i just bought a brand new mini cooper s. it came straight outta the warehouse and now has a total of 742 miles. after this short stint of drbing basically to school and back and around town, the clutch is completely fried. the dealer is claiming driver abuse which i think is completely ridiculous. i know its possible to burn a clutch in this amount of time but it takes alot more than a 15 minute mild city drive to school to do it. mini wont help me out... any ideas ????

 

Thats sad to hear. I would ask to speak to a manager and explain to him that a brand new car with about 700 miles should not have a burnt clutch. its obviously a manufacture defect or a faulty clutch. Print out this thread and show it to them if you have to. Let them know this is becoming a common issue and other dealers are taking care of their customers. Also I'd call MINI and complain that your brand new car is having these problems and your dealer isn't helping.

This is ridiculous. Im scared to take delivery of my MCS.

 

With all due respect: it's very easy to burn a clutch in less than 700 miles; I know, I did it once in several hundred yards and I've seen it done by others. For each person here that complains about bad clutches, I know three people who are past 50,000 miles on the original clutch. I'm not saying these clutches are perfect, but I am saying there's a lot of potential for excessive wear that not a lot of people seem to talk about around here.

The extra torque of the engine means it's easier to slip the clutch with a lot of power going through it, which will wear it out quicker, but just driving fast doesn't do anything to the clutch, as long as it's fully engaged. This is a small clutch, too, so there's less mass to absorb heat, which makes them more sensitive to burning. Think back to F1 cars of the 1990's, they had 800 HP going through a 5 plate clutch the size of a tea saucer, and those would fail in an instant of mis-use, despite being made from Unobtainium!

 

I once sold a new legacey gt to a woman who had to have a 5 speed that before she left our dealership had smoked the clutch.The lady in question came in to the showroom screaming that we sold her a lemon,i asked her what seemed to be the problem and she told me she put it gear then revved it up and the car stalled she then said that she tried a few more times each time increasing the revs before letting the clutch out .

I walked out to the car and could detect a strong burning smell coming from the car.I asked for the keys and got in the car,while starting the car and depressing the clutch i could tell that the pedal felt weird i reached for the shifter and noticed it was in 5th gear.

I asked the lady if she tried to pull away from the parking lot in 5th gear and she replied that of couse she did because when leaving she planned to get right on the freeway .

 

yeah but there were lots of clutch and flywhell issues with the first gen car and it wasnt as near as torquey, what with that iron block lump of a low-tech (yet bulletproof-dependable) engine.

And tell the track guys to "drive slower..."

 

Yes, I understand you can burn a clutch real quick by doing a few burnouts or heavy launches...or even riding on it often or slipping it inappropriately. But the poster above was saying he was just commuting back and fourth to school/work. I can't verify if it was being driven correctly, but if it was, a clutch should not burn at 700 miles from a daily commute, will all due respect.

Extra torque isn't an excuse for a clutch to fail prematurely. They should be engineered to handle the extra torque that the engine puts out. I had a 6 speed Audi with a chipped 2.0T that was putting out over 270lbft of torque (stock is 200lbft) and I drove many miles with no issues, as did many others.

But I agree, there is probably a majority of clutches that will go +100k miles with no issue. But it seems like the failure rate is higher than what it should be.

 

Part of the problem is we can't verify the important facts regarding what happened. We don't know if he was using the clutch correctly, or if there were a lot of hills on his commute. Without seeing the car and the driver's technique, we can only guess as to what really happened.

Also, it's not the extra torque that kills clutches, it's how the driver handles it. I used to drive a manual Honda Civic that didn't have a lot of torque. To get started, I had to rev the engine to 2500 and engage the clutch. The engine would drop to 1000 and I'd get started. If I reved the engine and engaged the clutch in the same way in the MINI, the engine speed wouldn't drop nearly as much and I'd be wearing out the clutch faster.

And as far as the overall failure RATE goes; remember that this topic is a very small sampling of the total MINI owners in the world, and is going to attract people who have had clutch problems. By the very nature of the topic, you're going to see a huge number of "clutch failure" posts in relation to "clutch good" posts. That doesn't mean the MINI's clutch fails often, this just means there are X number of people who read posts at NAM AND have failed clutches. Small, incomplete, and skewed samples make for inaccurate averages.

 

My Mini has had zero problems with the clutch. I only have 9400 miles or so but thus far it's been perfect. I sense no problems at all.

I have an 05 GTO with a 6 speed that has 86,200 miles or so on the original clutch and it works perfectly. I've had this car on several track days and at the drag strip several times with no apparent harm. Everything is original and works perfectly.

I think that unless the clutch is defective from the get go or abused most cars will never have a clutch problem. Those types of problems just don't crop up very often.

Pat

 

I've got 8,500 miles on my 08 Clubman S and I still think has the smoothest shifting transmission and best clutch feel I've ever driven on any car. I've had zero problems with the car.

 

Back in college we bough a honda civic with 140k on the original clutch. We told the dealer would only buy if then would replace the clutch if bad with in the first 6 months. Since we did not know how long it would last we made sure it would be gone with in 6 months. I would start off in 4th slipping all the way, hold the car against a parking lot stop for a few minutes at a time, drive with my foot on the cluth. It still took several hunded miles to get it to start slipping and then several hunderd more after that to get it to die and the car allready have 130k to start with. 700 miles just does not seem possible for a person to do unless there is something wrong with the car to start with.

 

If you do not remove your foot from a clutch while driving it will not really wear out but it will glaze and start slipping. Same is true when you use the clutch on a hill from drifting backwards. Do both and watch the thing start slipping fast.
A lot of people rest their foot on the clutch while driving. I think it even mentions to not do that in most car owners manuals.
When stopped at a light a lot of people just plain do not push the pedal all the way to the floor. That is also going to cause glazing.
When the dealer takes your car apart and the clutch is burnt up and not worn down they are just plain going to charge you. Warrenty will not cover a burnt out clutch.
Ronnie948

 

Hummmm
don't know if I would have told that story
doesn't seem entirely honest to me.

 

it was 16 years ago I was much younger then.

 

It would be interesting to see on these cars that have this issues if the disk is worn down. It would seem that a bad adjustment from the factory could cause the clutch to not engage all the way with you foot off of it or not disengage all the way with you foot on the floor and cause the problem even with normal driving.

 

You're correct, glazing will cause the clutch to slip well before the friction material is worn away, but I wouldn't say that the clutch isn't wearing out. The same slipping that's causes the heat to glaze the clutch plate is also wearing off the clutch plate's friction material.

 

Thought I would share a positive experience regarding clutch failure. I purchased my 07 Mini (all JCW parts short of wing) with about 5,000 miles on it and since have placed about 14k more miles on it. Last week I noticed an inconsistent throttle, and my RPMs would jump 10K RPMs and immediately drop.

Called Knauz Mini (North of Chicago) to set up an appointment to one, inspect why my engine was acting up, two fix the cold start issue.

It was five days before I could get in, and low and behold, after sitting the car for the weekend, I drove to and from work Mon-Tues and was losing more and more power. Tripped no CELs, and was able to determine it was the clutch, and it was going fast. It died next morning on the side of the highway. Had it towed to the shop where they confirmed my suspicions

Mind you I do not track the car, I have been driving a stick for 15 years, and know how to properly handle a manual in stop in go traffic. Granted driving on the highway in Chicago is not the best conditions for the car, but I have had several other high performance cars, and have never come close to blowing a clutch in worse driving conditions. That said I have no idea what the original owner did. Did I mention the car was an import from Italy?

Having read all these horror threads, I expected the worse. I could not have been more wrong. Knauz gave me a loaner and the next day my MA, Steve, who has been great ever since I bought the Mini, called me to let me know all the repairs are covered by Mini, and I could pick it up the next day (tomorrow). There were countless apologies for my inconvenience by several people at the dealership.

Lesson being, if your clutch acts up, be honest and courteous with the dealer while explaining the situation. Bad mouthing the car, dealership, etc will not with you any friends.

 

looks like a defective pressure plate may have been the culprit. i now have a lawyer involved....fml

 

Just had my clutch replaced @ 25k miles on my 08 R56...under warranty.

Throwout bearing was the culprit.

A ton depends on your dealer on whether or not they will warranty a clutch job. It's very easy for them to say "oh this is driver error" and send a bill your way.

 

It's just as easy for a driver to trash a clutch, too, even if they know what they're doing.

 

some people here insist that some people are not driving appropriately, which very well may be the case... but don't discount that it could actually be a bad clutch... i got my 2nd clutch at 7k miles under warranty...

i'm on my second clutch, and it is WAY better... i am guessing i really did have a bad clutch.. i've been driving stick forever, yet some people posted it "must have been me"... believe me, since the new clutch, there is a world of difference... overall, the driving experience is more "solid"...

i've taken the car out for "spirited sessions"... and the car has been performing marvelously... the only issue that i have with the car now, is that the run flats SUCK and the tires must be changed...

 

You're a smart dude. I've seen it posted here probably 4-5 times: car less than a year old. I don't drive it weird. Clutch goes out. Dealer says I abused it and I've gotta pay like 4 grand. To me that borders on grand larceny. Seriously. It's like your car gets run into in a parking lot. You call your insurance company for repairs. They claim you did it. They're both insurance issues that rely on your honesty.

 

The warranty on my '06 MCS w/ JCW is expiring soon, so I'm doing a lot of research to try to determine whether it's cost effective to keep the car vs get something new. Anyway, I noticed you mentioned Knauz MINI in this post and I was just there on Friday getting quotes for an extended warranty! Steve Porch still works there and I've had nothing but excellent service from this dealership.

BTW, I'm at 4 yrs, 41k miles on the original clutch and it still feels the same as Day 1. This is my first stick-shift car, too, so I "learned" on it. No problems!

 

Keep it!

 

nice zombie thread!

 

Zombies.
Not just for killing.