My MINI gets a new Transmission
 

Three weeks ago today I dropped off my MINI at CarMax (where I bought it) for it's 60k service. After replacing a cracked shift linkage bracket it was having difficulty shifting into first and grinding in 2nd, or so I was told. Well it's been gonig back and forth between CarMax and MINI of Irvine. MINI said it's the throwout bearing. They wanted $2,200 for a clutch job, CarMax was $1,300. So the car went back to CarMax and they gutted it yesterday only to call and tell me the throwout bearing looked fine.

So, my only guess is the transmission is going bad and needs replaced, what else could it be? It's all covered under my extened warranty through CarMax but still 60k miles and a new tranny? Really? I cannot imaging this being the problem but if it is, wow.

Were there any quality parts built into these cars at all? So far I can't imagine there were. Fun cars but what pieces of junk!

Thank God for extended warranties.

Sounds like a syncro is going, which is either a rebuild or a new tranny. It seems to be a common problem with the 5 speed tranies. Is yours a 5 spd or 6spd. More for my curiosity, and if it is infact a 5 speed, since you'd need a new tranny anyway. Look into what it would take to put a 6spd into it.

Yep, it's a 5-speed and if it needs replaced I will look into the additional cost of upgrading to a 6-speed. If it's tranny related all the labor will now be covered under the warranty so I plan to have them put all new clutch parts in as well. This way everything is new.

Got a call just now from CarMax, it's the tranny, she's dead and will need replaced and it seems MINI of Irvine has them in stock. That right there tells me the tranny's in these cars are junk.

I cannot upgrade to a 6-speed as that would void my warranty and no way is it worth that. My clutch was just below 50% so I'm going to pay for the parts (no labor cost as it's all under warranty) and have a new one installed as well.

So, it's looking like another week at least. An inspector will come out on Monday or Tuesday to give approval for the replacement and then it'll just be getting the new tranny and putting her back together.

Ah yes the siren song of Rover owners everywhere!:lol: Actually it's not the car that's junk per se, it's just the Midlands fiver is a HUGE POS.

They are not junk but the problem lies with BMW not allowing repair parts into the market. Right now I am faced with much the same problem with my '04 MCS 6-speed. In my case, I am out of warranty and the culprit is the input shaft bearing. The shop that has my gearbox is trying to find a bearing that would work but would also require the corresponding gear to be machined to fit the bearing.

The "normal" thing for BMW is to do is to do a transmission swap. The techs are not allowed to crack the case.

If a quality transmission was used in the first place you'd not be in this predicament, a transmission should run for the life of a car. I never once had tranmissions issues with any of my other cars, none, not even ones I put 125,000+ miles on. As I see, BMW or Rover, put junk tranny's in these cars.

The Midlands 5 speed is weak
 

but the Getrag 6 speed takes a pretty good beating. But no matter what, they're not all perfect, and even some examples of the best trannies ever went out after too short a time. Whomever that happened to felt shafted, even if it was one in a million. But BMW is notoriously, um, slow at recognizing the issues and doing something about it. Get in touch with Mini Mania, I think there were selling an uprated gear set for the Midlands, and they may have some experience with the parts you're looking for.

I don't know this for sure, but it's worth a shot.

Matt

I don't expect them all to be perfect, they can't, there built by imperfect people. But, there's a lot more here then that one in a million. It's quite obvious that there is a huge issue with these tranny's as a lot of people seem to be having failures. If I did not buy an extended warranty this fix would be on me only after owning this car for 18 months. I paid $1,800 for a 4 year warranty. Including this tranny repair and all the other repairs over these 18 months the total for warranty work, so far, will be about $7,000. I have 2.5 years to go on my warranty, if I still have the car you can bet I'll re-up the warranty, if I can't I'll sell it.

That's why I titled my last post
 

"The Midlands is Weak" And this is pretty well known. But I hear what you're saying. Just be happy you didn't get a CVT. It's got issues as well, and costs more to fix!

Matt

I'm just happy I got an extended warranty that's covering all this.

One very important lesson in all this, never own a MINI without warranty coverage.

^^^ we don't have a Mini dealer here in my country (Philippines), so you're lucky you guys have warranty, extended or not

i'm in the shop now where my tranny's being put back together. i spent $350 for them to take it out, disassemble it, and find out that i have to replace synchros (plural), tried to get a synchro kit for 2-3 weeks (yup you guessed it, couldn't find any, even for a Ford Focus SVT that has the same Getrag 285 tranny), and since i need a car to drive, told the shop to just put everything back together til i get a new/used tranny from the U.S.

FYI, my 2004 MCS only has 14,xxx kms on it, and i'm the 3rd owner here. seems the previous 2 owners didn't take care of it that well.

Bummer mini macky, I hope you get fixed up quickly. Needless to say I know exactly what you're going through.

My big question now is what brand tranny I'll be getting. They told me the dealer has them in stock but I have no idea what type or brand it is or if it is new or rebuilt. I'll ask when they call me over the next couple of days