So my CV boot has a hole in it, and I'm just preparing to sell my car. Tying up some maintenance odds and ends. I'm not terribly interested in removing the entire axle to replace the inner boot, but I've seen these types of boots that are split in half and have bolts that hold them together. Anyone try these, or know where to get them for the Mini?

 

I replaced mine a month ago. It not a difficult procedure. By the looks of the MINI grease that comes with the boot kit, I think it would leak out of a split boot. You might check JC Whitney, they had them for the old VW Bugs. If you go that route, I would also let the buyer know there's a temporary fix with the boot and maybe knock $150.00 off the price as good will. If the car's not fixed properly, sooner or later it will lead to a very expensive axle replacement.

 

Split boots are made so you can put them on without removing the axel....
They are a waste of $$....
A tiny biy of dirt gets in the grease of the cv joint, and boom, you need a new cv joint, comes woth a new boot.

 

If you're doing split boots, don't remove the old 1. Find 1 that you can sleeve over the old. When my inner RH CV boot got torn by the smaller clamp, I had to temporarily find a way to wrap it for protection til it got done. This is what I did:
1. Found me some non mini boot laying around by my friend's shop.
2. Removed the smaller clamp & that part of the torn boot. Didn't touch 95% of the torn boot in place.
3. Cut the non mini boot along the 2nd or 3rd groove & slit across the grooves so I could insert the non mini boot into the torn 1. You now have 2-3 grooves that would hold it in place.
4. Ziptied at where the clamp was supposed to be & at the 1st 2 grooves.
5. Rolled a folded garbage bag over the entire boot.
6. Ziptied on both clamps & in the mid boot area.
This was a 20min exercise just to protect the axle from water, grime, dust & to prevent grease from escaping while I waited for the the boot & fix sked.

Twas there for quite some time & was periodically checked. Amazingly, upon fixing, the garbage bag came off w/o any residual grease! The bearings never seemed to be contaminated! I'm not recommending this as a fix. I suggest you get a new boot & do it right w/c I did. It's not a difficult job. Don't remove the axle assembly, just the bearings. I was lucky to catch it upon tearing, so no real harm was done.

 

& oh, in the process of cooking up that temp fix, I contemplated finding some waterproof stretchable fabric & sew up a zipper to cover up that bad boot. Totally a waste of time, but fun facing some of MINIs challenges.

 

Orielly amd several other parts stores keep them in stock in the Help section smaller store will only have a couple of sizes bigger stores will have more. But they wont show in the computer so dont bother getting them to look them up.

 

Minsanity- what do you mean just remove the bearings. Do you mean take off the axle nut and the entire hub and axle should pop out?

 

Just did this, forget the Bentley manual way it is way more complicated than it needs to be. Simply take off the axle nut, tie rod nut/bolt, and two bolts holding ball joint. Drop the arm off the ball joint and the entire hub assembly attached to the strut can now move out of the way after simply tapping the axle out of the hub. Now the entire axle pulls out of the cup at the tranny that the tripod joint (what's under in cv boot). Take it to the bench, pull off the c-clip and tap off tripod bearing. Remove and replace boot, grease the hell out of it and reassemble in reverse order.

There is a video on YouTube as well that helps just search for cv boot replacement on r53 Mini Cooper.

Total time for a newbie is like 2-3 hours. Order the kit from WMW and have at it.

This method completely avoids draining tranny fluid and all that nonsense the Bentley wants u to do.

Cheers.

 

I did it the easy way. Axle nut wasn't removed. Just freed the lower part of the strut , wheel speed sensor tie rod & outer ball joint, if I recall properly, so the strut & axle could have enough room to sway outwards, enough to expose the inner CV bearings w/c are just locked by a circlip. You have to work under your car as you won't be pulling the entire axle assembly out from the tranny. Once the bearings are out, you can install your boots in from where the inner bearing was. Be careful to hold the bearing securely should you opt to tap it out instead of improvizing w/ a puller. Thoroughly clean parts of old grease prior to reassembly.
Google 'passenger cv boot replace (am i missing something?)'. K-huevo's post#8 is a great guide.

 

That works, I just didn't want to have to be under the car trying to wrestle a boot on and bearing off. Simply removing the nut allows it to come right out and can do a bench job.

Some reference pics I had to help OP

 

Good job, Blaxin!

 

Yeah i did the same thing about a few months ago. I knew me and my dad could do it so we did it that way, the whole process was easy if u done stuff like this before. The only problem i had was getting both clamps on the inner boots big side, since it was a tight fit pulling over boot. I ended up doing a whole cv boot replacement on everything since i knew i was going to have everything off! n yeah some zipties work better than the crappy clamps.

Car has been running fine since and feels more solid. The condition of the joints were dry but no damage, cleaned up and reasembled. I lost grease but didnt get no dirt inside.

Saved alot, maybe at least $1500 with everything. Along with other stuff i didnt include like new fan, fuel pump, belt.



Dont!! use split type, the cv boots on this car are different shaped on the inner boot ends. A tripod

Fun little car and happy motoring!