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My Other Project: 2006 R53 MINI Cooper S

rabbitstew said:
I changed the fuel filter on mine over the weekend and my god, after 100,000 miles it was black and the petrol in the filter housing looked more like oil. Shocking! Cleared it all out, refitted and car fired up straight away which is always a relief.

Also bought a hobbo intercooler which has arrived today, so will be fitting that at some point. Am intrigued just how good / bad it will fit - hopefully wont be too bad with just a bit of grinding off the inlet manifold with a bit of luck.

I also had a go at machine polishing some of the old bodywork - the bonnet has a ton of scratches on it for some reason. Unfortunately I discovered they are too far gone, so it will need a front end respray. Not really worth paying someone to do it on a car this cheap, so it will be a DIY job once the weather perks up a bit.

I'm happy that the filter needed changing, if you see what I mean. Maybe try some nice Shell stuff or something?

I'm intrigued about the IC, you just need a good seal on the 'snoot boots' (why they are snoot is beyond me...).

And sorry about the bonnet: warm place for a cat? Is there a chance to find a fresher one from the salvage maybe, or someone selling parts? Mine has a proper peppering of stone chips now... and I've only just got some of that touch up paint. It probably won't go well...
 
Cheers MaxA, great advice, will see what 'er indoors has to say.
Regards, Mike.
 
Counter Of Beans said:
Cheers MaxA, great advice, will see what 'er indoors has to say.
Regards, Mike.

Good luck. She wouldn't notice I reckon if you did take that front lip off (even if it's made of the toughest materials known to man). And it's basically a free mod.
 
We should be 'taking it to the track' on Saturday - a track day at Ahvenisto with one of the BMW clubs. I need to keep an eye on the weather as it's still very cool, just 5c this morning, with a day time high of 9c. It's great for IATs but I'm not sure I want to run semi's if I can't get any heat in them.
 
Ahvenisto went well, and the new Quaife really helped on the uphill sections of the track when previously grip was at a premium. It was also nice and warm which really helps grip, even if not all of the BMWs managed to stay on track (thanks for all the ***** gravel on the main straight you bastards).

This weekend, we'll be over at Alastaro, which is a much wider and flatter track, which seems fairly straightforward in the MINI (if you get the line right) but which reveals itself to be a bit trickier in a quicker car: there are dips which elongate braking zones and corners which require a lift. Maybe I can take some of the learnings across.

We'll have to see about the weather, as there's rain in the forecast, so I'll stay on my Bridgestones and leave the semi's at home. We'll then make a weekend of it, go to sauna, stay up late and drink beers while making up stories about what we got up to at the track.
 
Alastaro was a hoot, hot and dry, and quiet, so plenty of track time. I was running Nitto NT01s (a semi slick, more like a cut slick with a square shoulder and a rating of just 100), and according to my buddy in the car behind me, I was coming out of some of the slower corners on three wheels: lifting the inside front ...
 

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We also made it over to Knutstorp in Sweden with the R53s and GP2 this summer for the annual New MINI Sweden Club summer meeting.

It required some MINIs, a trailer, a Land Rover car, a ferry (each way), some driving, lots of V Power and e85, a couple of ice creams, plenty of coffee, and a shitload of 'Lonkero' (my "sponsor" Hartwall Original Long Drink 5.5%) in the after-party.
 

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Good stuff. My R53 has been running really well. In the end the cheap hobo intercooler was such a terrible fit I got an airtec one instead and fitted that. Lovely bit of kit. The suspension turned out to be shot, so I replaced it all with AP coilovers, with adjustable camber top mounts upfront and an uprated adjustable whiteline rear ARB. I also fitted new front wishbones & inner/outter ball joints and polybushed it all as well as the engine mounts. Car handles like its on rails now, even with horrible dunlop runflats.

Clutch ended up slipping with the extra power, so i swapped that for an OEM LUK one with a new stock duel mass flywheel. I was tempted with the valeo one but read some bad reviews on them.

Think next on the list will be to sort out the sloppy gearchange. Ive got a short shifter ready to fit so will do that when I get some time.
 
rabbitstew said:
Good stuff. My R53 has been running really well. In the end the cheap hobo intercooler was such a terrible fit I got an airtec one instead and fitted that. Lovely bit of kit. The suspension turned out to be shot, so I replaced it all with AP coilovers, with adjustable camber top mounts upfront and an uprated adjustable whiteline rear ARB. I also fitted new front wishbones & inner/outter ball joints and polybushed it all as well as the engine mounts. Car handles like its on rails now, even with horrible dunlop runflats.

Clutch ended up slipping with the extra power, so i swapped that for an OEM LUK one with a new stock duel mass flywheel. I was tempted with the valeo one but read some bad reviews on them.

Think next on the list will be to sort out the sloppy gearchange. Ive got a short shifter ready to fit so will do that when I get some time.

I'm happy to read that you've got a good set up, it makes such a difference. Sorry about the hobo intercooler, that was a waste of money.

I don't know why the Valeo clutch kit gets a bad rep, my buddy over here is running one on his highly modified track JCW which has a BVH and Catcam, ethanol conversion, and all sorts; I was at the dyno when he ran 270hp on the stock bottom end/internals and original supercharger (and he's got around 230,000km on the clock, many of which were acquired at the track).
 
I was going to add, the R56 MINI John Cooper Works GP in the pictures - the one with the number 21 and GP-2 number plate - is my brother's car. It's also modified and is dyno'd at 280bhp.

He wasn't too happy to be 3-4 seconds a lap slower around the 2.2km Knutstorp circuit and blamed it all on the tyres ... I think that he just needs more practise, more sleep and less hangover.
 
We were back at the track on Saturday with Mini Club Flying Finns at Ahvenisto: a tight, twisty, narrow, cambered and dangerous little track without any FIA approvals whatsover. Except for historic racing.

I made it by midday, jumped out, took off the summers, put on the semi-slicks (almost slick aka 'part worn' Nitto NT01s), added 2 degrees of camber, stuck my helmet on, and went out.

And then it started raining.

I didn't have any heat in the tyres, the track got wet and cooled down, and there basically wasn't any grip at all for the rest of the day, at either the front or the rear. Oversteer and understeer in the same corner. The only place I got any grip was under braking into the first corner.

I even went grass cutting at one point, when I found myself off line, and then sideways and then off the track. :dont know:

And then by the time I'd switched back to summers (part worn Bridgestone Potenza RE002s), it was too late. Bollocks. Season over. :x
 
Sounds like a bit of a nightmare session. :(

I had some adventures last weekend. I swapped out the front right hand CV joint for a new one as the old one had a little play in it. But for some reason the drive shaft must have not clicked into it correctly as upon the test run the shaft popped out of the CV joint. This is the long shaft with the mid-mount point on it. Anyhow, I got a mate to tow me home (I was only 5 mins away) and the rattling around shaft made a few horrible noises but I got home okay. Re-fitted the CV joint and made sure it was 100% on right. I could see some marks on the inside of the alloy where the loose shaft had hit the wheel so I assumed that is what the noises had been.

Anyhow, car drives fine now once again, but now there is a distinct CLUNK noise when you change gear, which is especially noticeable when you change from 1st to 2nd. I have a new shaft on order to replace the whole thing as I wonder if I have damaged it, but it sounds to me its more coming from the gearbox which is a bit of a worry as I really dont want to take it off again.
 
Ah, well it's always fun at the track even if your so-called buddies point and laugh at the grass cuttings on the car. At least there was grass to spin on to at that point, it's a narrow track with some very limited run off (hard granite rock) in places.

And since it was the last event of the season, we had a summer house booked, so we BBQd some steak, had a sauna, drank a few beers and some red wine, and laughed at each other spinning out on GoPro footage. It was a bit of a late night.

Sorry to hear of your driveshaft woes, it might be OK as these Getrag six speed gearboxes are really very robust.
 

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My little MINI is covered in muck and now wearing its 16x7 Team Dynamics and 195/55-16 Nokian Hakkapeliitta8 studded winters. There obviously isn't so much grip but the Quaife seems to put it down quite well.

My boy is dreaming of the days when the sea freezes over so we can cut a little track out there on the ice and practise driving, sliding, handbrake turns, over- and understeer. He's begging me not to refit the Sparco bucket seat so that his cousins (my nephews) can all also have a go!

You might think I'm mad, but there isn't much harm you can do on the ice as there's no snow banks, nothing to hit and no grip so there's no need to rev it out - it's all about managing the little available grip at modest revs, so I'm tempted to just let him out ... until I get cold, and need to defrost in the car.
 
An autumn shot of my 'British Racing Brown' R53: it's running à–hlins R&Ts lowered 30mm all round, with Vorshlag adjustable front top mounts (so perhaps another 5mm lower at the front as they're not as thick as the fixed à–hlins plates) for a bit of positive rake; c. -1.5 degrees of negative camber all round; 16x7 OZ Ultraleggeras with ET32; 205/50-16 Bridgestone Potenza RE002s; and - from this angle - you can also see the aero spoiler and JCW exhaust tips.

And yes, it's a dirty grey brown colour. This was a coffee break on a run in the country. Hence the project name.
 

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