Thank you for the excellent guide and photos. It helped greatly.

One exception, however. On my car, there are no "two 13mm bolts securing the ball joint to the wheel housing See Figure 10 and Figure 11".

So after looking at it for a while, I asked myself: "Why won't it all just slide down if I take out the 18mm bolt holding the strut in place and then lower the jack?"

So I did that and wiggled the brake disc and it all slid down. Then removed the three 13 mm bolts at the top, and out came the strut. So either I have an older design or a newer one or maybe the Euro version. My car has had a couple of front-end accidents, so who knows what I've got in there.

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This post was auto-generated based upon a question asked on our tech article page here: MINI Cooper Front Shock and Spring Replacement (R50/R52/R53 2001-2006) | Pelican Parts DIY Maintenance Article

What year model is your MINI?

- Nick