I purchase a 2003 Mini Cooper used with 55000 miles, and seemed in great working order then. Now, 3 months and 2500 miles later, the transmission is blown. It popped out of gear and will no re-engage. The check engine light is off, but the tranny stays in neutral even when it is put in R, D, SD, or M/S

It gave out going 2 miles per hour pulling up to a parking space - no high engine load, no high body roll - nothing at all.

We took it to the tech, who said something is wrong with the tranny, but they don't know what. There is some grinding of gears inside, but they don't want to take it off and look inside because they haven't worked on the CVT before.

I drive it enthusiastically, but not hard. I don't mash from D to SD, and I never use steptronic. I do use SD mode to get up to freeway speed, then let off the gas and switch to regular D mode, but I've heard that isn't an issue. Is there any way a semi-speedy but not extreme driving style could burn out a tranny in 3000 miles? I haven't taken it to track, and have redlined maybe 4 times.

Has anyone else had this problem? If so - what did you do? Also - how much does this tranny cost to replace/rebuild? How much does a conversion to a stick cost?

Thanks!

 

Wrong Forum, Should be 1st gen Stock Problems/Issues

Thanks

 

I think it is

 

If you do a search here, you will see that the CVT is not cheap to replace and nobody that we can find will even try to work on it. Most have paid about 5K plus for a replacement. Stick conversion will probably cost roughly the same.

 

I'm sorry your CVT is out, you're not alone in having this problem, FWIW..........I seriously doubt it was anything you did to cause it to fail. We have a member in the KC MINI club who runs his on the track, I'm sure that's way harder usage than yours has ever been subjected to (at least by you!)

Good luck on getting it fixed, my understanding is that you have two choices, a new or a used replacement gearbox.........

 

Tranny fixed - dealer dropped price to $3612 if anyone is interested.

 

great price for a CVT replacement.

also - YOU may have been easy on the trans, but what about the previous owner who drove it for 55k miles?

 

My 2002 MINI's CVT failed at 72000 miles. No extended warranty. Dealer quote 8 grand. I found several forum posts like this and took them to the dealer. The service manager is a great guy. He went to bat for me and they gave me a new CVT with a 2-year BMW warranty for $1350 (labor only). I got lucky, but they must be hiding something about those early CVT's to cave so easily. Thoughts?

 

it's more common than it should be. You got lucky on the replacement cost. The CVT technology is almost ready for prime time, but not quite for our cars. Let's all watch Nissan to see if the ones they're using start to pop as well.

Matt