My steering was going intermittently a little while back and we fiddled with relays and it started working again. Got out of the cooper yesterday and a 'weewah' wining noise was going when i got out and left the car. opened the bonnet up and after five mins it went.
Tried to start car today, but electrics were all gone, even immobilizer and key fob were out. Tried a bump start and got stuck down my hill! Luckily an awesome RAC dude came out and got me home, he spent over an hour lookin at it and was able to juice the battery enough to get in turning over. He worked out that the power steering module was shorted and was then draining the battery. He also pointed out that the mini has a combination of electric assisted PAS and hydrolic- which he then said that the electric assist would be only be used for parking and could be removed as a cheaper fix leaving me with 'standard' PAS and no module to drain the battery. Now I have never understood whether my ASC toggle switch is set to a default on or off position when the car starts- could excessive use of this feature have worn the system so much that it has shorted?
I am now currently having to disconnect battery at night, need to take it somewhere tomorrow but a mini dealer is prob out as its an 01 cooper with 90grand on the clock.
Any thoughts or suggestions?
