My 2010 Clubman 'S' stopped on the M25 last week - new clutch needed at 21.000 miles. Dealer talking to BMW about 'fair wear and tear' as I write. Needless to say I never ride the clutch and no track days and much to old to be sprinting from the lights. This is a BMW dam it!, its a Mini which usually do well on satisfaction surveys and the Clutch has gone in two years. Not a happy bunny. Hope your JCW dealer looks favourably on you even out of warranty. My Dad had cars in the 1960's which did 70,000 before the clutch needed replacing. Think there may be a problem here. Anyone else know of early failures?
For some reason these days clutches seem to start slipping at lowish mileages if the car is fitted with the dual mass flywheel, and sometimes the slip is associated/connected with the flywheel, the actual clutch lining when removed is not badly worn at all, its the flywheel thats at fault in many cases.
I never had a clutch wear out on a car before even after doing 110,000 miles and still going strong, now I have one with the dual mass flywheel if I get to 40,000 its doing well!! Im very gentle on clutches too and never do any towing of trailers etc.
My R56 needed a new clutch at less than 18 months old (and around 12k miles).
Dealer initially warned that I would be liable for the cost of repair, as the clutch isn't covered under warranty. Apparently the default line is, "well - it's probably your fault!" with some spiel about not being able to drive properly.
That said, they immediately approached BMW who, with relatively little fuss, agreed to cover all costs. The clutch was effectively written off as defective, as even if it has been abused, or the car driven by a new driver, it should not fail so prematurely.
I put it down to a one off, and didn't think too much about it... perhaps it was one bad clutch out of however many other thousand? That said, it will be interesting to see how many people on here have similar tales - seems we're at 3 already!
Long story short, I got it sorted, nice and easily, although it was well within warranty (even though not a warranty claim) and with below average miles for its fairly tender age. Would be a totally different story (I imagine) if the car was 3 years old with, say, 40k on... I saw the bill for the work which BMW covered and I certainly wouldn't like to be hit with that personally!
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09 JCW - Clutch mileage? 
if I'd have had to pay for it! 
