R56 - My 1st Big Failure

And its potentially a big one.  Driving home last night I was shifting from 5th to 6th gear and was instead greeted by what sounded like an explosion.  I knew my clutch had felt a bit "soft" all week, but nothing too bad.  It felt more like a master cylinder going south.  I had planned to spend time with it this weekend to see what had been going on. 

So anyway, I'm in the absolute worst section of road in town for this happen.  A busy limited access highway that joins an interstate, and its rush hour, and at night.  Oh, and I'm in the far left hand lane doing about 70.  After the "big bang" there was absolutely no drive, the clutch pedal was on the floor, and the sound of a thousand hair bands playing at once was coming from under the car.  I had to make it across 5 lanes of traffic, and when I finally made it, it was down to less than 5 mph.  Everyone thought I was being a dick but literally had no time to find the hazards. 

I had it towed to my favorite Indie shop since I lack the time or desire to tackle this.  We'll see next week when it finally comes out, but their theory is the throw out bearing exploded.  There is also the possibility the clutch fork failed as both are known MINI issues.  I have a feeling there isn't going to be much left of my wallet after this no matter what direction it goes.   I don't think there is any way the transmission survived, but we'll see.

At least you didn't get rear-ended. (See, I'm being positive about this.)

True!  It was questionable about that for a minute or so though.  

I'm struggling to see where either a throw out bearing or a clutch fork failure would result in no drive. Not disengaging the clutch, sure. But once the car is moving you could theoretically remove the t/o bearing and clutch fork entirely from the vehicle and you'd never know until time to shift gears. How would either of those negate forward propulsion ?

Edit : I'm not saying that above as an absolute, it's just not the first or fifth thing I'd suspect. I was a mechanic for a long time, but I never laid tool upon one of those particular cars ever.

In reply to Cousin_Eddie :

If the fork broke mid shift it's gonna be hard to get it back into gear while trying not to get run over. 

Yikes - glad you handled it safely.  This is the kind of thing that causes deadly accidents for less capable drivers.

In reply to Cousin_Eddie it was going from 5th to 6th so it was not in any gear when the event happened.  Once it occurred there was no getting it into gear, and the vibrations and noise were more akin to an engine exploding, although the engine appears unharmed.

My last clutch demise were the fingers in the pressure plate....and this situation ranks right up there with 'no brakes', 'loss of steering' and the dang motor blowed up.....glad your safe and the R56

racerdave600 said:

In reply to Cousin_Eddie it was going from 5th to 6th so it was not in any gear when the event happened.  Once it occurred there was no getting it into gear, and the vibrations and noise were more akin to an engine exploding, although the engine appears unharmed.

Understand now.

Dual mass flywheel maybe?

Well I don't know what it is.   But damn, that really is the grand daddy of all nightmarish scenarios. Hoping it turns out to be something simple and cheap for you although I am not sure those two words go with a Mini.

I will guess the friction material peeled off the disc and folded up on a big fuzzy ball.

Cousin_Eddie said:

I'm struggling to see where either a throw out bearing or a clutch fork failure would result in no drive.

I have seen an exploded throwout bearing grab and rip the pressure plate's fingers apart.  The carnage was glorious.

On that car, there was just enough spring tension left that it could be limped across a parking lot if you started it in gear.  If it happened at a higher engine speed and if the springs were lighter duty, I can see a complete loss of drive happening.  This isn't farfetched as the failure I witnessed was a Subaru, and Subaru tend to use really stiff clutches for some reason.

I'm just spitballin' ideas here, I am curious to know what really happened.

What is an “R56?”

smokindav said:

What is an “R56?”

Second gen Mini Cooper.

How many miles are on it, out of curiosity?

Oh, a mini. I looked at a first gen S, went with a MKV GTI instead. But I will probably sell it later this year and go back to a S197 5.0 Mustang.

"explosion" make it sound like a flywheel or maybe the pressure plate.

Here is hoping the input shaft is still in one piece. Glad you are ok. 

I hope this isn't too bad.  If the engine/trans comes out and it's salvageable, consider it an opportunity to do all of the stuff that would be otherwise difficult like belts, seals, and LCA bushings.

We just did the front suspension refresh on my wife's 2011 MINI.  It handles so much better now she wants to keep it.  There just isn't another car she feels is more fun *and* economical.  But they are needy temptresses.

Klayfish said:

smokindav said:

What is an “R56?”

Second gen Mini Cooper.

How many miles are on it, out of curiosity?

Just turned 67k this week.

smokindav said:

What is an “R56?”

I thought it was some kind of an Audi.  Didn't know they were Minis until now.

Wow... you should get more than 67K miles out of a clutch assembly in an R56.  

Otherwise I agree with Joe - It's a good opportunity to do a few other regular maintenance items.  Replace the LCA bushings with PowerFlex poly versions.  They last a hell of a lot longer.  

.Yeah, no warning at all on the clutch except a bit of a soft feeling for a couple of days before.  Nothing particularly worrying either.  I've been driving almost exclusively  manuals for what, 38 years now, and never experienced anything even remotely like this failure.  It's also never been on a track or autocrossed.   Like I said earlier though, clutch fork and throw out bearing failures are somewhat common in these unfortunately.  i'm anxiously waiting to see the internals and see what happened.  

The verdict is in, and it's "mostly" good news.  The problem was indeed the clutch fork.  It was broken into two pieces at the thickest part of the rod.  When it broke it also ripped the center out of the pressure plate.  The good news part of this is that the rest of the transmission is OK.  It's a bit beat up inside with but definitely serviceable.  All things considered i'm surprised it held up as well as it did.  Throw out bearing was still intact.  It's still going to be pricey, but nothing like as much had it been worse.  Of course like JoeTR6 mentioned, I'm taking care of a few other things while apart so this adding to the cost.  

(wasn't there supposed to be a clown?)