NHTSA Complaint #11688267 — 2019 MINI COOPER

I’ve been experiencing headaches, dizziness, and sudden tearing episodes while driving and the tearing only happens while driving my MINI. A few of these episodes have occurred on the highway, the painful eye irritation and crazy tearing made it very difficult to keep my eyes open, which has been super dangerous. I forced myself to keep at least one eye open to pull over, and fortunately I'm still alive. I recently found that these symptoms are probably linked to the premature failure (at 10k miles) of the AC system and exposure to the refrigerant leaked from the vent. I noticed AC hissing noise a few days after my warranty expired at only 10k miles, the dealer found super low refrigerant but could not find any leak. They recharged it and said my car was good, but noise came back after 3 months. They were still not able to find the leak, and asked me to replace one part at a time until it's fixed. I called MINI, MINI helped the dealer to find leak from compressor and replaced it. I mentioned a weird odor every time I start my car but they didn't investigate further. The noise came back again after 5 months (at 12k miles). I brought it to another dealer (since I moved) and two independent mechanics (as the previous dealer has been very incompetent), all diagnosed leak from evaporator because of the odor and that the cabin air filter has refrigerant dye all over it upon checking. The previous dealer didn't check the filter at all according to my dash camera, and because of the same odor, the timeline of the repeated failures, I believe the evaporator leak also happened at 10k miles. And one of the independent mechanics who specializes in BMW and MINI mentioned he had seen quite a few such cases in 2018 and 2019 MINIs. I think failure of two major AC components at such low mileage isn't normal, and the unexpected headache, dizziness, and strong eye irritation while driving are super dangerous. The repair cost for the defects should not be customers' responsibility.