Hello,

I have had my 2009 3-door that I bought secondhand for a year now. The entire time, it has burned approx. 1-liter of oil every *100* KM. From the research I've done and conversations I've had with Mini, this is allegedly a valve issue and they want more to fix it then I paid for the car, so I've been topping-up my levels instead.

That's not the problem.

The problem is I did a long drive a few days ago and now there is a very large pool of oil under the car in the garage. By large I mean the circumference of making a circle with my arms. Historically, this was never a problem. Although I burned a lot of oil, I didn't leak a lot of oil.

Also, while the car always generated a lot of smoke, the exhaust pipe was usually fairly clean - a little residual oil, but nothing significant. Now it is caked in thick soot, with wet oil dripping from it.

Anyone have any ideas what may be happening? I haven't had any recent work done on the car, so no risk of incorrectly installed parts.

Also, my mechanic is 100 KM away, and I have a 600 KM trip coming up this week that I absolutely must make it and the car is my only transportation option ( I live in Canada and the distances here are significant). Obvious advice is "don't drive it," but that isn't an option for me. So, I'm wondering what kind of real damage I might be doing here...

Many thanks.