Hi. i thought i posted our story for everyone back in April but it doesnt seem to be listed anywhere. i will give a brief summary of what happened. my husbands 2003 mini cooper spontaneously went on fire in front of our eyes after having benn parked for 4 hours. i have read comments from others regarding other mini fires who feel it may have been arson...NO WAY. Dont ignore this very real danger with these cars..there have been many and Mini Northeast as well as mini UK are TOTALLY AWARE and do nothing to warn mini owners of this deadly defect! Luckily or perhaps unluckily we are one of the very few whose car was saved by my quick thinking..hose weilding husband (and the local fire dept) . It tookBMW mini 3 weeks to get our car back to us after many stalling techniques and double talk. they "diagnosed the problem in 2 days " we dont know why but it seems your power steering fan didnt turn off when you shut the car off causing it to continue to run, burn out and ignite your power steering fluid" they also claimed to have NEVER had this happen to anyone else although I have found in my research many documented cases! our car is back with us bt not for long..we are looking to sell it..we will never sleep peacefully knowing this car is in our garage attached to our home and under or childrens bedrooms! I have no confidence after dealing with BMW mini and reading about case after case that bmw has a true handle on this problem. they wont even admit there is a fault in the car let alone really know if they FIXED the problem. I guess they are waiting for a fatality to warn the consumers and recall the cars for further testing and inspection! Good Luck to all you mini owners..i hope you never have to face this ordeal!! STAY AWARE AND KEEP SAFE! jujubee

 

HMM this seems to be a second source of Fire. Power steering pump and the ABS pump

 

Interesting, you can learn more here: http://www.kenet.co.uk/bmw-problems/ and in a BBC report here: http://www.kenet.co.uk/bmw-problems/Watchdog.wmv. I don't see anything on this post 2003 models. Though BMW may not admit to the problem, it may have been repaired since that time(?).

 

Not that I am justifying anyting, but other manufacturers, are aware of wiring issues with their cars, and it is not reported very well. Maybe there have been other documented cases of this, but not enough to form a justifiable pattern.

Mazda Proteges for instince, the wiring to the headlights shorts out and melts, and the socket needs to be replaced. We did about 5 last year alone in a town of 14,500 ppl. But have not seen any TSB's on that issue yet.

J

 

Hey Jujubee, do you remember how many miles were on your MINI at the time? Is it a Cooper or an 'S'? I'm trying to compile as much info on these types of fires as I can. My '03 MCS caught fire last week. It was also the power steering - the electronic power steering pump shorted out. Thanks.

 

Since a saw a post about this I thought I should let everyone know. I had a 2008 mini cooper s convertible and enjoyed it tremendously until 2 nights ago. We had gotten a call that an alarm at our store had gone off so we went to check on it we got back about 11pm. Our neighbor was out of town and asked us to park one of our cars in her driveway so that it would look as if someone was home. At 4:20 am we awoke hearing loud popping noises thinking someone was trying to break into our house. We looked out the window and what we saw was the mini engulfed in flames 20 feet in the air. If I hadn't parked in the neighbors driveway our house and our 3 series would all have been in flames too. I had just taken my car to the dealer and the service rep has heard my car fan and asked if it always ran on high like that and I said yes. So apparently this is a problem and they obviously know about it if they are asking. What is left of my car looks like something out of a hollywood movie set. I first thought the same thing. Someone torched my car but after reading about other fires it is now apparent that it is a problem with mini. I will never own another mini and I will tell people about the problem and to be careful.

 

I love that. Just because something happens to someone, even though its at best a .1% chance of it happening. The whole line is obviously cursed. We all know that other cars have never caught fire before, ever.

 

Who said the whole line was cursed? No one did. Relax. I am glad that people share anything about our cars good AND bad. I dont blame the guy for not wanting to own a mini after this.

I am glad no one was hurt. Sorry your car was destroyed.

 

I never said the whole line was cursed. What I was saying is that this has happened to more than one person. And I don't want it to happen to anyone else. I was not aware that there was a problem with the engine fan running on high after the car shut off. Mine was the service rep noticed it and didn't let me know it was something that I needed to keep an eye on and that it could possibly catch fire. Our entire home and other car could have caught fire if it would have been in my driveway. I lucked out the a neighbor asked me to park in her driveway because she was going on a camping trip with her son and wanted it to look like someone was home. We were lucky if this had happened to someone in their garage they wouldn't be so lucky. Thank you for being concerned that no one was hurt as to the other guy who says it is .1% of ever happening do you have those statistics to prove that.

 

No problem. Some people here crack me up. We cannot say anything bad about minis OR this site? Give me a break.

Of course he will say we can say something bad about this site or Mini's but obviously that is not true.

My fan sounds like a harrier jet when I turn off my car and that is why your story caught my eye, thanks again for sharing. Seeing that pic of your MINI on fire and the aftermath made me cringe. I would be devastated if I came out to see my car like that

 

Hi my mini just caught fire sat night I posted something on here, mine was a 08 with about 9,200 miles on it. completely devastated check out the pics

 

If this is something that's known to cause problems in a significant range, they would have to recall said models for fixing. However, it seems too scattered and sparse to be anything but really bad luck, at least until it's diagnosed as a real problem for many people.

Granted, having it happen AT ALL is a bad thing, but not enough for recalls.

Although after considering what happened, if people are killed or injured, it will definitely result in a recall, or so I'd assume.

The Lexus/Toyota recall two weeks ago, of over 10 models ranging from 06 - 10 for all sorts of lines due to driver side floor mats, because of a few accidents, was enough for multiple recalls. So it's bound to happen if it keeps reoccurring.

 

Check out the Spontaneous Engine Bay Fire thread:

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...bay-fires.html

there's lots of information there.

 

Wow. Dejvu! My 2008 Cooper S on 10/2 Spontaneously combusted within 10 mins of me arriving home from work. Hell, it almost burned my brothers house down.
I had just gotten home, as I just said, and my nephew was yelling to me, "Uncle T your car is on fire!"
I ran out and it smoking heavily and I could see some flames coming out from under the engine area and I tried to move the car away from the house but as soon a I approached the car, the flames shotup in the air like 5 to 10 feet.
So the fire department came and it took them a good 15 + mins to extinguish the fire and burning the garage door and some molding. Extremely lucky the Santa Ana's were not blowing that day, they were the 3 previous days, or the house would have burned for sure.
I notified MiniUSA on Monday AM and they returned my call in the afternoon and investgating it currently. I looking forward to see how they handle it and finding the cause of the fire. I would say they did seem sincere in any inconvinences this may have caused, but only time will tell if they were truly sincere by handling this event quickly.

 

I guess its not as rare as Jeremy thinks it is. This is scary stuff indeed. Now I know why a friend of mine installed a fire extinguisher in his mini.

 

For that fire I had, no way. The fire department had to cover the car in foam to get it out. Intense.

 

FYI, my 08 had around 38-39K on it.

I posted pic's in my gallery of it.

 

yeah it took about 20 minutes for the fire department to get my fire out also and the fire detective that came out the next day said that the flames were in excess of 1200 degrees. I have to say that it probably will take someone dyeing for before a recall actually happens. Many car companies dont think a few isolated cases is enough to recall thousands and thousands of cars that will in turn cause them to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars. I hope this never happens and the problem is solved but I didnt get much help from mini. It just so happens that my insurance company called them and put them on notice if they wanted to investigate but nothing back from them. I had already called mini financial and let them know and I really got nothing from them.....

 

seems like a trend in this thread that they're 08's... but the start of the thread was an 03, so i guess none of us are really "safe". im happy people post stuff like this because it keeps all of us aware.

 

Welps, i'm sure my 2nd generation will most likely die from cold chatter starts before spontaneously combusting

 

Do you have any wood to knock on Matt??!!

I feel sorry for Roger and Teasea, it is going to take some time before these issues are resolved. Let us know what the Investigaotrs say (Mini or otherwise). It might not be a bad idea for you two to exchange information, pics. names, inusrance cos., it might seem trivial, but if a suit does come along and one of you knows about it you would be able to keep in contact. Just a thought.

 

FYI, I will not here back on the investigation on the fire for another 2 to 3 weeks. I'll keep you all posted.

 

Hey longtime user of this wonderful site. First time posting. I own a 2007 MCS with 36,000 miles. I took a 5 minute drive to my local library yesterday and returned home to park my totally stock vehicle in the garage which is attached to the house.

I sat in my kitchen for 5 minutes after I parked car and smelled burning and saw smoke out my window of kitchen.

I ran into garage and my whole hood of the mini was engulfed in flames. I quickly tried to put out with hose in garage and it was no use. I grabbed dog and phone out of the house and called 911. By the time the FD arrived and put out the fire, the car is completely wasted. Engine compartment is a charred mess. All plastic from the doors forward is completely melted. Glass shattered, front end is completely melted away. I believe car is a total loss as the dash, parts of seats and tires are melted.

luckily the house survived but my garage is a total loss and needs to be gutted.

I write this to warn others. I have no idea what caused this but was shocked to see others expereince this on this site. Any advice on what to do with BMW when I finally get insurance settlement? I am very dismayed and pissed off but would like to know if there is a class action suit going on or other means.

I loved my car and had much fun but I am having a hard time convincing myself to get another. If this happened at night with my family sleeping rather my kids being at school and wife at work during the day it could have been deadly.

 

Sorry to hear about your loss my friend. It sucks. I loved my Coop too, the car was a blast to drive, it was cool looking, fuel efficient. Thou the service department @ mini always wanted to violate my wallet. Bastards.
Anyway, my insurance company settled with me last week and the exact cause is still under investigation and will be for the next few weeks. So I don't have any answers for you.
Mini has been pretty good about staying in contact with me throughout this incident, but they didn't replace the car, which I hope for (I would have requested a ejection seat thou in this one).

 

So I should listen for the fan running every time I get out of my car? I have a beetle & they had a problem with the fuse box on top of the battery melting & causing engine fires. I ran it to 240k with no problems. Lets hope I have the same luck with my 2004 S