I just sent the Footwell Module for our 2009 Clubman S off to ECU Pro for repair. It had no water damage, but for a couple of years has been giving lighting error codes, and seems to have gotten worse. What causes the FRM to fail? I've read everything from jump-starts to just disconnecting the battery. If you can't disconnect the battery, how are you supposed to work on most of the car?
Thanks for any thoughts!

 

Something seems it was not fixed with the repair.

We have heard them failing on jump starts and other work on the FRMs.

Good news is MINI has some new ones in stock finally per model. This is yours: https://www.ecstuning.com/Mini-2009-...or/Electronic/

We also added ones from dorman now in aftermarket: https://www.ecstuning.com/b-dorman-p...hed/502-095kt/

 

The FRMs fail because of EEPROM corruption. The EEPROM is a memory chip on the circuit board where the processor can write data and retrieve it later. If it writes data while the supply voltage is too low, the data gets corrupted.
If you drain the battery too low or disconnect it while data is being written, failures happen. This is a known issue with all EEPROMs and electrical engineers have ways of designing the board to help prevent this. Whoever designed these FRMs screwed up.
You CAN disconnect the battery safely - you need to open the hood, lock the doors and wait 20 min. This gives the FRM enough time to go into sleep mode where it won't be writing any data.

 

Lear Corporation developed all the footwell modules for MINI and BMW group and current. They also make the seats for all the MINIs outside of the nicer recaros.

Thanks for the info on the EEPROMs

 

That's interesting. Hopefully the FRM doesn't mind if you leave the window rolled down, otherwise you couldn't unlock the door to get into the car to do any maintanence that needed the battery disconnected.