Just bought a 08, Dealer purchase, lease return. Vibration issue at 65/70 mph. Took car to tire shop tire pressure corrected one tire balanced. Drives better but there is a pull sometimes left or right. Took car back for alignment, all 4 adjusted. It is worse and I also experience intermittent steering wheel rocking at 20/30 mph driving over slight uneven pavement and light braking to a stop. I took the car to local mini dealer service. (Not where I bought it) Showed the alignment print out to the mechanic. Spot on. The mechanic put the car on the rack. I was asked to come and see some things. He found replaced control arms with the parts sticker still on. It was his opinion that the car had been in a collision. Replaced oil pan gasket, leaking oil. I called the person I bought the car from and told him what was going on. He said the car had checked out fine and that this is all just a bad tires issue. He said control arms are replaced on these cars all the time? He said he would take the car back no problem. I took it back but now he said he has to check the car out first, He will put on new tires and go from there. The car fax was clean, but i have found a report from (davis/BMW- dealerspeed.net) It shows a repair history dated 09/2007 mileage 0, Paintwork, doors/body mouldings, front. This was with the other paper work given to me at purchase. What do you think is going on? Any ideas? Thanks

 

Sounds like it was damaged in shipping 0 miles. It makes no mention of control arms ect
I've not heard of control arms being a trouble unless hit or pothole damage

 

Thank you for your reply. I picked the car up today from the dealer. He had it laser tested for frame damaged. The specs were OK. He replaced the tires, apparently 3 were bad. I was told that it is a common problem with run flats. They can go bad before they wear out if not properly inflated or driven on while flat (whats the point?) not to mention the cost! It drives much better, but still a bumpy ride. I have the S convertible with the center exhaust. I'm going to look into having a custom design routed to the sides and then maybe back to the center. I want to make room for a spare tire and get rid of the run flats. Has anyone out there in Mini land ever had this done? Thanks.

 

Everyone dumps the runflats due to the troubles. I keep a plug kit , air compressor, can of slime and a AAA card incase all else fails