Hampton Roads Club Mini

As you may remember, my MINI was in a wreck a couple of weeks ago.  HERE is a write-up on the wreck.  I thought I'd catch you up on where we stand:

Clay at Crown MINI Cooper Service has been managing the repairs.  We had to go back and forth with the insurance company to get complete estimates because all the damage wasn't visible and the cost of certain items had increased since the insurance company's lists were made up.  In the end, the two were able to come to an agreement.  Clay tells me the car should be finished and road-tested today so I should be able to pick it up Saturday.  I'll give you a final update when I see the car.

Bob

That's good news!

If the relationship between shops and insurance companies is so one-sided and strained, I would think more shops would just start refusing insurance work.  There must be some incentive for the shops to take insurance work, or they wouldn't do it.

I can kind of understand where the insurance companies are coming from - they have to set *some* limits on how much they're going to pay for the repair.  Obviously, they're not going to pay to have Chip Foose or Boyd Coddington do the repair work on a ten-year old Toyota.

I don't know how it works with auto shops, but after I had my motorcycle accident, I saw a lot of the "agreements" reached between TriCare and Norfolk General Hospital.  The hospital would charge $1000 for some procedure, and TriCare would say "That's nice - we'll give you $250", and the hospital would take the $250 and call it good.  I can't imagine the hospital was really losing money on the agreement, or they'd stop treating TriCare patients.

I do know that my final bill for one eight-hour orthopedic surgery, some post-op cleanups, and an 11-day hospital stay was almost $140,000.  I know TriCare and the hospital came to an agreement where the insurance didn't pay near that much, but I'm also sure that the hospital didn't end up losing money on the deal - not by a long shot.

You'll notice that I haven't joined in the "reindeer game" of "bash the insurance company".  :lol:  I will say it's just no fun to be the "monkey in the middle" or the "one moving part" while things are getting sorted.  For some reason I decided to hold my peace and let the two parties work it out.  It seems to have worked this time.

Crown invited me to pick the car up Saturday.  I spent eight hours going up and back (traffic in the eastern corridor was unbelievable) only to find some things "needed adjustment".  I'm going back up again tomorrow.  Might have more details later.  Wish me luck ..and a shorter trip!

Thanks,

Bob

My MINI is back and looking great.



There were some, *ahem* shenanigans in getting it right involving an eight-hour(!) 'round trip to Richmond where I came back empty-handed, but its great to have it back and the work on the back was done well.  As a result of the shenanigans I ended up with an '07 MINI loaner for five days...





..or maybe a billboard.

The new edition is a vastly different car.  I'd love to comment on the differences between it and my '03 but don't want to raise any hackles, so I'll leave that up to you.

Now we just have to sort out a few issues on the front of the car.  In the wreck, we were shoved through a line of cones.  Where we contacted one cone there was some minor paint chipping and marring that was overlooked by the shop.  I go for another evaluation on the 10th.  We'll see...

Bob

Glad you have your favorite car back Bob. :)

Okay, here are my impressions from five days with the '07 MINI.  Bear in mind that I've driven MINI loaners for the last four years and have enjoyed more than one of them.  I went into this with a clean perspective, hoping to like the second generation as much as the first.  The particular loaner car I drove had four thousand miles on the clock:

I'll start with handling, because that's near to all our hearts:  The first thing that struck me with the car was that it wasn't nearly as stable as my '03 Cooper S.  With my car, you can plant the thing in a lane on the interstate highway and it stays there without much thought or supervision.  With the '07 MINI, I was actively driving all the time.  The car tended to wander about, so you were steering it ALL THE TIME.  There was also excessive body roll for a MINI.  Whenever I changed lanes on the interstate, the resultant wallowing made my wife uncomfortable and made the car feel "less than in control".  I realize that my Cooper S is a car with a firmer suspension and 17? wheels with run flats, but feel that the handling was below par even with allowance made for that.  My wife kept wondering if this wasn?t simply a lemon.  I wasn?t sure how the handling could be affected in this way.  The brakes were "grabby" compared to my Cooper S.  I can say that the new auto transmission was much more comfortable than the old MINI CVT and the "Sport Mode" button provided some get up and go in the lower portions of the power band.  It did, however, leave you uncomfortably high in engine's power band when you settled down to cruise on the interstate, so I found myself hopping back and forth 'twixt normal and sport modes.

Next, controls: There are lots more features in the new cars, however there has been a loss of simplicity and clarity in the displays.  The U.S. Air Force did studies as aircraft cockpits evolved that showed that as more info is displayed, the ability to take it in actually diminishes, unless care is taken to provide both graphic displays and numeric displays.  IMHO, the newest MINI suffers from info overload by providing too much info concurrently in digital form and providing less-than-precise secondary analog displays (such as the gas gauge).  The keyless ignition, while a cool idea, ends up requiring MORE steps to initiate than a regular key.  The car I drove had steering wheel-mounted shift paddles for its automatic transmission.  IMHO, the paddle-shifting feature provides little utility and, frankly, the paddles got in my way because of their placement.  I'm not sure the steering wheel has changed sizes, but it felt slightly smaller.

And now, to the radio.  Let me preface my remarks by saying that I am an audio engineer by trade.  I use audio gear all day long and have done so for twenty-nine years, so I have an idea of whether something is "new and innovative" and thus requires adjustment on my part or is simply poorly designed.  I have to say that the new ICE system is a disaster from the standpoint of user interface.  The control design has too many submenus under which some of the real basics (tone controls and balance) live. Accessing any of these functions requires far too many points and clicks with too many controls to be safe to operate while also operating a moving vehicle.  The previous system wasn't exactly a simple unit either, but this is a strong step in the wrong direction.  On top of this, the control system is counter-intuitive, with control split between its encoders in an odd sort of way.  The long distance between the ICE display and the lower encoder merely exacerbates the situation.  To top things off, the CD slot is extremely hard to aim for as a result of its sharp styling.

Now to the interior styling:  The beauty of the first Gen. New MINI was its visual simplicity.  The interior was very simple and easy on the eyes due to the small number of surface types and simple lines.  This effect has been lost in the second generation entirely.  The overall impression of the interior is that it is much busier and more cluttered.  That is clearly the case with the instruments, but also with all the surface treatments.  It is as if they took the original design and "touched" everything, adding complexity wherever they touched.  However, it is also clear that all the interior materials except the seat covers are lighter in weight.  According to my wife, the surface textures chosen looked like 1970?s faux leather executed in hard vinyl.  There is more unfinished plastic visible.  The overall effect is a cheaper feel.  The front cup holders will take full-sized cups, though they get in the way of the controls.

Finally, the exterior:  The easiest way to describe the vehicle is that it appears that the exterior was built from lighter materials that aren't as securely joined.  Most body panels gave when touched and rattled when tapped.  What drew my attention was that the doors rattled when I shut them.  At first I thought it was just the new lightweight mirror caps, but tapping on the door panels themselves yielded a metallic rattle that was repeated on other body panels.  I'm aware that the following is a "known issue", but when shut, the bonnet doesn't line up properly.  While the right side has a neat shut line when closed, there?s a two-finger gap between bonnet and body on the left side.  On the loaner I drove, the front edge of the new dual sunroof didn't shut tightly, so there was wind gusting noise from it whenever the car was in motion that rose to a loud commotion which drowned out the stereo on the highway.  Sadly, the external lock button falls right where my thumb rests on the exterior door handle, causing me to inadvertently lock the door more than once and finally meaning that I had to rest my hand on the handle with care from then on to prevent it.

At the end of my loan time, those at the MINI dealership asked what I thought and I told them.  Amazingly, they agreed with me, apparently aware of the shortfalls and lighter weight of everything.  I could not have been happier to get my own car back.  It's solid, precise feel and uncluttered simplicity were very welcoming.  I don?t see myself "upgrading" anytime soon.  However, I haven't seen too many of the enthusiasts in the club leaping into an '07 either.

So, there you go.  Just my observations.

Bob

Nice write up Bob, I'm looking forward to driving an 07 and checking out the details first hand.

Glad the real MINI is back in your driveway.   :D