Hey guys, so i wanted to share my experience with my 2004 r50. When i bought the car it had 68xxx miles, now it has 98xxx. To my knowledge the car was involved in a very minor accident in the front (cracked front bumper). Has a clean title. To get full story on how i obtained the r50 check out "My story. New comer from Philadephia" on NAM.

Here are some of the problems i encountered.
Oil leaks, PS pump, coolant loss, electrical, alternator, tie rod
(except the oil leak in the oil pan area the repairs are not related to the accident)

A couple months after i bought the car i changed the oil and i noticed that there was oil leaking. Checked it out and it was the head gasket. I was told that is a common problem. I also checked out what i believe is the oil pan and it has small thin cracks in a bunch of places. It might have cracked on the previous owner due to an under carriage hit (I think). None of the parts looked like they were replaced in the under carriage area. I don't think oil pan usual cracks due to aging. The thing that surprised me is that i didn't seem to be losing oil level on the dip stick. I checked multiple times to make sure i had regular oil level, didn't notice any loss of oil. I probably wont fix either of the leaks because the car has 98xxx miles on it and i will sell it in the near future. Don't think its worth it, also they are very minor leaks.

PS pump failed on me not long after i bought the car. Symptoms included very loud whining noise when ever i would steer. Stiffer steering than i expected, but still very drive-able. When failed, very very stiff steering came in effect. I replaced the pump with my own cost (around 400 w/ small fan). Flushed the steering fluid. Filled it with new fluid and worked the steering in. When on the road the steering felt little easier to steer, but not as smooth as i hoped it would be. Still to this day the whining noise has not gone away even with a new pump. I latter found out that there was an "extended warranty" or more like recall on the pump. Called the dealer and they said "its normal (the whining noise), we cant do anything about it until it actually fails". Obviously its not normal.

I have been experienceing a loss of large amounts of coolant ever since i bought the car. Never touched the cooling system. I would fill up the reservoir about every 3 days to the indicated max capacity. Have not found any traces of coolant under my engine. I think there is still coolant in the system, just not in the reservoir. The reason for that is because my engine hasn't over heated. If there would have been no coolant in the system, it would have been long gone. I have read that the reservoir is to blame, a swap should make the difference.

Electrical. My automatic cvt transmission would only switch to 3rd gear. In order to go 35+- mph the rpms would be around 5000 when going that fast. Took the car to the shop, they ended up changing a wire because it had experienced aging (experienced the temperature changes too many times, i think the wire cracked due to aging). May bey it got squished somewhere and a connection failed. I believe this wire was telling the transmission when to switch gears. The computer went into EP (Emergency Program) either to protect the transmission or because it new something was wrong and went into EP to prevent further damage. The car runs as normal with the wire changed.

Alternator
I share my car with my sister and i think she drove into a big puddle. I think some water got into the alternator and it ceased up or it just stopped working. Don't know what actually causes the alternator to go bad. I charged up the battery to get the car home with jumper cables, only made it so far. Ended up towing the car home. I changed the alternator, bought it from Pep-boys for $217, i still have to return the core to get $55 back. New alternator works as its suppose to.

Tie Rod
I live in Bucks County which is in the suburbs of Philadelphia, PA and when winter comes around pot holes start to show up. They get patched up leaving a bump. Some of the roads just have a very rough surface. The front passenger tie rod got a bit worn off. If i would be facing the rim and push and pull from each side the wheel would move about 1/2 and inch. Which is not really bad, but just for safety i ended up changing it for $50. I think the tie rod went bad due to wear and considering the mount of miles it has on it.

Those are my problems that i encountered. I expected many problems with the car because it had high miles to start out with. A very tight engine doesn't help either when coming to the life of the engine either. The previous owner was a female, i don't want to offend anyone, but she didn't take good car of the car. She pushed the engine to its limits very often and a lack of maintenance was present. Even though many problems occurred with my mini i still enjoy it and will stick to minis in the future.

Feel free to correct me if i am wrong about anything. If have any ideas why something went wrong, please share i would love to know.

 

Probably could have left it as previous owner, the female part is bs. Plenty of men treat cars like crap. I think you offended 50+% of the population.

 

Whining from the power steering is normal in the 1st generation MINI.

My own experience on my 2006 non-S convertible, purchased new: it was fairly reliable for 75K miles, then all hell broke loose. One big ticket repair after another, topped off by a valve job. My power steering had also failed, and not covered by the warranty extension (cut off was early 2005 production).

 

Absolutely. Male or female has nothing to do with this. Douchebaggery at its finest.

 

I dont think the whining noise is normal. When you buy a mini off the dealer it wouldn't come with the whining noise, so why should it be normal. Yes, it doesn't do any harm, but its not normal for the whining noise to be present.

 

Mine always whined, purchased new in 2006.

It's normal: https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...ing-whine.html