I’ve replaced all my interior lamps with high-intensity white LEDs. So when you open Blimey’s door at night, it’s like opening the refrigerator door at 3AM… BRIGHT! And a nice, cool, white light.
One of the glaring - no, that’s not right…
One of the dim-witted deficiencies of the MINI cabrio is the lack of ANY form of lighting in the backseat area of the car. I stuck a Sylvania Dot-It 3-LED press-on lamp to the ceiling strut to make a rear “dome” light - and it works well once you’re actually in the back seat to use it. But it’s a little treacherous climbing in back there when you can’t see where you’re putting your feet…

I think I’ve copied about 400 things from ImagoX… he installed blue cold cathodes to light his cabrio rear footwells. While blue interior lights don’t do it for me, white sure as heck does. I purchased two white 4.7″ 12-LED strips from oznium.com a few months back after having success with the longer versions in the ImagoX “light that boot” mod.

I tapped into the wires for the passenger side footwell light (brown/black=ground; brown/yellow=hot) and ran 18 gauge 2 conductor wire under the carpet edge floor trim to beside the seat, then under the seat rail and to the Oznium strip (gold=ground; silver=hot). Strip is zip tied with 3 ties to the rear round steel cross-brace under the seat, with the LEDs pointing straight down.

Another run of 18 gauge 2 conductor wire runs from here, under the inboard passenger seat rail, through the console, under the inboard drivers seat rail, and to a second strip under the drivers seat.

Works great - color matches the white high-flux flank LEDs I have installed for the front footwells and puddle lights. The strips fade on and off just like the front footwells. And I like the brightness of the 12 LED strips - just right for my taste. I think the 9″ 24 LED strips would be too much.

Several folks have heard about how I (and others) put their cars on four jack stands using the 2×4 jacking method… I’ve explained it a number of times, but there always seems to be someone who is nervous about it and wants to see pics. Some things shouldn’t require pics. But I like to be helpful, even to people who probably shouldn’t be jacking up their MINI. So today when I jacked it up for the 5K wheel clean,wax and rotation, I took some pics.

DISCLAIMER: Attempt this at your own risk. This is NOT the factory-approved method to lift a MINI. If you break your car, don’t blame me. If your car falls, don’t blame me. If you don’t know how to use a jack or jack stand, don’t blame me. None of these have been problems for me so far, but YMMV.

Here’s my rig - a Harbor Freight race jack, two of my four jack stands, and a 38″ long piece of 2×4. A couple of inches shorter or longer would work. The 2×4 just needs to fit BETWEEN the jack point blocks under the sill.

Here’s where I put the 2×4 under the sill. It’s slid under there until it hits a part that protrudes down further - so it’s resting flush on the flat, wide part of the bottom of the plastic sill cover. On the cabrio, there is an extra under-chassis brace that bolts near the rear end of the 2×4, and makes the back protrude out an extra half inch or so. No worries.

Note: More recently, I’ve cut my 2×4 so it fits between the front jack block and the rear cabrio brace mounting point - now it slides all the way underneath like it should, and I like this better. This is only necessary for the cabrio…

I was going for the Super Bowl Prince-esque phallic look with the jack in the reflection, but it didn’t quite align… I love how the funhouse-mirror-of-a-door makes it look like I have 12″ long legs. But they’re actually 19″ long…

Then I just jack it high enough to get the jack stands under there. Today I just needed to pull the wheels - so no need to go high. Recently when I did my USS I needed it as high as I could get it - so I jacked it as high as the jack would go using the same technique. This will make some people nervous - so you could jack it halfway on one side, then all the way on the second side, then go back to the first side and jack it the rest of the way. But I’m not afraid of it sliding off the 2×4. Jacking the second side actually seems safer to me, because as the second side approaches the height of the first, the bottom of the sill is actually leveling out, so the 2×4 is at less of an angle as it goes up…

Have the jack stands pre-set to the height you’re going to use, and ready to slide under there.

Slide the jack stands under the jack points, ensure that they are under the jack points, make sure that as the car lowers you’re NOT GOING TO MISS THE JACK POINTS, and lower the jack (SLOWLY) onto the jack stands.

Now move to the other side and repeat.

Voila - a 2006 MCS cabrio on four jack stands. Without pausing to take pics, I can do this in 2 minutes or less.

And yes, to do the rotation I could have just jacked one side at a time. But it’s more convenient to have all four wheels off and be able to get the “assembly line” going. Today I removed the wheels, washed the wheels and tires, treated tar specks with tar remover, waited, washed the brakes, suspension and wheel wells, scrubbed off the tar, dried the wheels, hand rubbed them with Scratch-x to get the rest of the gunk off, wiped them off, touched up some curbed spots with the Dremel sanding drum and touch-up paint, waited for the paint to dry, applied Wheel Shield, let it dry, buffed it off, reinstalled the wheels, applied Extreme Shine tire treatment, waited, wiped off excess. I would eat of these wheels.

Wow - flipped 10,000 on Blimey today - in six and a half months. That may be more miles than I’ve EVER driven in six months. On my last car I was driving 12-15K per year for the last few years. And it’s not like we’re not driving the minivan, too - we just got back from a 1400 mile Florida round-trip on the van…

My job hasn’t changed. I still have a 20 mile round-trip commute - just like the last 7 years. But it’s funny how the MINI has me looking for excuses to drive - both around town and on business. Fly to Atlanta? Nah, that’s something I used to do BEFORE the MINI. Now I drive if I can work the timing. Drive all the way across the state for a sales call? YOU BET! Can I come back next week? And how far are you from Fontana? Oh, no reason… just curious…
And I only take the interstate if I have to get somewhere FAST. Otherwise, I take the country roads, find a few twisties, and get there almost as fast…

Wow - I think I’m turning into a DRIVER….

So today I made the pilgrimage to Thomasville, NC to “Mini Mecca” of the Carolinas - GrassRoots Garage. I had an appointment to have my two remaining pre-Dragon mods done - a 15% pulley install and a one-ball exhaust mod. I’ve done EVERYTHING else to Blimey myself. But these two are beyond my skill level… They are DEFINITELY not beyond Dan Zipkin’s…

If you’re not familiar with Dan and GrassRoots - Dan is a highly certified and highly rated BMW technician who was selected to be the first MINI technician in North Carolina, back when Flow BMW acquired their MINI franchise. Dan got MINI trained and certified, and performed prep and dealer option installs on almost all of the first year’s MINIs delivered in North Carolina. As Flow grew their staff of MINI technicians, Dan trained and supervised the team. Eventually Dan took an opportunity to move on to the area’s Bentley dealership - but remained in high (and growing) demand for off-hours work for the area’s MINI community as one of the most knowledgeable and experienced MINI mechanics around. Eventually Dan opened his own garage - GrassRoots - to service the growing MINI community. It’s now sort of a rite of passage for a MINI enthusiast here to go spend a day with Dan, have him take you for great barbecue for lunch, and leave with a more capable MINI.

Grassroots Garage - note the three MINI race cars in various states…

Here’s the man, the legend, Dan Zipkin…

So - after that brief pause for a commercial interruption -

The Pulley!

Dan prefers CravenSpeed pulleys. Craven produced some special, very cool pulleys for Dan, laser engraved with the GrassRoots Garage logo. And RED - which we all know is the fastest color.

After much consideration, I opted for a nice, conservative 15% pulley - this pulley is 15% smaller in diameter (and thus circumference) than the stock supercharger pulley. As a result, for any given engine RPM, it turns the supercharger (and water pump) 15% faster than stock. I’ve never heard of anyone having engine problems with 15% pulleys - but there have been some folks who have reported issues with smaller pulleys.

An interesting sidebar - Dan had a JCW pulley in the shop that had been removed to fit a smaller pulley. We took a pair of calipers to it and it was - hold onto your pants - 10.4% smaller than stock. NOT the 14.something% commonly thrown around as fact. The Craven 15% pulley measures 15% smaller than stock.

So… a pulley install is a bit more involved on an automatic transmission MINI than on a manual - and after watching Dan do it, I’m darn glad I didn’t try it myself. To access the pulley, Dan puts jacks under the engine and transmission, disconnects the mounts for these, and lifts the engine to expose the supercharger and pulley. Then a pulley puller is used to remove the stock, pressed-fit pulley from the supercharger shaft.

Here’s the stock pulley with the puller attached:

And here’s the engine with no pulley:

And here’s my nice, new, engraved, RED 15% pulley, with belt and tensioner re-installed!

See how easy that was? hehe

Dan did a LOT of steps before, after and in between these photos. One thing we did: there is a rubber grommet in the bottom of the stock airbox, with a hole that enables the airbox to get a bit of cold air from the cowl area. With the Dinan intake, this is still in place. The hole is probably 25% as large as it could be - the rest is covered by a useless rubber membrane that restricts flow. Dan cut away the extra material to effectively open my Dinan intake even more. Extra cold air for $0 - I like!

Next up….

The One-Ball Mod!

After a lot of studying available exhaust options, I chose to go with the aptly named “One Ball Mod” of the stock MCS exhaust. In the stock exhaust system, exhaust gases flow out the exhaust header, through the catalytic converter, through an almost-straight pipe to the rear of the car. Gases then flow through a resonator on the passenger side, through a muffler on the driver side, and out twin tailpipes. This modification removes the resonator (the big, heavy can on the passenger side of the exhaust system) and re-routes the exhaust pipe to the remaining muffler. The result is less weight (about 20 pounds), a little more volume and “growl”, less backpressure, and better flow resulting in more power. And MAYBE less “drone” at low RPMs and highway speeds. And the only cost is some labor to perform the cutting and welding required.

Here’s the “before” photo - with two “balls”:

Dan marked the exhaust at the location to be cut. then removed the cabrio-specific bracing under the rear of the car, the exhaust hangars, and unbolted the exhaust from the cat. Then he removed the exhaust from the car. Then the scary “point of no return” part - Dan started hacking up my exhaust with a reciprocating saw! I knew this was coming - but it was still a LITTLE unnerving… The first not-easily-reversible thing I’ve done to the car…

After the initial cut, Dan re-installed the straight pipe on the car, to assist in lining up parts to be welded. I bet this would sound NICE…

Then Dan cut off the resonator, and cut out some pieces of pipe to use for the re-routing. Here’s the now-worthless resonator…

He then placed the muffler/tailpipe assembly back on the car and spent a while test fitting and modifying a couple of sections of pipe until he had the fit “just right” - then he tacked everything in place with the welder. REAL men fearlessly weld inches away from full plastic gas tanks…

Then he removed the whole assembly from the car, completed welding the joints, let it cool, and reinstalled the system. Here’s the result. Dan did a fantastic job getting this to line up - it’s straight, the tips are centered, and it’s solid.

The re-routed, welded pipe - no holes, plenty of clearance in all the right places. Not as pretty as a brand new $700 stainless system - but for $100, it’s a thing of beauty to me!

I love the way this sounds - more growl, a little more volume, it amplifies the burble a bit, but it’s not obnoxious and not at all “ricey” sounding.

While Dan was working, UPS delivered a shipment of 12 rare, previously unobtainable Non-BMW-branded-or-priced NGK “JCW” plugs. Here’s proof:

These are the same plugs sold as JCW - just without the JCW price. They’re NGK number BKR7EQUP. These cooler plugs should help prevent pre-ignition and/or fuel “dumping” with the pulley. Soooo…. now Dan has 8 plugs left. The first 4 are installed in Blimey!

And, while I was there, I had Dan download my ECU to have an MTH tuner file generated. I have my first scheduled dealer service after the Dragon - after that, if they don’t flash the ECU, Dan will have MTH generate my tuner file and I’ll stop by for an extra “boost”… more to come on that later…

I drove the 2 hour route home - over some moderately twisty, open country roads. The pulley and exhaust, combined with my existing Dinan intake, are AWESOME! There’s significantly more pull and power from about 3000 RPM up to redline. And I LOVE the sound - both the added supercharger whine, and the improved exhaust sound. It’s all good! Blimey loves more throttle!

So several folks on NAM scared the beejezus out of us newbies about Midnight on the Dragon. They basically implied - or said outright - that if you don’t have driving / rally lights, you’re going to be Dragon bait.

Not wanting to be Dragon bait, I researched what my options were. Factory driving lights are obscenely expensive. So I opted to shamelessly copy my buddy ImagoX and install Hella 2500 lights with Outmotoring.com brackets. ImagoX wrote up a fantastic how-to on NAM for this combo, and I like the look, features and PRICE of this setup - about $130 total including shipping and stainless steel screws & bolts from Lowes.

Matt’s instructions made this a pretty straightforward 2 hour install. I just had to splice about a foot of extra wire into the battery power lead - everything else is per Matt’s guide. I’m currently using the 3-way switch that comes with the kit, it snaps sideways into the knock-out on the euro parcel shelf. Later I’m going to rewire the angel eyes into my parking lamps and the driving lamps into my high beams. But for now this is good enough for the Dragon!

Here are the results - including Blimey’s UJ grille and custom mag stripes!

These things make some LIGHT too! I’m waiting on some 65watt high intensity bulbs from Daniel Stern for my high beams that supposedly put out twice the lumens as the stock bulbs. With this combo, I should be able to sufficiently light up the guy in front of me on the Dragon!

UPDATE: I rewired these tonight. Now the angel eyes come on with the parking lights. The switch allows me to turn off the driving lights, arm them so they come on with the high beams, or override so they’re on no matter what. Details of how I did this are on ImagoX’s original thread on NAM - see post #25.

UPDATE to the update: I received and installed my 65watt Osram high-beam bulbs from Daniel Stern - these things are BRIGHT. With these, plus the Hellas, plus the Xenons, it’s like Blimey has aircraft landing lights when the high beams are blazing… su-weet.

UPDATE 5/19/2007: My Hellas got some WATER in them (not sure how it soaked in there, but it did) so I took them off, dried them out, and put them back together with copious amounts of silicone sealant to keep the water out. While I had them apart, I cut and ground the “extra” mounting protrusions off the back of the light housings. It was pretty soft cast aluminum so it was pretty quick and easy. Cut them down with my air cutoff tool, then broke off some small pieces with pliers, then ground with my die grinder and a coarse rotary file, then sanded them smooth with my little “power file” belt sander. Painted the modified area with black Testors acrylic model paint I had lying around - a good color and gloss match. Here are the results. They look MUCH better this way I think… Still plan to make some better brackets - I bought some steel but haven’t had time yet…

After seeing how HOT MINI’s get… at least compared to, say, Hondas… I’ve gotten a bit paranoid about spontaneous Blimey combustion. So I broke down and bought a 2.5 pound Safecraft Halon extinguisher. Then after experimenting for a while and determining that there just plain isn’t a good place in the cockpit to put this thing otherwise, I broke down and ordered the Brey-Krause seat mount to put it on the front of the passenger seat. And because the standard wire-and-strap mount for the thing just seems flimsy, I ordered the Safecraft billet mount. I’m still waiting on the billet mount, but here it is on the standard mount…

While it looks like it might be in the way for the passenger, it really isn’t - it’s well behind where your feet typically go when riding or entering/exiting - and it still allows unobstructed access to the seat adjustments. It slides fore-aft with the seat. Very solid and very cool.

Why not just a plain old cheap red fire extinguisher in the boot?

1) “Plain old” fire extinguishers contain corrosive chemicals that can ruin the parts of your car that aren’t damaged by the fire…

2) I want it QUICKLY accessible in case I need it (and I hope I NEVER do).

3) Would make a pretty good glass breaker or weapon in a pinch…

4) BLING!

Oh yeah, and I know that production of new Halon 1211 has been banned since 1994 as an ozone-depleting substance. But you can still buy “reclaimed” halon… kinda like “carbon credits” - you can have all the halon you want, as long as you don’t manufacture any more of it from scratch… actually, that’s a lot better than carbon credits, which don’t really do anything except redistribute wealth.