MCS Cabrio

With the release date of the MINI cabrio fast approaching details of the car are starting to trickle in. While there are fairly important things that we simply don't know yet (like it's name) we have a good picture what the car will be like in full production trim. And to add to the list I just received some further information regarding some different aspects of the car. While this comes directly from someone within MINI please take it all with a grain of salt as none of it is truly confirmed.

  • The chassis was stiffened in the initial development of the MINI to accommodate different variations like a convertible. This does two things; keep the incredible rigidity of the MINI intact and allows engineers to lop off the roof without having to add a huge amount of chassis reinforcements which generally also add weight. So while weight will be added and the chassis will be altered slightly it would seem that it won't be the usual chop job/reengineering of the chassis done by many automakers.
  • Marketing (at least in the US) will very much focus on top down motoring (yes that's a bit vague).
  • The top is design to be similar to the “California” top that BMW produced for the 318ti in the late 90's. You can see a prototype of this feature in this photo (first shown in Autoexpress and Bridger.us/MINI almost a year ago. Update: This has now been confirmed!
  • In the US, dealers will get their first demo cars sometime around mid August with sales beginning around mid September. We may see several cars in the US sometime around mid July for various activities.