2007 cooper S 70k miles
 

Hi, I just bought a 2007 Cooper S with about 70k miles. 17 inch rims. Paid 10k for it and love it! I just can't believe how roomy the interior is. The mpg is good and and handling is great but my only surprise is the bumpy ride. I feel like my butt is feeling every bump and small cracks on the road. But I guess, this is the price you pay for good mileage and size.


I do have one concern. The car engine stays on after I shut off the ignition. Almost a minute after I shut the car off, the car engine and fan seems to be still running. Eventually it does shut off but is this normal? Any response would be appreciated. Thanks and see you on the road.

Hank

Hey --

Mine does that too. It's just the fan cooling the turbo. When I got mine at the dealer, he said that was going to happen. He said it can stay on for up to 5 minutes after a long car ride or only a few seconds if it was just a trip down the road.

Brandi

Fan
 

Thanks Brandi. What a relief. I've owned many cars but it's the first one that does that. :)

Mine also has a bumpy ride. I have an 06 with 15 in wheels.

The cooling fan stays on to cool down your turbo so your motor oil doesn’t jell up (coke) inside it. When you shut off the car the coolant stops flowing into the turbo and the heat from the exhaust goes right into your bearing housing on the turbo. This will cause the turbo to fail prematurely, so Mini leaves the fan on to help the engine/turbo to cool down after driving. Especially since your catalytic converter is bolted right to your turbo all that heat ends up in your turbo. I am not 100% sure but I think on my 2012 MCS the water pump stays on for a little while to help cool down the turbo also. You definitely want this or your turbo can fail prematurely like around 60 to 90k.
FYI since you have a turbo always let your car cool down 2 to 5 min before you turn it off and only use ACEC A3/B3 (100% synthetic) oils (API spec synthetic oils only need to be 1% synthetic to be called a synthetic, so you don’t know what you are getting) and change the oil at 5 to 7k not 15k.

Do you have the sport suspension package or any upgrades? Mine doesn’t and the ride seems fine to me, although it is a little stiffer than a Cadillac.

Great response!
 

Thank you for the comprehensive response. It completely answered my worry and then some! It makes total sense why the cooper does this. I hope my turbo lasts a long time and I will cool down the engine before shutting it off.

I think I have the sports suspension package but I'm not 100% sure since i bought it used. The previous owner did not know as well. but I do have a sports button and I am able to manually shift once I engage the shift to the left.

Also I have another question: I have the tire low on air symbol coming up and i can't seem to turn it off even after checking the tire pressure. The previous owner has 1 run flat tire and 3 regular tires. Does this have something to do with it? your reponse would be of great help.

Thanks
Hank

great but i didnt do till now http://www.centplay.com/affiliate/home_5348/

My wife is the expert on this she does it on her R50 all the time. It is an iTPMS system so it doesn’t monitor the tire pressure, in our case when we take a corner hard, spin the tires, rotate the tires, or have low pressure the light comes on. The iTPMS system monitors the wheel rotation and does a calculation to see if the rolling radius is the right size for a fully inflated tire.
Having two different types of tires is not such a good idea especially if you have a 3 to 1 rather than a 2 x 2. it will really change the handling since you have 3 ~20lbs tires and 1 ~40lbs tire. To top it off the run flat has a less forgiving sidewall which will change the way the tire flexes in the turns. I recently felt the effect of the 2 x2 setup and why tire shops put the new tires on the rear. I always knew it was not a good idea to have this setup but forgot about it when I got in the corners. Since I had two different kinds of tires with different compound I found out really quick what a bad idea it was as I took my first drifting lesson at 50mph. It is pretty hard to get a FWD car sideways in a corner but when your have street tires on the rear and track tires on the front it is really easy.
Anyway the rolling diameter is different between tires so you might need to reset it more often especially if you drive hard. We usually reset ours about one time ever 2 to 3 months it is normal for our R50 not to much to worry about as long as you keep your air pressure right. On our R56 with all new run flats and N2 it never seems to come on. With your setup I would think that it does have a big effect on your TPMS system. I would definitely get rid of the one off tire it will have an effect on the TPMS.