people describe their fitted PSF grilles without having to resort to the larger and heavier skid plate:

Vespa's PSF grille

Moorlockx's PSF grille

I like this idea and will probably do that as well shortly.

Cheers,
Markus

 

In defense of the large skid pates, they protect much more than just the p.s. fan...

And no, i'm not defending them just because I won a free one, but I drove my MINI all winter long and I can't tell you how mny. times i've heard quite a loud klunk sound comming from under my engine due to stealth chunks of ice.. The skid plate gives it a good working over before it has a chance to it the underside of the rest of my MINI... even the occasional un-avoidable styrofoam cup has been totally shredded by the trip under my car..



Rocketboy_X

 

I'd be curious to see the reasons listed for these P/S fan failures. I mean, what happens to cause it to blow the fuse to begin with? I've seen and heard of this happening, but other than the dealer guy telling me he's seen 3 or 4 with sticks and stuff jammed in them, I've heard of no other reasons.