Hey everyone, I've got a 2006 Cooper S and it has developed this very perplexing issue just yesterday after a ~120 mile drive down interstate 95 with the A/C on. When I arrived at my house after this long drive, I noticed a fairly strong burning smell and an odd noise that seemed to be engine speed dependent. When I popped the hood, after shutting off the engine the smell was quite strong. I started it back up and noticed gray smoke coming out from around the alternator/ under the supercharger. Today, when I went back out to look at it, I decided that the belt might have gone bad, so I replaced it with a brand new unit. The old belt did have a bunch of very fine black dust on the ribbed side of the belt, so I figured it was a good call. Slap the new belt on there after spinning all the pulleys to make sure none were jammed, and this seemed to eliminate the weird speed dependent noise, however the smell and the smoke were still there. During these times of changing the belt I was disconnecting the battery every time I went in there, just to be safe. The last time I reconnected the battery, and went to start the engine to try and pinpoint the source of the smoke after removing some more plastic guarding from under the front of the engine, as soon as I flipped the ignition to "ON" (but without starting the engine) I hear a whirring noise the progressively got louder and louder. Turns out this was the power steering pump, which I do not remember doing previously. What could be going on with my engine? Could the power steering pump be causing the smell/smoke? (seems funny, because the are where the burning smell lingers after the car as been off for some time is around the supercharger pulley). Did I screw up the power steering pump when I reconnected the battery?
Note: All during this time, my battery light never turned on. After listening and pinpointing the power steering pump whizzing away, I tried starting the engine, however I was greeted by loud clicking noises, which is suspect means the battery is depleted from the pump running at full speed without the engine on.

Thanks for any insight into this perplexing issue...

 

The P/S pump is a recall/extended warranty item. Depends on your model & miles, but check into it. My local Mini dealer replaced both my pump and fan (and probably the fluid as well) at no cost to me. 2004 R53 with (then) 98K miles on it.

 

Mine just went out too. It's not covered on the 06's. :(

 

If it's not the pump, there can be an oil smell/leak coming from either the valve cover gasket or the spark plug O rings (they just wear with age.) Both are cheap and easy.

 

Check the crank pulley. It smell like burning rubber when it goes bad.

 

+1 on the checking the crank pulley. Things can go bad really quickly if it fails completely so I would stop driving the car until it's checked or replaced.

Here's a post from another thread.

 

Hi,
Most likely the crank pulley. They all go out at some point. I have replaced three to date (on different cars, I have owned)
Itsme Wayne

 

Thanks for all the input. I actually just replaced the crank pulley a couple months ago, because it finally bit the big one and cleaved itself in two, so I was fairly confident that it shouldn't be the source. I decided to go all-in on getting to the alternator, since that's more or less where the smell was coming from. FINALLY got the little bugger out of there, and it REEKS of the smell I was getting (and with it removed, the engine bay is devoid of that god-awful smell). Tomorrow I'll go track down an alternator and get it bolted back up into the bowels of my engine bay, so I can get back on the road (hopefully )

 

Good for you! Now get that Mini driving again and let us know how it turned out!
Itsme Wayne