Jul 31st, 2004
As more and more MINI owners are taking their cars to the track they're finding that there are a couple weak points of the MINI (and any street car for that matter) when it comes to track use. And the one that seems to pop-up more and more is brake fade. Well Promini has a great explanation of what causes brake fade on the track and how you can go about reducing it. Here's an excerpt:
Once you understand the cause of a fading brake pedal you will see how easy it is to avoid it in the future. Brake pedal fade can occur for two primary reasons. The most common is the over heating of the brake fluid to a point where the fluid actually boils and turns to gas. The other common scenario is the over heating of the brake pad friction material to a point where it simply disintegrate from the pad backing plate.
You can read the entire article here.
Jul 30th, 2004
In these photos we finally see the anthracite headliner, Purple Haze, new grab handles, and the new side sun-shade (among other things).
[Purple Haze/Anthracite Headliner Gallery]
Jul 30th, 2004
For those wanting to see more “real world photos”, here's a good comparison of the 2004 Cooper versus the 2005 Cooper. Both cars are identically equipped except for xenons in the '04.
[photo 1] [photo 2]
Jul 30th, 2004
There's a great thread at North American Motoring going on right now about dislikes and likes of the 2005 changes. I thought it would be an interesting topic to hear other people's opinions on. And with the first deliveries going on this weekend I thought it would be a good as time as ever to discuss this topic.
continued →
Jul 29th, 2004
The day is upon us. The first 2005 MINI hardtops delivered to customers on the East Coast should happen sometime today or tomorrow. Congrats to all those whose cars about to be delivered. MotoringFile would love to hear any first impressions of the '05 changes so feel free to send them in via the contact link above.
You can check out an extensive gallery of the US spec 2005 MINIs that were just delivered to MINI of Peabody over at Ian Culls MINI weblog (also where the picture above came from): [LINK]
Update: Pre-spec Convertible demos will be here around the end of August. Each dealer should get four demos. The first batch of customer order convertibles is just about to start production, so we should see those in early September.
Jul 28th, 2004
It would appear that the US spec head-unit will be the same as the 2004 with the exception of a much larger volume knob. Okay enough with the knob jokes! Larger photo here
First one who gets an MP3 cd in there and actually tests one in action gets a hearty round of applause.
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p>Update: This comes from Aleks at Hassel MINI:
Just burned a cd with one mp3 on it to test and it came up no problem. The units we have look just like the 2004 with the exception of a grippier volume knob which will make it easier to twist in a hurry.
When you first put the disk in is brings up a message saying that it is checking the cd and then it brings up the first track.
Thanks Ian for the photo!
Jul 28th, 2004
Get ready for more bling bling on the MINI. here are some of the first official photos of the chrome hinges that are optional on the convertible. In the US they are available only with the chrome mirror caps on the Cooper and Cooper S ($120). You can see a larger photo here.
