Whilst changing the top plates on my r50 cooper, once the old top plate come off, the large ring bearing shot its ballbearings all over the floor, so off i went to BMW and they sold me a strut top plate bearing, which when i went to fit it, the bearing where the spring sits is too small, so went on the net and bought another one. here are the pics,
the top pic,
one at the back is from BMW and they assure me its the one for my car, but the bearing plate is far to small for the spring.
one on the left is from bmwmotormec and again assures me its for my car.
the one on the right is the one that came off the car, with the broken bearing plate.
As far as i know the car is stock. Can BMW be wrong??? i have heard that later cooper s' have a smaller spring, which would account for the smaller bearing seat.
The one I said is the one shown in the workshop manual for the later cars, thats all I can say.
I dont have a manual for the early cars to check the other.
Are yours the originals on the car do you know?
You could always take the old one down to the dealers and show them, maybe they can ask one of their mechanics then??
There was a problem with early model suspension whereby they would "pull left". A suspension change was made with March 2002 builds. Earlier built cars were supposed to have their front suspension refit by dealers. I suspect yours was never done. I doubt they even make the original (faulty) parts.
If any recall work has been done, MINI should have the details on their system, ask your local dealer if they can check from the chassis number etc or if you have the past service history in the service book ring the dealers in there and ask.
If the upper bearings were breaking up the steering would probably start to pull over anyway?
I think your car has the original front suspension ...
According to RealOEM, 31-30-6-758-309 is for builds through February 2002 and 31-30-6-778-833 is for builds from March 2002. The former part is the revised one to fix the "pulls left" problem.
A dealer should a service bulletin explaining what parts are required to fix the "pulls left" problem.
Well, took the strut bearing back to BMW with my original, to be told that the springs must have been changed!!!
They wern't interested in trying to find the correct top mount, so refunded my money and now I'm back to square one.
At least you got your money back, doesnt help you I agree, perhaps you could get some advice from one of the suspension suppliers that advertise on this forum as to the way to go now??
If BMW are now saying its non standard like.
Go back to the MINI dealer and insist they find the service bulletin related to the "pulls left" fix. The fix involves more than fitting a new top mount. Short of finding the old top mount on a wrecked MINI, you'll have to apply the "fix" to your MINI.
You could check the part numbers on line at a site such as BMWminiparts is an idea, see if they are the same??
I was led to believe theres not much that can be transferred across between Gen 1 and Gen 2 MINIs?
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2001 Cooper top strut problems 
