R56 Mini Cooper S

[RS Grant]

After my old job going in the bin with the rest of 2020, I was losing my company car and the commute to my new job was just a few miles back and forward. I thought this was the perfect opportunity for a return to shed, so I started looking at petrol non-turbo Focai and Mondeos around a decade old... until I realised that I'm only going to be doing a few miles, so why not get something a little more fun. But budget performance is rarely hassle free in my experience; I'll never forget being told 'cheap, fast and reliable; choose two' when I was younger.

Having also recently lost the option of driving an R56 Mini CooperSD when me and my ex went our separate ways, I thought that a wee R53 Cooper S might fit my brief well.. until I started reading about them and seeing that finding a good one may be a bit of a gamble, added to the fact that I was a touch pressed for time and couldn't find any cars within 300-350 miles of me with the mileage/history/spec that I wanted.. so I started to look at R56s, and quickly skirted past the earlier N14 engined cars towards later N18 engined cars. Obviously still a gamble, but well, I'd rather cry at the side of the road in a broken well specced R56 than an older version.

I was quite specific about the spec that I was looking for and that counted a few options out before they reached my short list. There were a handful of cars which I was interested in, but this one was the closest to me and by coincidence my favourite colour combination/highest spec too... the low mileage (34k), fresh brakes and a matching set of nearly new Michelin Pilot Sport 4s were all big ticks in the box for me as well.

Here are a couple of the pictures from the advert:

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr
Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

The colour combination was a wee bit different to the others that were for sale, I've liked dark metallic green cars since my dad had a Vauxhall Carlton CDX in that colour (with a light cream interior) when I was growing up. I think it suits the Mini well, but I know that colours are a subjective thing.

From doing my VIN decoding, it would appear that my car is missing the OE bonnet stripes which I may/may not re-fit at some point.

mini build by Grant F, on Flickr

The spec list of the car is:

B22 British Racing Green Metallic
T6GW Polar Beige Leather

383 Roof And Mirror Caps In Black
3A1 John Cooper Works Aerodynamic Kit
2P8 Cross Spoke JCW Challenge Wheels
329 Black Bonnet Stripes
313 Exterior Mirror Package
210 Dynamic Stability Control (DSC)
5DT Dynamic Traction Control (DTC)
4UF Sport Button
249 Multi-function For Steering Wheel
345 Chrome Line Interior
420 Sun Protection Glass
423 Velour Floor Mats
473 Front Armrest
493 Storage Compartment Package
494 Seat Heating
4AA Roof Lining Anthracite
4AU Additional Decor Rings
4BD Interior Surfaces Piano Black
4C1 Colour Line Carbon Black
4CU Interior World Carbon Black
521 Rain Sensor
522 Xenon Lights
534 Automatic Air Conditioning
563 Ambient Lights Package
654 DAB Tuner
6NE Enhanced Bluetooth Mobile Preparation
6NM Mini Connected
6UM Mini Navigation System
6VC Control Combox
872 Chili Pack

I don't know if I've included stuff which is standard or not there, but I've taken out what I think was standard equipment and left in what I believe were options.. some of which are hard to believe, like the interior lights? Velour floor mats? ...guess it is a BMW after all.

I've not had it long and despite telling myself that I'd leave it alone.. I have already done a couple of wee bits to it, the first was an essential rear seat removal so that my labrador can come along on Mini adventures with me. Was a piece of cake to do and left me with this:

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

I've ordered a rear seat delete kit (same as the GP2 Mini) so that I have a more usable flat rear floor in there, as well as it being more aesthetically pleasing to the eye than my current set up of work gear and a piece of foam... as you can see, the car has been pressed into service already:

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

While I was in about the interior, I removed the front seats so that I could give the carpet a good clean as I normally do with my cars. I thought I'd have a bash at fitting the Recaro CS' which have been gathering dust since I took them out of my old E92 M3. I ordered some VAC floor mounts from Martin at MS Motorsport and stuck one of them into the car:

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr
Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

...but time and patience were running low so once I got the seat in and couldn't reach the rear bolt holes to secure the seat... it all came back out and the standard seats were refitted. It's bitter sweet really, I want the CS' in the car but at the moment the luxury of seat heating in a Scottish winter is probably more valuable than extra bolster support.

Been pretty difficult to keep the thing clean since I got it, however the bonus with it being so small is the fact it doesn't take long to get cleaned up again.

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr
Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr
Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

I haven't really had any proper sunlight to show off the colour, the best I've managed is the lights in the garage when I was giving it a quick polish and switching the numberplates..

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

Since it's December, here is a Christmas themed one from The Dome in Edinburgh..

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

Initial thoughts are that it's a well built, well specced, nippy, brilliant handling wee thing. I've had the not unexpected comments from a couple of guys I know about it being a hairdressers car, my sexual orientation, etc etc... but I really don't care, I think it's great and it feels like it's going to be the fun all-rounder that I was looking for. It also averaged just over 39mpg at normal A and B road speeds after collection..

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

So far I've had no issues, everything works, it's really nicely specced and has everything that I think I'd want/spec myself if I bought the car brand new. I had a battery discharge notification pop up once but I'd been farting around in and out of the car cleaning it so I'll just keep an eye on that.. if it needs a new battery then I'm sure the cold winter weather will certainly make that happen sooner rather than later.

The grip and directness of the steering is great.. the trade off for this I guess is the ride. The MPS4 tyres fitted are (I believe) non-runflat and if I'm honest, the car is pretty stiff over broken/poor quality surfaces, so I can only imagine what it'd be like with runflat tyres fitted.

I've picked up a JCW exhaust for some extra occasion because the standard Cooper S is a wee bit muted as standard. I'm also led to believe that they respond pretty well to some other very basic breathing/cooling mods and a remap, but we'll see...

[dibblecorse]

Nice write up and a cracking little car, is there a solution to the CS seat issue ? Hope so, looked great in there ....

[Over over under steer]

perfect colour combo, particularly those seats with the green. Something about deep greens and cream interiors oozes class.

Those CS seats.... wow, time to go find myself a set for the 981, they look the nuts.

Lovely car, if you plan to keep it, overhaul the suspension, give it a wee remap and some uprated pads and you'll have yourself a bag of fun.

[HotHatchFan]

Big fan of this, looks great in green. Something about these being all filthy that just looks so right..!!

[cerb4.5lee]

A cracking write up and a cracking colour combo too.

It is a lovely spec too.

I can't escape the hairdresser comments at all from my mates...because I have both a F56 Cooper S and a 370Z Roadster!

I will look forward to following your experience with it.

Enjoy it.

[5harp3y]

great colour combo!

these are an absolute bargain. my wife's got one too and it's one of the best little cars we've ever had

[RS Grant]

dibblecorse said:

Nice write up and a cracking little car, is there a solution to the CS seat issue ? Hope so, looked great in there ....

Thanks very much.

I'm unsure about what the solution for the seats will be, the current attempt was:

Recaro CS'
Recaro Runners
VAC Floor Mounts
VAC Seat Belt Recepticle Mount

I'm not sure whether it was a lack of working space, poor working light, my lack of knowledge or a combination of all three; but there are certainly R56 Minis out there with CS' fitted so I know it's possible.

I'm just hopeful that I don't need to resort to the mounts sold by Recaro/Lohen because after an email to Lohen, they said that the seats would be mounted a fair bit higher than the standard seats. One of my biggest gripes with newer cars is seats sitting too high, but the OE seats sit low in the Mini and I'd like to retain (but ideally decrease) the seat height if possible.

I'll revisit it in the spring time and hopefully make it work, I'll send it to a specialist if needs be.. but the difference in support was (as expected) night and day even in my mock/semi-fitted state; plus it looked great nestled in there.

[d_a_n1979]

What a great car; always really liked these, I can even fit in them which is a plus Wanted to get one for the wife but she's not won over

Great picture outside the Dome too...

This is the 1st year in a long time we've not been to Edinburgh to see the Christmas markets

[LordGrover]

Nice. I suspect I shall get one of these in the near-ish future.
Will follow with interest.

Talking of following, I followed one of these through the lanes last night. I'd always heard they have poor headlights, but it was like following a mobile Sun. From behind I couldn't tell whether he had extra lighting or something, but crivens it was brighter than a Summer midday!

[RS Grant]

Over over under steer said:

perfect colour combo, particularly those seats with the green. Something about deep greens and cream interiors oozes class.

Those CS seats.... wow, time to go find myself a set for the 981, they look the nuts.

Lovely car, if you plan to keep it, overhaul the suspension, give it a wee remap and some uprated pads and you'll have yourself a bag of fun.

Yeah I'm the same, obviously I experienced my old mans Carlton first hand.. but also remember seeing cars like Jaguar XJs in lovely shades of dark red/dark green/dark blue with light biscuit coloured leather and thought they looked fantastic, so I've always been a fan.

CS' are lovely, would definitely recommend them as a decent road seat that provides good support while still retaining the ability to adjust back rest, tilt, etc.. I believe that you can even specify them with airbags and seat heating too, although mine don't have these options.

I wouldn't bet against a gentle remap at some point, however, from the reading that I've done it looks like I may have to budget for a clutch and flywheel replacement if I go that route because the jump in torque from a remap is quite significant; there are guys with basic Stage 1 remaps who have experienced clutch slip almost immediately.

[RS Grant]

HotHatchFan said:

Big fan of this, looks great in green. Something about these being all filthy that just looks so right..!!

Thanks I'm also a fan of them in green, nice change from black/white/red that I see a lot of.

Filthy sporty cars always look good to me, makes it look like it's being used and enjoyed properly.

[RS Grant]

cerb4.5lee said:

A cracking write up and a cracking colour combo too.

It is a lovely spec too.

I can't escape the hairdresser comments at all from my mates...because I have both a F56 Cooper S and a 370Z Roadster!

I will look forward to following your experience with it.

Enjoy it.

Haha yep you've certainly given yourself a double dosage of those comments with your choice of cars!!

It's good fun wee car, really happy with it... I was going to say that I was missing the tower of torque from the V8 in the M3 just to trigger you, but I wont. ...to be fair, it'd also be a lie because they're very different cars to drive.

[RS Grant]

5harp3y said:

great colour combo!

these are an absolute bargain. my wife's got one too and it's one of the best little cars we've ever had

Yeah they are a bit of a bargain IMO.

It was hard not to jump straight to the full bhuna JCW, but to be honest with the spec/mileage that I've got with this car; the equivalent JCW would have been near on double the price... and given that I'd started looking at shed money Mondeos, I'd already used up all available man maths equations to justify this to myself.

[RS Grant]

d_a_n1979 said:

What a great car; always really liked these, I can even fit in them which is a plus Wanted to get one for the wife but she's not won over

Great picture outside the Dome too...

This is the 1st year in a long time we've not been to Edinburgh to see the Christmas markets

Thanks Dan, I'm also not the smallest bloke and find that there is plenty of space... in the front. The rear seats were absolutely pointless and the boot genuinely comical, but with the rear seat delete I think it'll be reasonably practical wee two seater.

The loss of the Christmas Markets this year was a big blow for everyone, they're absolutely brilliant, great for the city and one of the many things which I have really missed too.

[RS Grant]

LordGrover said:

Nice. I suspect I shall get one of these in the near-ish future.
Will follow with interest.

Talking of following, I followed one of these through the lanes last night. I'd always heard they have poor headlights, but it was like following a mobile Sun. From behind I couldn't tell whether he had extra lighting or something, but crivens it was brighter than a Summer midday!

I have driven a few of the new Minis, every time I've been that impressed that I've gone straight on to the classifieds afterwards and looked at what is available and whether I can justify getting one... this time I finally got there and I don't regret it at all. Brilliant wee cars and glad I went for the R56 model with the slightly newer tech that I'm more familiar with from my experience in E9x BMWs.

Maybe the car you followed had the optional spot lights fitted? Although I've got to say that at no point have I thought that I was driving with poor lights using mine in the dark with just the OE xenons.. guess it depends on what you're used to but I'm happy with the output and don't feel the need to invest in additional lighting.

[d_a_n1979]

RS Grant said:

d_a_n1979 said:

What a great car; always really liked these, I can even fit in them which is a plus Wanted to get one for the wife but she's not won over

Great picture outside the Dome too...

This is the 1st year in a long time we've not been to Edinburgh to see the Christmas markets

Thanks Dan, I'm also not the smallest bloke and find that there is plenty of space... in the front. The rear seats were absolutely pointless and the boot genuinely comical, but with the rear seat delete I think it'll be reasonably practical wee two seater.

The loss of the Christmas Markets this year was a big blow for everyone, they're absolutely brilliant, great for the city and one of the many things which I have really missed too.

Yeah; I think that's why the wife isn't too keen She'd want the 4 seats, but then again if she's driving it, I'll be in the passenger side up front too... And If I'm driving it; she'd be the same, or behind me with her hobbit legs

I fit fine in the Racing Jazz; it's the head room that's great in that and I know the mini's are the same, but it's my shoulder width that generally causes issues (usually up against the B pillar with no room to move haha)

Re the Christmas Markets; last year TBF was the worst we experienced; all of a sudden they'd tripled in size and for me, ruined what it used to be, traditional and enjoyable

We generally come up for a few days, later in the week rather than a weekend, or do a Sunday/Monday night stop over (Ibis Royal Mile, Scotsman or The Balmoral - depending on which has the best value (we've stayed in the Balmoral cheaper than the Ibis before)! The markets were great; small enough to enjoy, but with enough different stalls etc; but last year was just manic and we stupidly went on a Saturday and back in a day on the train...

[cerb4.5lee]

RS Grant said:

Haha yep you've certainly given yourself a double dosage of those comments with your choice of cars!!

It's good fun wee car, really happy with it... I was going to say that I was missing the tower of torque from the V8 in the M3 just to trigger you, but I wont. ...to be fair, it'd also be a lie because they're very different cars to drive.

I sure have!

It certainly doesn't take much to set me off about the E92 M3...that's for sure!!

[RS Grant]

Wee bit of an update on how things have been going, the car hasn't been driven for a couple of weeks and I got the 'increased discharge' warning again when I started it yesterday. However after a drive it cleared and hasn't reappeared, but I guess this points to a weak-ish battery so will need to keep an eye on that and give Tayna a shout when the time comes.

I've also freshened up a couple of bits on the car which were simple tasks, one of which I did just after I got it and the other two I did yesterday.

First up was the aerial because the rubber boot at the bottom had perished and started to crumble away when you touched it.

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr
Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

I looked at replacements which seemed to be around a tenner, but I was quite keen to get rid of the remote control car look so I went with a genuine Mini Sport stubby aerial as a replacement for £22 from my preferred BMW parts department.

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr
Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

All fitted up, it looks much better/more modern and *touch wood* DAB signal hasn't dropped off at all so it's been a 10/10 change for me.

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

The next wee change is something I do with every car I buy and one of the greatest mods that anyone can make IMO... fit new Bosch wiper blades. I'm glad I did with the Mini as it turned out that even though the original blades were working ok, one of the blades fitted was actually the wrong size. So for the sake of £14 for a pair of them on Amazon (the same price as one blade from Halfords?!) with a 'free' Wurth screenwash thrown in, these have made a good difference.

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr
Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

The last change was finishing off the removal of the rear seats which I had already carried out just after buying the car. I wanted a flat floor for a more finished look and everyone on The Facebooks and Instagram seemed to really rate the Mini Works 'Rear Seat Delete' kit found here.

I got a black friday discount when I purchased this, but it's essentially a piece of MDF trimmed in accoustic carpet that brings me back to the big subwoofer boxes that everyone had in their cars 20 years ago... although maybe that's still a thing to be fair?! But aside from a small subwoofer I fitted to a Transit Connect that I had, I've never revisited the big stereo system thing after I got my twin 10" subwoofer box stolen from my RS Turbo in 2001... which you can see, still hurts.

Anyway, fitting is meant to be 'drop in' easy... however... it turns out that wasn't the case here.

The front part fits fine, the small MDF 'feet' underneath locate over the front seat anchors without any hassle. When I went to fit the rear part, it is marginally too wide, which required removal of clips from the boot trim for fitting, then refitting the clips once it had been persuaded past. It is also a little too deep so creates a slight step in the middle of the boot. It's something I could live with, but it's not how it's meant to be, so I think at some point I'll peel back the carpet and shave a bit of length off so that it fits snugly and the load area is totally flat/more aesthetically pleasing.

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

It's been tested out by Barney too, who is much happier standing on a solid base than boilersuits and rigger boots..

Untitled by Grant F, on Flickr

As you can see in the photos, the car could do with a bit of a hoover/clean up.. but this time of year makes it pretty difficult to keep on top of things. I'm actually on the look out for some proper Mini rubber floor mats popping up for sale second hand to replace the make do rubber efforts I've fitted in place of the carpet mats which I think would have headed for total annihilation if they'd been kept in there.

In other news, I was offered an AEM strut brace and Evolve decat from a friends old R55 N18 JCW at a price that I couldn't really refuse... so they're sitting in the garage now, along with the JCW exhaust that I had already bought for the car.

I've done a bit more reading about tuning the car and it would suggest that if I was to go Stage 2 with the car; better plugs, air filter, decat/sports cat, cat-back and intercooler with a suitable remap then I should see around 230ish horsepower with the same kind of torque figure too.

That would make for a quick wee car, however, the downside is that with the new found performance the clutch will likely start to slip quickly/immediately... so that whole upgrade stage becomes a hell of a lot more expensive once you throw in a clutch/flywheel and possibly some kind of LSD (employing the 'while it's apart' logic here) as well; which has dampened my enthusiasm for releasing the extra power a touch.

I started to investigate suspension upgrades for the car after that, quickly discounting the cheaper stuff like 'Stance+' as nothing more than an aesthetic upgrade. I can get Bilstein B14 for just under £800 but they're fixed rate with no adjustable top mounts, or there are sets of BC and MeisterR available for just under £900 which come with adjustable damping and top mounts. From there it's just over £1000 for a set of ST coilovers which are made by KW (just without the same rust proofing as proper KW suspension) and also have adjustable damping and top mounts... then Bilstein B16, KW V3, Ohlins are all £1500+ per set.

Given that I'll also be wanting to fit some adjustable rear arms, uprated bushes and have a proper geometry set up done on the car if/when I fit a replacement set of shocks/springs then the costs start to mount up pretty quickly... so I'm not sure what will come next with the Mini; I try to remind myself that this is a car which I said that I'd leave alone.

[paultownsend]

In the green this is a stunning little thing. Especially with those Recaros. I hope you don’t have neighbours. With the JCW and decat that will be too loud. Especially in the cabin now you’ve taken out the rear seats. I’d try the exhaust first. It will sound great in sport mode with a tank of VPower.

Pop pop pop........

Edited by paultownsend on Thursday 24th December 16:47

[350Z on the Wolds]

The clutch should be fine. Mine (N18) is on a manic stage 1, jcw exhaust but that's it, and it's running 237 hp and 270 ft lbs with no issues. Has been for 2 years nearly. Done at CLP Tuning in Sheffield.

Love the colour too and I would have those CS's in my car in a heartbeat!