Mini wheel bolts -confusion

[mikyman]

I have an R53 Cooper S 2005 and have just had the wheels refurbished.
To complete the look I asked for some chrome wheel bolts as a birthday present from my family.
I have just returned from my local tyre fitting depot and am confused as to what I have.
They removed the first bolt and found whilst it was the same size as the new pack of locking bolts, it was smaller than the other standard bolts.
Useing a simple measure I think the bolt from the car is an M 10 size,as is the new locking bolts. However the new standard bolts seem to be M12,so are too big.
I cannot seem to find any suitable bolts on E Bay or other suppliers. Everyone says the standard bolt is an M 12.
The car has the original Bullet alloys and had run flat tyres.
Any ideas please.

[SlimJim16v]

Standard is M12, the later R56 MINI had M14.

[mikyman]

Thanks, I found that out, but i still dont understand why my car has smaller diameter bolts. The new set of locking bolts are a match for the existing wheel bolts
Any ideas why and where I can purchase standard bolts to match.

[chrisch77]

As noted above, the wheel bolts changed from late in life of the original R50 model shape, actually ahead of the R56 launch, but from M12 to M14 IIRC. So if your car had been made in 2006 it probably would have had had the larger bolts.

[mikyman]

Thanks. ' Standing the problem on its head', were M10 size wheel bolts ever fitted to any model in the Mini range?
My car is a 2005 model, were these bolts fitted then,as I have no knowledge of bolts being changed.Even have the original locking wheel nut.

[SlimJim16v]

Nope, too small, can't think any recent car would have anything that small. Maybe the original mini, but imperial size.

[E-bmw]

All early (R5X) bmw minis used m12 wheel bolts.

All later ones (after 2006, 2008 for convertibles) were m14, you need to look for R53/50 wheel bolts on ebay etc.