I know this could be argued to be in the wrong forum... and is most likely gonna cause a debate or two!
I often read on this forum (and I only ever use the 1st Gen Faults and Fixes forum on MINI2) people complaining about various problems or faults appearing on their MINIs, who go on to claim that their particular fault is a "Common complaint" as if this should automatically drop the blame/liability at the manufacturers (in this case BMWs) door. Yokohama tires generally wear out after 8,000 - 10,000 of reasonably hard driving, but I dont hear anyone saying Yokohama should accept they have a problem and pay for the labour to have them replaced.
I was just wondering when the users of this forum see the line between "common fault" and general wear and tear???
I mean I have read of people complaining about the power steering fault claiming the car has "only" done 70,000 miles, I would class that as getting on for half way through a MINIs usefull life, and I dont think 2 pumps in a life time is extreme, I dont even think a pump every 4-5 years or so is excessive in my opinion (not when you stack it against, say Peugeot HDi fuel pumps that seem to pack up at about the same rate or worse, and cost twice the price to fix properly!)
Surely we all can agree that a MINI wont last forever without needing a single component, I just wondered what everyones opinion was.
How long do you think a PAS pump SHOULD last, how short a service life would you accept?
What about the gearbox, should it be expected to last as long as the engine... even though its oil is not changed anywhere near as often as the engines oil is?
For how long should BMW be held accountable to, so called common faults, and when we should just take it on the chin and put it down to component failure caused by wear and tear... cause they just dont make em like they used to!
How "common" must a fault be before it is classed as a "common fault"?
Not looking to cause trouble, or argue any points here, just genuinely interested in others view on this matter.
"Allow me to explain... Understeer is when you hit the armco going forwards, Oversteer is when you hit it going backwards!"
Agree with your points and as a mechanical engineeer by trade I have tried to get this message across when replying to some owners when complaining about various faults at higher mileages..................as if all components should last for the life of the car and never fail or wear out !
Just because I use the term "common fault" does not mean that BMW should not be held responsible. If the car is in warranty it should be repaired for free. Common fault to me (on this forum) basically means search and you will find a wealth of information on the matter.
On how long things should last, it will vary. If you drove hard on those tires, then Yoko is not responsible. Likewise if you have suspension issues that caused wear. It is kind of hard to prove the above thus hard to hold them responsible.
Maybe you guys have a point things will wear out,But you cant say these cars are as reliable as a Japanise make you just got to love em to keep em,I had a Mitsubishi Lancer before this and made over 100,000 miles in it with tyres brakes shocks and exaust replacement.This cooper is at 40,000 miles and has had a gearbox and clutch,window motors, 2 steering pumps,raidator fan prob,engine mounts,airbag light reset,door lock problems,oxygen sensors oh and the roof liner detached itself and fell into my head.You got to love it considering it's in a higher price bracket.
Generally with reliability comes boring.... I have had reliable but I never had fun with my reliable car. This car has been fairly reliable minus a few issues like the engine mount and a flat battery. That being said, I have done a lot of work to my MINI and I may have caused both.
I'm not sure which side of the fence to sit with this one! I've had no major problems yet (touch wood [or laminate covered chip-board as my desk is!]) with my MCS but have read a lot about people who seem to get a car from a bad batch and things go wrong all the time.
My parents have driven a toyota and nissan from new, quite hard, and both have done 200,000 + miles. The Toyota in 17 years has had a new radiator (but managed 2000 miles with the old one knackered!) and the nissan 16 years of towing etc has never had a single thing go wrong. you rarely hear of other car makes from the 90's to do the same without a single thing breaking.
The first post made sense to me as I am used to manufacturing complaints. No matter how reliable a car, even Toyota's etc, there will always be some components weaker than others. Improve them and a different set of components become the weakest. You only need to visit any active forum to see a list of culprits. Not much compenstion if you are the unlucky person to get an unreliable car though.
Some people are like a Slinky ........ not really good for anything, but you still can't help
but smile when you shove them down the stairs
I totally agree,i've never owned a car that did'nt need parts,but gearboxes PS pumps complete radiator fan assembly because a $5 relay stuck inside if 20,000 miles.I've noted that lots of the probs are also common on the S model as well with the exception of the gearbox of which we need thiers to fix ours,that's a bombshell of a bill when out of warranty.99.9% of the owners are everyday people not mechanics.I bought the R50 for lack of the supercharger expecting more reliability.I have a whole bunch of suspension fun parts to install in the new year and keep asking myself are you a complete idiot.,the car suckers you in
What do fellow "forumers" expect to pay on labour rates?
I know the figure in my area varies from £40 per hour for a cheap independant to upwards of £120 per hour for the fancy dealers... in both cases the technician will probably get between £7 to £14 of that figure.... the rest goes on paying the overheads and equipment... and in the case of the dealerships, all those "extra" members of staff (service receptionists etc) whos time cant be charged directly to the customer.
The other raw nerve is the price of parts... and that is nothing to do with the grages themselves. To give an example, we fitted a £350 part to a japanese car the other day that took half an hour to diagnose. half an hour to replace, so the bill was £350 plus 1 hours labour (around £45).
After I was paid, overheads (lighting heatng) covered, service receptionist paid, the diagnostic tool cost (that particular tool was £4000 3 years ago), insurance (about £1000 mnth) The garage probably made well under £10 profit... and we got 5% off the part....that is £17.50.
So although the customer leaves the building ******ed off he just spent £395 this close to christmas... and is no doubt moaning down the pub about the extortionate prices the motor trade charge... we, as business, were lucky if we made £25 off him!
The diagnosis time thing was a blessing... when we deal with extended warranty companies, they wont pay for diagnosis time, so theoretically, if it takes me 3 hours to rip wiring looms apart to find a chaffed wire that took me 10 minutes to repair, we would only be able to charge £4.50 to the warranty company, who then expect you as a customer to pay the rest, or us to take the hit.
In dealerships, its only slightly better, when a technician is trying to find a fault with your car covered by a manufacturer backed 3 year warranty, he/she is only allowed 15 minutes to diagnose the fault, if he/she hasnt found it by then, it is affecting his productivity, and therefore his bonus, and therefore his income at the end of the month... this should go a long way to explaining why technicians in dealerships often wind customers up the wrong way by just "guessing" after 20 minutes so he can get on with trying to meet bonus targets!!!
One last thing... I have in my time had customers say stupid things like "£60 per hour labour... I want your wage at the end of the month!".
When I last worked in a dealerhip (this was only 4 years ago), charging £60 per hour labour, I saw £6.63 of that... and I, like 99% of all the technicians in the British motor trade have to buy ALL my own tools, and my toolkit, including all the code readers and test equipment is around £35,000... it doesnt take a genius to work out it takes a LONG time to get a return on my investment!
So the next time anyone complains about garage bills being too high, remember, the service receptionist you most likely will take your frustration out on, and the technician you will probably complain about, have next to nothing to do with the big number at the bottom of your invoice...
incidently, I have been told by a parts supplier to a dealer, when I asked why some parts are so damned expensive when the cost to make them are so low, the reply was "some of the prices are artificially high as they have been off set against the loss made on 'goodwill' warranties!"
Rant over.
"Allow me to explain... Understeer is when you hit the armco going forwards, Oversteer is when you hit it going backwards!"
Good rant. On the last point people don't understand how the world works these days. Manufacturing costs are very low, nothing else is. So the part is cheap to make but you need admin of the factory, wages, admin of transporting parts, technical departments to answer questions and redesign when needed, wages of head office, computers to track all of this, a legal department etc etc. I doubt if manufacturing costs are a tenth of the price of parts. Oh and by the way I saw what my company was charging another company for my time on a contract once.... if I got all of it I could have retired after a couple of years .
Some people are like a Slinky ........ not really good for anything, but you still can't help
but smile when you shove them down the stairs
How much on diagnostic tools??? a code reader is £30! And an advanced one is under £100 or even £30 if you have a laptop
I think what really annoys people are the £100 rates of labour and things always taking to the nearest hour. Personally its not my choice that the garage spend £5 Million building a new showroom so I have big respect for the mecanics that know their stuff and work within there means in a normal garage.
The parts debate will keep going for ever but I am on the rip off fence. Fair enough design and manufacture costs have to be reclaimed but when you are making 1million or more a year how much do you need to mark each one up by?? especially when you might be making another 100million other items that year too. So £10 a pump? that not much so £10million a year? or wait... a pumps maybe £300 so £50 a pump? £50million?
A simple eOBD fault code reader can be bought for around that price now (were at least 4 times that price a few years ago!!!) but they ONLY read eOBD codes... and usually only the generic engine managment codes (P0 and P2 codes... no use if you get a manufacturer specific P1 code or a body (B) or chassis (C) type fault code) and the "live data stream" if available at all on these tools is notoriously slow... simply c**p for finding intermitant faults. These code readers have their place... and I am glad they are becoming so cheap, but when it REALLY hits the fan... its a bit like asking a painter decorator to paint your whole house with a half inch brush... its theoretically possible, but you know he is gonna tell you to get on you bike!!!!
What about SRS and ABS/DSC/ASC/ESP system faults... they are rarely read by these cheap scanners.
Then what about equipment to test the offending system/circuit... a decent test lead set can set you back £200-300, an ACCURATE multimeter that can be relied on will cost around £100, then a decent hand held scope meter (NOT a scoping multimeter... they cant work fast enough for alot of modern systems) they cost anywhere between £650 to £1300. Then there is the "make specific" stuff, these have come down in price with the use of ebay... Sure you can get VAG and BMW stuff for a couple of hundred quid, but the likes of the Merc and mitsubishi stuff will still set you back at least a grand... with or without a laptop!
And you cant code ECUs to cars without these things these days... and there is no point being able to diagnose a fault, if you have to tell the customer to take it to the dealer to finish the job.
If I thought for a second I could get away with selling the whole lot and getting by with a £40 eOBD scanner... I would punt the whole lot on ebay!!!!
Not meaning to get on my high horse... just think people should know a little of what goes on in the motor trade, and what is involved in keeping up with all modern cars.
That said, my trusty hammer cost me a tenner 15 years ago, and has fixed loads since !
"Allow me to explain... Understeer is when you hit the armco going forwards, Oversteer is when you hit it going backwards!"
Are you an electrician or mechanic?? Say multimeter or oscilloscope to most mechanics or even eODB and they will look blank at you
I totally agree ODB is fine for the average sensor fault but for live data it is rubbish and the MINI Ecu for one has a good 50+ live data values available. Only way I could have diagnosed a friends MINI had a low reading MAP sensor. Luckily that K line cable has been the most useful yet......
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. 
! 15 years is great value 
