UKPylot’s MINI Blog

From a twitter conversation, name redacted to protect the poor guy:

Test drove a MINI Cooper S over the weekend and it was aight. I expected more and the interior was fugly. Also saw a couple of REAL MINIs on the freeway and that was the coolest thing I’d seen all month.

@xxx don’t make me set my MINI-crazed friends on ya

@tendancer MINI-crazed enough to pay a $3K premium on top of the MSRP?

@xxx only 3K ? I remember when it was 5 or 6! I paid MSRP for mine.

@tendancer The S I test drove would have come out to $35K. That’s an R32!!

Regular readers will know I’ve been a big fan of XM Radio for a few years now, keeps me in music for my long weekly commute in the areas where all I can pick up is Mariachi music from Mexico. But there’s two problems right now, one I can fix, one I cannot.

1. My antenna is wired to the CD changer in the boot and, because I didn’t know how to wire it through the panel, the wire comes through the back of the car, between the two front seats and the antenna sits on the dashboard. Nothing metallic there so for the longest time it has been sitting on a mat designed for things not to move. And it has worked great for almost three years but all of a sudden it has no grip at all. The pad moves across the dash in tight corners, which it never did, and the antenna doesn’t grip the pad like it used to. So now it’s flying off into the corner or the floor at all times.
2. Despite there being oodles of channels, 95% of my listening is to UPop, a channel dedicated to “world pop music” but is largely UK and US pop music. I love it for the UK content. But this week I tuned in and heard 3 Coldplay tunes in a row which made me wonder what was going on. Next I heard a jingle that said it was “30 days of Coldplay” - 30 days of Coldplay?? Even Chris Martin himself once said he was boring to listen after too long, who on earth wants 30 days of it? And the few times I’ve tuned in, I think I’ve only heard about 6 different songs, though of course with Coldplay who can tell the difference between them anyway? So now I need a new channel for a month. So far I have switched to Fred which is a “history of alternative music”. They have good spells - of new wave/80s pop - and bad spells - punk and obscure US bands from the 80s I’ve never heard of. I just hope UPop comes back after this, as I miss my UK pop fix.

I’m behind the times, only watching Top Gear on the tele, so just recently got around to watching the final episode of last season. In the show they had a mini-awards segment where they announced “worst design of the year” to which Clarkson quickly said that the Clubman was so ugly there weren’t any competitors; the other two agreed. Next up was “worst car of the year” to which Clarkson again quickly said it must be the Clubman, but they eventually came up with something else.

So then I was reading that Top Gear gave it some kind of best car award so what happened? Did they subsequently have a big change of mind ? Or What?

More I see them, the more I like them.

Turning into the street outside my apartment I spotted a super shiny Clubman S parked on the forecourt of a repair shop (for convenience to the local hostelry I think) - my first sighting in the wild. I didn’t really get a great look as I crept by but I must say it looks a whole lot better in the flesh than in pictures on the web. Looked real nice.

Spent last night pondering whether to trade in my “gas guzzling” Cooper for something a little less thirsty. Yeah, I know what you’re thinking, so let me explain…. my monthly commute is about 1600 miles, most of that highway miles. Unless I take a big cut in pay by working locally, or my boss decides teleworking is not evil, this isn’t going to change. So, my fuel costs:

In regular driving I can get 27 mpg, if I try real hard I can probably get 30, though I haven’t managed that yet. The Civic Hybrid claims 45 mpg but I figure 40 mpg is more likely.

Why did I use the Civic Hybrid as my comparison? I was looking at cars that I could trade in the ‘05 and not spend much more to buy. This puts the Clubman or new MCS out of reach. An MC could be possible but I’m tired of driving to Escondido for servicing, and the outrageous costs involved.

Am I really thinking about getting out of the MINI? Not sure at this point, it’s possible. I’m depressed about the state of the convertible top, why keep a car that you can’t put the top down? I’ve heard a new top could be as much as $4000, I’d rather put that to something new.

The cost of (private) flying has risen worse than the cost of motoring. Plane rentals in my flying club are up to the $100 an hour mark, saving $1-200 on driving could mean the difference between giving up flying, and still being able to do it. As much as I’d hate to give up the fun of the MINI, high gas prices may mean that the auto becomes utility again.

You have to love the optimism displayed by the OBC. Filled up over the weekend ($4.475 for those of you interested) and when I got to work this morning I had traveled approximately 150 miles and the OBC was saying I had 360 left in the tank. I’ve never gotten 360 miles from a full tank, let alone one where I’d already done 150. I’d love to see 400 miles on a tank, let alone 510!

What you don’t have to love is the, now, quite noticeable wear in the fabric of the convertible top. Both sides of the top have two clearly visible dots where the fabric has been worn thin by the underlying mechanism. At 61,000 I’m out of warranty (not that Brecht were willing to do anything about it when it was) so am faced with either a $2200 bill for a new top, or simply not using it any more. Neither seems that good to me. I suppose I shall trawl the forums for some DIY solutions, maybe I can do something to stop it getting worse?

I thought this was pretty good: