Tracking CVTs

[valnmike]

Quote: Originally Posted by Sejanus (original)

Well my MINI passed 100,000 miles the other day and still no CVT issues, so this seemed like a good time to take another headcount of those of you who are still around on MINI2 and TotalMINI. By my last reckoning we've had 35 CVT MINIs sign up and only one reported failure from among those cars. That seems pretty good to me. It'd be great if folks would check in again with the current mileage of the MINI or let us know if they have experienced any CVT problems.

'02 CVT 100,000 miles, no problems

Just over 74.000 miles on my 2003 CVT, driven daily into and out of Washington DC, and still runing without trouble (knock wood).

[michaelgraveman]

New to the site. Just bought an '03 cooper with 90000k miles. I have driven it 3000k miles so far with no cvt issues, only power steering problems. Will keep you guys updated.

[Dr. Voice]

My 2003 CVT died a couple of weeks ago at 88,000 miles. The CVT drive belt shredded itself, filling the transmission housing with metal.

The cheapest I found to fix it was $4,000 for a used CVT plus $1,500 labor. The shop didn't see any evidence of any sort of abuse, just a sudden failure. Neither the dealer no MINI USA would offer any sort of help, both saying the car was "too old". So apparently transmission failures at 88,000 miles or 7 years are within the design specs for MINI (may be why they only offer a 50,000 mile warranty).

At any rate, since I bought the car used, I still have two more years left to pay on it. I also can't afford dropping $6,000 cash into the car. So I now have the world's most expensive lawn planter at my house until I can pay the car down to the point where I can sell it for parts.

I'm disappointed that, while MINI has no legal obligation to fix CVT failures outside of the warranty period, they seem to be ignoring design flaws in those CVTs that are leading to early transmission failures. That's the last MINI I'll own. I just paid $1,500 cash for a 2001 Saturn with 190,000 miles on it that will likely be more reliable.

Anyway, just my MINI CVT experience. You can also find mine, and others, at this site:

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/automotive/mini.html

[GTVmiami]

My 2002 CVT died last week at 89,000 miles.
the oil changes had been done every 30.000. The transmission died without notice.
After reading dozens of threads in this forum i come to the conclussion that CVT's are going to fail right after your warranty expires, leaving you with nothing but junk.
just fyi i called BMW to get a quote on trade in value AS IS, telling them about their CVT design issue.
"well sir, we can offer you $1200 towards the purchase of a new Mini".
luckily the car is paid for, and i have a reliable daily driver.
I refuse to get another CVT transmission and go through the same problem in the future.
Has anyone in the forum swapped the CVT for a regular auto? i have the tools and knowledge to perform the task, just need to know if it was done before and the problems that were encountered.
regards
GTVmiami

[Sejanus]

My sympathy to both of you. The cost of fixing the CVT is a bit of an outrage in my opinion. Just to restate though, the point of this thread is to get folks to check in with CVT's that are running fine and then see how many of them fail. So far out of the 36 MINIs that have been logged into this thread without problems at the time, we've had two failures that have been reported (the last at 198K).

[Dan Eriksson]

Hi, got a 2005 Cooper with CVT. Only 1300 miles. No problems whatsoever. But the CVT-problems I read about is worrying. Has anyone tried to get an official explanation from BMW?

[Sejanus]

Yes, but one has never really been given. Some people have been able to get discounts on the repair work, although I think most CVTs are too old even for that these days.

[Dan Eriksson]

OK, nothing official, I´m not surprised of course. Any idea how many Mini CVT:s there are on the roads? And how many of them gets a CVT-breakdown before, lets say 100 k miles?
I mean: Should I stay or should I go? with this otherwise nice Mini.

[Sejanus]

No idea I'm afraid in terms of anything official. All I can tell you is that of the 37 MINIs we've tracked on here only two have failed, one before 100K and the other just shy of 200K.

[Senior]

My 2005 Cooper has run out of its factory warranty and because of the troubles reported by especially Nissan, I took out extended warranty for the powertrain @ $1,400 for 2 years. My car has just 45,000km on it and I love the CVT performance and gas mileage is great. The CVT took some getting used to but once one gets the hang of it is is really great. Hopefully I will be one of those who does not experience problems. I am encouraged by what I read here that only 2 with very high mileage have had failures out of what appears to be many responses. Maybe Mini will react positively to the Nissan news release and extend the CVT warranty to 10 years as they have.

[michaelgraveman]

Looks like I"M another victim of the CVT trans failure. MY car started growling at me the other day. I haven't confirmed a CVT failure but I think it is ineviteble. Looks like it is going to be sitting in the drive for a few years until it gets paid off. Good luck all CVT owners.

[Sejanus]

Can't say I've heard of a CVT growling. Usually they just go.

[michaelgraveman]

Sejanus, Hopefully it's not the CVT but I don't know of anything else it could be. It only does it while the car is in motion. As I slow down, the sound winds down. As I speed up the sound winds up. It doesn't do it at idle. Guess we will see what happens.

[michaelgraveman]

Also, while in neutral and while revving the engine, I get A click once the revs are at 2000 rpm. I can feel the click in the gear selector and also hear it click around the fuse box.

[Sejanus]

You've got me. But I'd get in to a dealer real fast (sorry for stating the obvious).