I gotta battery story for you. My 02 cooper died in a parking garage with a low ceiling not to long ago. It happend on a weekend and there was no "battery truck" available to help me and no one would tow me out. Mini roadside could not help, the dealer never returned my call, my car was stranded. I finally got it out when a batter truck could help me. It gets better! The battery that went bad was the factory battery. It leaked out its acid out of the bottom of the case onto the transmission linkage without my knowledge. Well guess what, my transmission started to get really stiff, so I took it to Johnnys auto clinic in San Pedro. He looked it over, the acid had destroyed my tranny linkage! Guess what, yes I am out of warranty...I don't trust my local dealer anyway (Johnny did all my brakes for much cheaper!). I knew if I took it to a dealer it would be a $4000 new tranny...Johnny did some research, ordered parts and saved my tons of money!! If you live in LA, Johnny is the man! I hope this doesn't happen to you...:

 

Price of the tranny if you dont mind me asking .. Hope mine never goes but would like to know what a non-dealership cost.

I have a 2002 as well with the original battery. I will take a look to make sure there is no leakage.

 

my cooper is a standard....if you have an S your battery is in the back, not under the hood like mine, I think...

 

R56 batteries are all under the hood.

 

surfmini, how much did you manage to get the work done for? I have this exact same problem, except for the fact that I had replaced the battery myself. I've replaced many batteries on a good number of cars, but I did not realize that Mini's were very different. I put in a normal EverReady battery from AutoZone and it started the car and worked PERFECTLY (no leaking acid or anything) for an entire year.

Then, a couple of weeks ago, it became hard to shift into gears, but only until the car warmed up. I figured it was because it was really cold here (mid-teens to low twenties) and it just needed to warm up. But, no... I was getting off the freeway, downshifted to second and when I shifted back to third I heard/felt a small pop and smelled something bad. The transmission was stuck in second and the gear shift went completely loose.

As it turns out, battery acid had leaked down onto the shift cables and transmission and eaten away the shift cables. Also, there's supposed to be a rubber ball or something on a stub coming out of the transmission that connects to shift forks. (Not a car guy here, just repeating what was explained at the dealer... He showed me where all the damage was.)

So, now I have a quote for $4,000 to replace the transmission and shift cables. $2350 for the transmission, 12 hours @ $95/hour for labor, $232 for shift cables plus 2.5 hours labor for those.

I'm trying to figure out if there's any way to get a transmission from a salvaged vehicle or maybe have another transmission shop rebuild the one that's there (or just replace the parts that are damaged). Surely I can get this done for much less than $4k, right?

 

Welcome to NAM David. Sorry that had to be your first post. Problems suck.

 

If you got a 5 year old battery ... has not anyone thought to get a new one say 2 years ago. OEM batteries are weak to begin with

Sorry for your hassles Its a terrible way to learn about batteries and what happens when they are old.

 

what does that have to do with his 02? if you dont have anything to add to the disscussion then dont post at all.

back to the topic, I had the same problem with my 77 911 SC. The battery went dead and stayed bad for about 3 days. when I got a new one and TRYED to install, no more place to put it, the acid had ate through the battery box and into the front control arms and power steering pump.!!!! so be carefull it can REALLY mess things up when a battery goes bad.

 

I got my mini back last week. New shift link cables and linkage plus labor...$640. They also cleaned up all the acid damage to the other parts. My car works fine now, but it was in the shop for a week. Parts came from the dealer, Johnny had to special order the linkage. I would avoid the new tranny. Your problem sounds just like mine, everything was real stiff, but once you wrestled it into gear for the first time it would start to work....it sucks! When Johnny called the dealer, they tried to tell him the trannys came assembled, but somehoe he got the parts he needed. good luck!

 

surfmini, the EXACT same thing happened to me. I took it Coleman Taylor, they took one look and said it was no problem.

There was not actual tranny damage. It was just the shift cables and a small rubber and plastic piece that connects the shift cables to the shifting fork. I specifically had asked BMW about REPLACING it and they said it was part of the transmission and BMW only replaces TRANSMISSIONS, they don't repair them.

But, you're right on target: $650 for the work. (Ended up being $800 including overnight shipping for the parts and tax.) Add in a new battery, two wreckers to move the car around town and two weeks of a rental car and it was $2k or so...

Good to hear that someone else found the same solution I did! Thanks!