Mini Cooper/S Tech

shawnwhipple · **Joined:** Wed Aug 20, 2003 6:28 pm **Posts:** 603

I'm thinking about picking up an older Mini Cooper as something to drive for awhile and I was hoping to get some help from the mini owners in the club. Anything or years I should avoid? What's the best online source for info? How do they hold up once they get over 100K miles?

Steven Carter · **Posted:** Tue Aug 14, 2012 9:57 pm

Rodney may have a lead on a well-set up Cooper S for DS...wasn't it in NoVa?

RodneyWright · **Posted:** Tue Aug 14, 2012 10:54 pm

Steven Carter wrote:

Rodney may have a lead on a well-set up Cooper S for DS...wasn't it in NoVa?

Shawn, please buy this car....

http://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale ... 1648&Log=0

Looks to be very nice and it has a clean carfax. Only 2 issues I know of is 1: located 5 hours from Raleigh. 2: spent most of its time up north, NY and NJ for 2 years, off to Cali for 3 weeks and then back to VA for the rest of its time on the road. According to the guys at Flow, it should be fine.

This is exactly what I was looking for, 06 cooper S, chrono package, 6 speed, no sunroof, LSD and a factory installed JCworks kit. Makes it a DS monster and the tires are cheap. Wife and I had a serious "discussion" about this car and she won....this round..... but the battle ain't over

Talk to Brice and Mary, they have and drive the same car sans sunroof.

The 05 & 06 super charged cars had most of the bugs worked out and are relatively robust and the motor has a good rep. In 07, the turbo'd motors came out. According to what I've read on northamericanmotoring.com, there are potential serious issues w/ this car and motor. I'll let some of the other mini owners chime in. I know Jordan's has held up well and that car is a blast to drive. Does take premium fuel, but returns about 26 around town and more on the hiway.

clinehall · **Posted:** Wed Aug 15, 2012 6:28 am

www.northamericanmotoring.com is the total mini queer site, everything you need to know. Take a lot of it with a grain of salt, a lot of waxers on there.

I am sure you wouldn't want a slushbox but that is something to completely avoid as the CVT in the first gen has a about a 119% failure rate. LSD didn't come out until a couple of years into the production, that's my only problem with my 2002.

BriceJohnson · **Joined:** Thu Apr 13, 2006 7:33 am **Posts:** 2230

RodneyWright wrote:

the tires are cheap.

Wrong. . . The works kit means 17" R-comps. Cheap relative to a Mustang, but far from cheap.

Definitely stay away from the regular cooper manual transmissions. The transmissions are super fragile. Gwen went through at least 2 of them.

Thee cooper S, motor mounts tend to fail (not a huge deal), I recently had the TPS go bad (requires replacement of the whole throttle body though), and a couple other minor things. Main issue I would recommend you look at is if you are buying a car, check it for "strut tower mushrooming", as this can create a car that is impossible to align properly. Runflat tires and heavy wheel/tire combos can definitely take their toll on the strut mounts and the surrounding sheet metal over a lot of mileage.

Vincent Keene · **Posted:** Wed Aug 15, 2012 9:25 am

Wow, you guys are just lobbing them up there for me aren't you?

Michael Westerfield · **Posted:** Wed Aug 15, 2012 10:49 am

Vincent Keene wrote:

Wow, you guys are just lobbing them up there for me aren't you?

Ever googled "shock tower mushrooming"?

I was really confused as all the first page results led me to superior German engineering. Must be something wrong with google.

Vincent Keene · **Posted:** Wed Aug 15, 2012 10:57 am

Michael Westerfield wrote:

Ever googled "shock tower mushrooming"?

I was really confused as all the first page results led me to superior German engineering. Must be something wrong with google.

What's funny is our General Lei ('89 Nissan Sentra) has seen 10X the hell that any of these Minis have. We have been through enough bumps/jumps to ruin three sets of shocks, but all the shock towers are just fine. Seems the Japanese can design shock towers that last even on an base mode economy car. That must be like rocket science to do that in Germany.

JohnByers · **Posted:** Wed Aug 15, 2012 11:06 am

the Japanese certainly have a leg up on "dive bombing" so its no suprise they have well built shock towers for sudden abrupt hard objects

JamesShort · **Posted:** Wed Aug 15, 2012 11:07 am

Issue 1 (German or not): struts

clinehall · **Posted:** Wed Aug 15, 2012 11:51 am

Vk is getting slow in his old age.

clinehall · **Posted:** Wed Aug 15, 2012 11:53 am

BTW, Shawn this will mean alot to you. They are super safe, tough as nails. My Daughter flipped one and walked away, I have been rearended at 70mph compared to my 15 mph and I'm still here.

shawnwhipple · **Joined:** Wed Aug 20, 2003 6:28 pm **Posts:** 603

Thanks for the input guys. I guess I should have mentioned the budget is around 6K to 7K. That's why I was looking at older ones. It's looking like the plan will be to buy something a little cheaper to drive for awhile and then the daughter will probably get it as a hand me down. A Mini just seemed like a fun car that isn't a Honda Civic or a Toyota Corolla. Nothing wrong with those cars but they are a bit plain.

BriceJohnson · **Joined:** Thu Apr 13, 2006 7:33 am **Posts:** 2230

http://raleigh.craigslist.org/cto/3209798627.html

Alternatively, did Lee Williams sell his 328 yet? You should buy that.

BriceJohnson · **Joined:** Thu Apr 13, 2006 7:33 am **Posts:** 2230

Wanna buy my 3 (not seriously considering selling it right now, but it WOULD be perfect for you)? My car is supposedly worth around $5k, due to its high mileage (172k). You should be able to find a 2004-2006 S 5 spd in that price range.

In all seriousness, a mazda3 would be a great car to look at for that price range, and its definitely more fun than a civic or corolla. The 2.3 has MUCH better torque, the handling is far superior, and its much cheaper/easier to fix than a mini.

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