So, the other day I hit one of those stupid cement car stopper things with my front passenger side wheel. The alignment was off pretty bad, so I took it down to firestone and they guy checked everything out, said nothing looked bent, and they did an alignment for me.

Its now about 5 days later and I noticed a weird thunk sound whenever I would come to a stop, and then accelerate again. The same would happen if I were to go over a speed bump or something. So, I was going to head over to my parents house tomorrow and get the car up on jack stands and pull apart the suspension up there to see if I could notice anything, but just now as I was driving up my parking structure, it started making a NEW sound (hooray )... this time it was more of a scraping sound... metal on metal or like a chain sliding across the ground almost. So, I stopped the car and got out to see if anything was scraping on the ground, and nodda.... couldnt see a damn thing. The sound was only occuring while I was moving (phew... that pretty much excludes any engine problems). I got back in the car, started it up, and the sound was gone! Got all the way to the top of the parking structure and I started turning the wheel back and forth... I noticed that when it is ALMOST all the way to one side, it makes a slight rattling sound... cant remember if it happened before or not... the sound is very faint.

I am absolustely stumped! I can turn the wheels back and forth fine, and a quick visual check everything LOOKS ok. Ill need to get it up on jackstands and start pulling crap apart before I can really tell.

Has anyone had this happen before or have any idea what the hell this could be??? I am ASSUMING it has to do with that damn cement thing, but I cant be certain.

 

brake rotor rubbing:
loose wheel bolts
loose sway bar links
??

 

I planned on checking 1 and 3 tomorrow. The wheel bolts are all torqued to 100. So annoyed with this... bent tie rod maybe?

 

So I took it to a local shop today and what took me 3 attempts to try to figure out took him all of 2 minutes. The guy is absolutely great and I HIGHLY recommend his shop for any bay area MINI driver that needs to have service not under warranty done on their car. Send me a PM and I can disclose all of the shop information for you.

SO, apparenty it is the inner ball joint on the A-arm.... he said its completely shot. My question to all of you is, do you think that this should be under warranty????????? I have H-sport springs on the front of the car, no other mods to the front suspenstion. Im waiting for a call back from East Bay MINI to for their input on it, but I wanted to see what you guys have to say about it first. So....

SHOULD IT BE UNDER WARRANTY OR NOT???

 

I don't think it should be under warranty, as you caused the damage by hitting the cement piece, but whether or not it will be is a different matter

 

Actually, this didnt start to happen for about a week later so Im not sure that is what its from.

 

i've had a series of bad experiences with the Mini front end. Both wheel bearings had to be replaced within about 4 months of each other and one of my outer lower ball joints.

 

were they covered under warranty? did you have springs installed at the time?

 

Warranty repair? didn't you hit one of those stupid cement car stopper things the other day?

 

see post #6.... I definetely couldnt be sure thats what its from. The guy at the shop said the same thing... it COULD have been that, or it could be completely unrelated... there is no way to tell for sure.

 

I see... I would just pay for the repair and get my car back asap so i can play with it on the weekend.