We’ve reported that BMW was fighting this recall (for obvious reasons). Now it would seem they’ve finally succumb to the NHTSA’s pressure. Here’s an excerpt from the NHTSA (sorry for the all caps – that’s how they roll in the US government apparently):
> BMW IS RECALLING 28,450 MY 2007-2008 MINI COOPER S VEHICLES. THE CENTRALLY LOCATED TAILPIPE EXTENSION PROTRUDES SLIGHTLY BEYOND THE REAR BUMPER. IT IS POSSIBLE FOR INADVERTENT CONTACT TO OCCUR WITH A PERSON’S LEG.
+ MINI Cooper S Recall / NHTSA
Well NHTSA, now go onto doing the same to make MINI recall their defective clutches and flywheels.
Well, that is just great – Maybe now I can get my Harley recalled since it has scorched my leg a few times, then maybe my Viper and then I’ll go after Carroll Shelby for the burns from my Cobra sidepipes.
What a crock! If you burn yourself on the exhaust tips, it is YOUR fault! If your child or someone else burns themselves on the exhaust tips, it is YOUR fault!
Let’s just start making all items with no sharp corners, no pointy tips, nothing that gets too hot – Nothing that could harm anyone in any way and then everyone who incessantly complains about this kind of stuff will be happy and the frivolous law suits will cease.
and C4 – Just curious, what exactly is wrong with the defective clutches and flywheels? As I owned a 2003 Cooper S and now a 2007 Cooper S, neither of which did I have any issues with those items — Nor have I burned myself on the exhaust tips.
Just want to thank the very few people that seem to think the Mini recall is better than the Mini service meno. At the end of the day all this is about is opening law suits against Mini showing a defective product causing injury. It’s not like this recall is going to magically remove burns from people.
Another reason why the US is the laughing stock pretty much world wide.
C4 I have had 3 Mini’s and have spent more than a little time on the track and although I would agree the flywheel and clutch could have been better. However having said that I have never had problems with either personally. Don’t really think flaming Mini is really going to do anything to magically change your current cars, maybe you should communicate this to Mini that you would be willing to spend more money on your next Mini for a upgrade.
“Another reason why the US is the laughing stock pretty much world wide.”
Wait, what?
Are we the ones who made automakers make massive changes because when cars run into people, it hurts the person?
The OEM LuK clutch material is very soft and don’t last long. The springs on the clutch plate release bearing springs lose lubrication (Defect)and begin to wear out unevenly. The dual mass flywheels glaze and begin to squeal with the infamous “Chewbacca” noise.
All of the above are well documented and widely known faults with the OEM clutch hardware. Last I checked the clutch is a vital part of the drivetrain and poor durability of its parts can pose a safety risk.
I agree this recall of the tailpipes is frivolous at best. But when it comes to critical components that affect the driveability and safety of the vehicle, the line has to be drawn.
Whatever… The NHTSA gets complaints and reviews them. Not happy with the result? Submit comments to the NHTSA…. Write your congressman (or woman)…
Matt
This recall is nonsense. I’ve had my R56 for over a year and have never burned myself. Isn’t it common sense to be careful around a hot tail pipe?
I guess they should weld the bonnet shut so you can’t open it while the engine is hot.
Not one to write in to the Government in general, the base fact is that unless you drag the media along with you or include a large check no politician gives a ounce of care about your perspective. Thats why this is a representative democracy. Just a small part of the less stellar parts of our nation.
C4 I do have to wonder if part of the clutch, flywheel problem is people thrashing their cars. The fact is that I am sure there are real issues but I think a good portion of the complaints are from people that have pushed their car quite hard.
Is this a BMW AG recall or a BMW NA recall? There is a difference. The question is are other countries doing the recall or is this just for the American consumer?
Do Canadians have a problem?
daft
Seems to me an USA recall only. NHTSA does not legislate or issue recalls for foreign countries.
JONPD, the flywheel and clutch issues are well documented as defects in materials and/or design of the parts in questions. I am sure there are X number of cases where the vehicle has been driven hard.
The LuK clutch hardware is used as OEM on several makes and models of cars around the world.
Check the Chevy Silverado Duramax forums for yet another example of crappy LuK quality. Some of these trucks were sold with the same design dual mass flywheels as we have in our MINIs.
I find it pathetic that a clutch that is babied and driven properly, never abused or thrashed only lasts 25K miles.
It also seems to me that the there are some heat disipation problems in the clutch assembly.
C4 – You may be absolutely dead on correct with your assessment of the LuK clutch, but I happen to know that a lot of my fellow motorers have gotten way more than 25000 miles out of the OEM clutch -Sorry to say, but to me this sounds like operator error to only be getting 25000 miles on it…
Demon, I wish. Been driving manuals for 23 years. 6 Honda/Acura manual transmission products, never replaced the clutch on any of them and those cars were kept over 100K miles.
Let me give you this hint….My car is at the dealers now and MINI has agreed to replace the flywheel and clutch for the third time. TSB SI M21 04 08 confirms that 2005’s were fitted with a defective flywheel from factory. Clutch plate release springs wearing unevenly for no reason.
The TSB also instructs the dealer techs to replace the engine to transmission alignment dowels.
Unfortunately these problems are alive and well in the R56 S. Take a look at NAM, MINI2, etc.
My driving technique is more than appropiate. The clutch is simply not fit for purpose.
<blockquote>“What a crock! If you burn yourself on the exhaust tips, it is YOUR fault! If your child or someone else burns themselves on the exhaust tips, it is YOUR fault!”</blockquote>
I suppose it’s also your fault if you took Vioxx and died. I mean, after all, you took it. You swallowed the pill. No…let’s not place blame on the product designers…let’s not force them to make a safer product!
What misguided outrage!
<blockquote>“Just want to thank the very few people that seem to think the Mini recall is better than the Mini service meno. At the end of the day all this is about is opening law suits against Mini showing a defective product causing injury. It’s not like this recall is going to magically remove burns from people.”</blockquote>
Look: MINI/BMW is a corporation. It is not a relative, it is not a friend, it’s a corporation. I love the cars they design and build. But if they produce a product with a design flaw, I expect it to be addressed. I know that in this case it has been. I don’t care if they are forced to do a recall or not. It has nothing to do with me. I don’t care if people sue MINI/BMW or not. Again…it has nothing to do with me. I work in pharmaceuticals. If my company produces a drug that causes undue harm to patients, they should sue the company. Employees like me might lose our jobs, but it’s our responsibility to have a safe product in the first place. I don’t see people defending Merck with the passionate outrage that people are crying in defense of MINI/BMW. If your surgeon left you with a disfiguring mark on your body when you went in to get a prescription for an upset stomach, you’d sue them. I don’t see why I should feel such sympathy for a multi-billion dollar company (whose cars I happen to enjoy driving) that might now be exposed to law suits resulting from a design flaw that ended up causing their customers undue harm. I understand if you are a BMW shareholder. But otherwise, I don’t understand why people are so upset about this recall being mandated.
Aaron – Not exactly an apples to apples comparison
WHAT A CROCK!
I think it is an apples to apples comparison. Bad design, consumed willingly, resulting in injury. What’s dissimilar? A proper design, making the tailpipes out of insulating ceramic, would have cost more, just as 3 more years of phase 3 clinical trials would have.
We’ll have to agree to disagree on this Chad and Aaron – Most everyone who knows how a combustion engine works knows that the exhaust gets hot and unless you are blind, you can see the chrome exhaust tips and you know their location. Are we to have motorcycle manufacturers completely shroud their pipes and exhaust systems?
Either way, I am keeping my exhaust just as it is – I take complete responsibility for any injury that I incur from my own negligence. MOTOR ON!
Somebody’s been chewing on lead based paint to think this is a worthy candidate for a recall.
Remember… the US consumer pressure also wins against the pop up exhaust of the 2005 MCS… this is just the same story… In Europe we can burn, but benefit from our pop up exhausts 😉
Aaron I hear what your saying but at what point should the government step in to. Lets look at all the way people get injured by cars every year.
Accidents related to speeding, should they limit car speed to 10-15mph?
Wide number of pinch points, should they get rid of the hundreds of places on every car digits can get caught in?
etc etc etc…
Safety is a warm blanket, while its true its a great thing the base fact is every think you or I will ever handle can cause harm to us. There are no truly safe products. If you can point out anything that is safe I can assure you there are literally many ways that it can be unsafe.
Demon,
When MINI raised the height of the car and lifted up the rear bumper on the R56, someone on the design team should have realized that when you correspondingly raise the height of the exhaust tips, you come into potential conflict with human anatomy. Standing sideways, the curvature of one’s calf muscles bow out in such a way that the same exhaust tips placed a half inch or quarter inch lower will most likely never make contact whereas the raised ones are much more likely to do so. Yes, we all know they’re likely hot after driving. However, as a designer, you have to design for the likelihoods of usage your client will face.
As for motorcycles, well, they are completely different machines. When operating a motorcycle, one risks serious bodily harm if not properly attired with protective clothing. Touching a hot tailpipe will give you warning while causing damage to your clothing well before it damages your skin. Operating a car does not call for similar protective gear. Thus car designers cannot rely on the fact that the operator will likely have another layer of protective clothing in the event that they inadvertently make contact with extremely hot portions of the vehicle.
Aaron – half the motorcycle riders I see are wearing shorts and slippers.
I’ll add to the clutch-flywheel debate.
I’ve got 26K on my 06 R53, and I have had the squeal occasionally- it was worse last spring- seemed that if the MINI sat undriven for more than a day, or was driven in rain, it would start chirping for the first few miles, just in the shift into 1st and maybe 2nd. Warmed engine and the chirping would end.
After reading posts about the cause, I actually thought going too GENTLY on the clutch was making things worse because the flywheel was just getting more polishing. I took to letting the clutch out a bit more aggressively- to burn off that glaze on the flywheel.
Can’t say as it has worked but I haven’t had any chirping for several months, since June?
Knock on wood! Maybe my clutch time has yet to begin!
To those blaming drivers: I’m not a hot foot. I drove my Jetta 5-speed for 48,000 with no clutch wear so I don’t believe in my case it’s just driver error. Or was that VW just twice as well built?
I would almost liken this recall to the ‘bail-outs’ that our country is facing now – I think that each issue sets a bad precedent for the future.
Yes, it’s common sense to avoid a hot tailpipe.
But the average american apparently has no common sense, and the NHTSA does their best to protect you from yourself.
Of course that average american buys a boring Toyota, not a MINI.
You don’t put a hot exhaust pipe sticking out where people load and unload things. That’s just plain stupid design. Had it been off to the side, this would have not been and issue.
How hard a concept is this to grasp?! You guys that that think its the person’s fault for getting burned remind me of Homer Simson grabbing the electrified cup cake over and over again..oww…oww…oww…oww. Not too bright are you?
I wonder if this recall was prompted by the same granny who spilled hot coffee on herself at McDonalds? Shakespear was right!
rs, as someone that works in public safety can tell you that the number of injuries created each year by auto accidents, a portion of them caused by Mini drivers. Mini has developed a vehicle that can travel with enough inertia to cause harm. I guess then the fact Mini has made this possible that they should recall all our cars and limit them to very low teen miles per hour? How dare Mini to put that innocent looking accelerator so close to the driver, it can’t be the drivers fault for driving more than a few miles per hour eh. Honestly guys do you really think that a recall fixing what Mini was already fixing is making a car safe?
Second the comment Pete about Shakespeare!
What a waste of a recall. Aren’t recalls for defective parts or safety hazards? People being careless on the outside of the vehicle isn’t the responsibility of the vehicle, it’s the responsibility of the people. I know the self-proclaimed “burn victims” will balk at my stance, but I feel we should be responsible for our own actions. You didn’t swallow the exhaust tips, you put your legs against them knowing they’re there and hot.
—>C4: My friend has 190,000 miles, and counting, on his original ’02 MCS clutch. My stock clutches have held up fantastic during stock and even higher power levels. Perhaps you’ve been driving with bad habits for 23 years.
I had our now traded-in R56 S in for service a month ago and they did the recall without asking us. The tips stick out maybe half an inch. I am not lazy when I go to get stuff out of the back and lean into the bumper to get another inch or reach like a lot of people do.
This argument could be made for my E46 M3 with 4 tail pipes that stick out from the lower bumper panel. There is a curve to the rear bumper that puts the tips behind the curve but they are still there. A lot of cars have a type of exposed tip. Some have the tip curled up under the bumper valance. You know what you are buying when you shop for a car. A tail pipe that is exposed is noticeable since there is a cut out in the bumper (duh). With the R56 it is a chrome tip (bright and shiny). The Cooper’s also have a tip that sticks out too, why should it only be the S model.
It just shows how lazy and whiney all too many Americans are when it comes to consumer goods. To complain about something so small like this is a waste of common sense and time.
Well there is a happy enbding to my clutch story. I just picked up my R53 S and the new clutch and flywheel are in one word: FANTASTIC.
Better than new. MINI picked up the tab for the parts and labor 100%. Definetely there is something fishy with the OEM clutches.
Many thanks to the fine folks at MINI and Lauderdale MINI for 5 star service.
Ryphile: I never slip/drag my clutch, never leave my foot in while waiting at a traffic light, always rev match, etc. In other words, my left foot never depresses that clutch unless it is absolutely necessary.
We don’t have hills here, so there is no wear from dead stops on inclines.
I will be more than happy to revisit any of those “habits” and I am always open to suggestions from those of you that have been lucky enough to get out over 100K miles out of your stock clutches.
Ryphile:—-> Some MINI tech from the UK (MINI2) claims that “Pre-facelift” R53 S came with single solid flywheels and 2005+ dual mass FWs were added from stock.
Is this true?
C4: My ’02 MCS howls like Chewbacca when starting off from 1st gear. But I’ve got 76k miles on my car and it started about 5k ago. Where can I read more about this? If I pay to get this fixed I want them to do it right the first time.
Doc Ob is correct in suggesting we write our congressmen/women. They listen to voters. Those who say it does no good are just too lazy to write.
—>C4: The MINI tech is mistaken. Every R53 I’ve ever done a clutch on, from April ’02 build-date onward, have always had a dual-mass flywheel. Those dual-mass flywheels, incidentally, are usually broken by 30k miles…broken in that the rubber holding the two masses together breaks down and does not function properly anymore.
Enzo, same thing was happening to me. Your dual mass flywheel is bad and needs to be replaced. I am assuming you have the original factory flywheel as well.
MINI back in 2006 issued a “better” flywheel to correct this and another problem dute to poor dampening. The newer flywheel has an updated part number as well. But the clutch kit part numbers are the same from 2002-2004 MCS and 2005-2008 R53 and R52 MCS.
Look up this TSB in NAM—-> SI M21 04 28 Dated September 2008. For the “chewbacca” noise MINI recommends replacing the flywheel to the new updated part number, clutch kit, guide tube and transmission to engine aligning mounting dowels. I had the TSB applied to my ’05 R53 S earlier this week and my chewbacca flywheel and farting clutch pedal are gone.
However, since it appears you are out of warranty, you probably be much better off buying a quality aftermarket clutch and flywheel for about the same or less than the OEM LuK clutch parts. I hightly recommend the Clutchmasters FX200 clutch kit and dual mass flywheel (Lighter, means faster revs). Both should run up about $900 delivered to your door and with installation around $1,500 for the whole enchilada. Many people that have the FX200 swear by this setup in their MINIs.
Replacing the clutch at the dealer with OEM parts will set you back at least $2,500 (9-10 hour job @ $120 per hour). MINI picked up the tab for this third clutch replacement.
Good luck.
darn:
and i was hoping to get the brand on my calves with the new car.
Too bad that a recall was never done for those of us who lost our cars to a fire! And there were more of those that are documented than those who have gotten burned by the tailpipes…
Shame on you MINIUSA and BMW!!!
Donna, I remember reading about your first MCS loss due to sudden fire. What was the final finding regarding the cause of the fire? Leaking power steering fluid or something to that effect?
I agree. I think there are more pressing issues than a tailpipe recall. Still, it all comes down to dollars-cents and the huge liability potential that a general recall may infringe on the product and brand image at large.
Heck, I’m going to ask my MA to mount my exhaust on the roof! Why risk burning myself when I can fry those little buggers crapping on my nice clean car!!! 😉
we laugh our pants off here in Europe. What a totally nonsense callback.
at least a car manifacturer who still has money enough for this kind of idiot callback. Shoudn’t Ford make a callback for their F150’s. Because during driving the dashboard disintegrates. O no… Ford is bankrupt.
The whole country falls apart, a big financial recession and …yes I must admit… this is way more important!
<p>FWIW I just had my first service since the “mandatory” status on the recall. SA asked, I said Nah, no problem, still sporting extremely dangerous exhaust tips.</p>