Hey Guys, Just wanted to run this problem by you.

I recently bought a MINI from melbourne, its an ex show car, beautiful car, love it to bits. Just ran into the problem that the gearbox just chewed itself to pieces... As a result of this, it has ground up metal that fine that it has sent it into the oil pump, which almost seized, went through the oilpump and into the engine....
I have taken it to the MINI specialist in town and he has told me that it was caused by the tires being to big for the car and putting far to much strain on the gearbox. The wheels are 13" and are pretty damn fat.. He told me that the damage was already on the way before i bought the car so it wasnt anything that i was to really know about.

At this point i have to get a different Gearbox for a 71' MINI, a new Oil pump and i dont know what state my engine will be in cause we havnt got that far yet... (Anyone with parts for an old school gearbox that are for sale id love to hear from you!!)

Just wanted to know if this sounds about right for the diagnosis.

The car has been in a few MINI shows so i rekon some of you guys would know it when you see it, will post a pic when i can find one... Im not sure if the guy that sold it to me knew about it and ditched the car before it got any worse but im no mechanic so i had no idea that gearbox was on the way out, seemed fine when i bought it

Bummer!!

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David L


My greatest fear in life is that when I die my wife will sell my Mini and tools for the price I told her I paid for them!

Theres my baby... as broken as she is now...



Oh i didnt mention to cause of the freak winds we had the other night, and the bonnet not being held down by anything.. anyone wanna take a guess as to what happened...?

you should be able to get your hands on a new gearbox fopr around $1000, depending on where you look. its a far quicker path to go down that getting your box reco'd, and may be cheaper (not sure about that one...)

you will also need to flush out the entire motor, all of the oil channels everything, to get all the ground up bits of gearbox out. of course, change the oil filter, but you should be changing that when you put the new oil in it anyway.

AND...thats a mini, not a MINI hehehe it does look very nice. are you coming up to mount cooper on the weekend?

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78 Leyland Mini - Prince

...and for that kinda price.. id be doing what i did.. and that would be getting a rover engine... as theyre low KM;s and better engines my 2cents

thats a very good point!

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78 Leyland Mini - Prince

Except you still don't know what you're getting gearbox wise...

The 13's will put more stress on the diff, but it should not cause any damage to to a well built gearbox. They ran them from the factory on heavy 13x6's with a tall gear ratio.

Were you rough on the diff, dumping the clutch and doing wheel spins all the time?

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Starlet Conversion:
http://www.ausmini.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=15484

Hi Braff,
Bad news, sorry. The wheel sizes won't wreck a gearbox but bad driving will. Now, I'm not saying you wrecked it, the failure could have started quite some time ago. We'll probably never know whether the PO new it was on the way out or not and there is probably no point in speculating. You just need to get it fixed and get on with enjoying it.

Regards
Al

Nah i was really good to the car actually, i didnt like the idea of giving an old car to much crap for the fact that it might die on me hehehe... Yeah i might look into trying to get a Rover set up put in... i would love to have gone for a drive but my car is in bits at the moment, my other car (a 91' magna ) is busted at the moment to with radiator problems.. so im driving the old ladies old car for now which is on its last legs as well... i dont think it would make the drive to melbourne hehe..

Will keep posted what happenes with it..

Also yeah i know i had to flush the engine, just hoping it hasnt caused and damage that cant be fixed...

How Positive are you that it wasnt the wheels that wrecked it? cause if it wasnt them then i can just get a new gearbox, if it was i have to get new wheels new breaking system so on and so forth.... The guy i took it to rekons it was the wheels that put to much strain on it but again, im no mechanic so i dont know... Ive only had the car about 2-3months and like i said i didnt give it crap and drove it well, id say it was on the way out before i bought it..

AS well as the oil galleries etc get the mech to pull the main bearing caps and big end caps off for a look . I've done similar where a thrust washer dropped into the gearbox and got shredded into white metal flakes , scratched the bejeezers out of the bearings but the crank was ok . I'm guessing your mech will do this anyway but best to check to be sure . Can you put your location in your profile too .

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Sounds a little strange to me.

Dont ignore the possibility of another failure which did the gearbox and oil pump and that the gearbox wasnt the culprit. Imagine getting all this done to find it was another failure that caused it.

My lack of mininess is showing through, but is this a common result of a gearbox failure in a mini?

i'd be getting that capslock issue sorted out first

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If there has been flakes of metal in the whole engine then it is probably safe to say that the engine bearings, galleries, pump, followers and practically everything will need to be stripped out, inspected and replaced... Sorry to hear about it but it's not a good thing at all!

If you just go replacing just the gearbox you may have a major problem later on (or right away!)

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Lillee - 1969 Morris Mini K

Hi Draff,
Any power available to wreck a gearbox is produced by the engine. However,with big wheels, big revs and clutch dropping will load the gearbox more because bigger wheels provide more traction. Bigger wheels alone will not load the gearbox more than smaller ones unless you make it happen.

If I were you, I would have the engine dismantled and cleaned at the very least. A Mini engine sucks oil from the bottom corner of the gearbox and adjacent to all the gears that have just failed. The oil pump then pumps it to all the bearings and you have told us the pump is rooted.

Regards
Al

Yeah i havnt dumped the clutch since ive had it or anything like that, do my gear changes at 2,500-3,500. The only time it sits high on revs is doing 100ks on the highway etc, could this have done it? The car sits on about 4,000 or just under doing 100, but from what i understand from a pretty stock mini thats about right. (Running a 1100 with twin SU carbs)

Also gave Link Automotive a call this morning to have a chat and see what they had to say, they told me that the wheels arent the problem either, how it was driven and not changing the oil enough was what did it. So now i have 2 stories... One saying its the wheels, and if thats the case i then have to replace the whole breaking system cause its got groved disc breaks on the front and 13" are the only things that will fit over them, not to mention new gearbox, oilpump and the engine work... If its not the wheels i can just do the engine, gear box and make sure the rest is all good..

Ah the joys of cars.....