Took my Mini to Mini to get an alignment yesterday after it starting pulling to to the right. Drove the car home and it felt great, all good to go. I drove my Jeep to work today and when I got home I walked past my Mini and noticed a mark on top of each black wheel arch. It's like a square 1" X 1" impression with about 2" on either side where the plastic is discolored. It's strange, tried to wipe it off but it wouldn't come off, I had to use my Black Eagle Tire Dressing to cover it up and get the black color back. Anyone seen anything like that before? Wish I had taken pictures of these marks. Why would they attach something there to align the wheels? It was on all four wheel arches in the same exact spot.

 

Pics or it didn't happen.

 

Rather than asking a whole bunch of people who weren't there and, of course, will never be able to see said marks, why don't you ask the person who actually did the work? ...just wondering...

 

+1 to posts #2 and #3

 

Just asking in case someone had the exact thing happen, they would know what I'm talking about. If you haven't seen it, don't respond or a friendly no would suffice.

 

So I finally had time to stop by my Mini Dealer/Service Dept... Looks like they do attach a sensor on the wheel arches using two sided tape as part of the alignment process. They couldn't get it to stick due to the plastic conditioner I use to keep the plastic looking nice and black so they used alcohol to clean the area and of course ended up discoloring it. While at the dealer they used some heavy duty plastic conditioner from their detailing area and it worked pretty well, the black color came back nicely. I think they were pretty much prepared to replace all four wheel arches if they had to. Might be something to watch out for if you all get your alignment done at Mini/BMW.

 

OK then, mystery solved and you've added to the lore of MINI motoring.