Rear left wheel grinding noise on new Mini One D

[joncrouch]

Hi there

I am hoping someone can help, my wife's mini has started making an intermittent but quite loud grinding noise from the left rear wheel.

It appears almost random and comes and goes for a few days at a time but is definitely louder at low speeds (2nd and 3rd gears) and when starting to accelerate - if I let my foot off the accelerator it stops - it is also louder when turning right i.e. on roundabouts

When I took it to the local dealer they couldn't find anything amiss, tbf it didn't make a peep en route...typical!

Any ideas/thoughts welcome!

Thanks

[sad61t]

Things that come to mind are:
* Wheel bearing - I had an intermittent rattle on a Renault 5 engine that magically cured itself whenever the garage took the car. Eventually the entire pulley disintegrated en route to work - only time I've watched bits of a car bounce down the road in the rear-view mirror. Car made it to a local indi near work and they fixed it same day.
* Stone in the wheel trim (unlikely unless your Mini has the shell {huh? predictive text LOL, now they would rattle!} steel wheels + trim).