[Willem Fick]

Ooh, I have many....

Decided to service my wifes (BMW) Mini myself after having it serviced by BMW for the first 4 years and 50k miles. Was surprised at the state of the air and oil filters, the former disintegrating during removal and the latter really caked in thick sludge. With them out I proceeded to drain the engine oil, but for the life of me couldn't get the oil draining plug loosened.

After trying any conceivable tool and method for several hours I still couldn't get it to budge and ended up having to resort to removing the entire sump. My heart fell into my shoes when the first line in the sump removal section of the Haynes Manual referred me to the section on how to remove the air conditioning pump, and that in turn referred me to the section detailing how to remove the entire front clip.

Turns out that what I thought would be a walk in the park, turned into a 6 hour curse fest to get the sump of, followed by a visit to a machine shop, in turn followed by another 6 hour curse fest. No good deed goes unpunished I guess...

Interesting note:

With the sump finally out I saw that the drain plug (which according to BMW records was replaced at every service) still had its original green factory QA mark on it, which suddenly made the state of the filters and oil very clear to me - BMW probably never once serviced the car!