Hampton Roads Club Mini

Hey whats up everyone. I was referred to this board by another member who I ran across on NAM. I just picked up my 06' MCS on Thurs evening and I am in love already. I've wanted a Mini S for almost 2 years now, and when it was time to buy a new daily last year, I just couldn't find one in my budget. Long story short, I finished all the boring things in my life (home renovations) and now I was finally in a place where I could go for the car I've really wanted, an R53.

After months of looking I came across this gem:

2006 MCS w/ 53k miles (pics of when I bought it)



Came with Sport Package, Cold weather Package, Luxury package. The car is in fantastic shape, needs a real solid Cleaning on the interior and exterior. The previous owner was your average car owner, so in my hands it will get far more attention then it did before 

Being that there is a recommended 60k maintenance on it, I figured that now would be a good time to do the maintenance and since some of the "maintenance" includes parts I intend to upgrade, I decided to skip to the point and go ahead and do some of the mods I wanted to do to it now.  I also don't know what the previous owner has done because he just brought his car to a local tire shop for maintenance so I am assuming nothing outside air filters and regular oil changes with regular oil.

Already ordered:
New Oil Filter w/ drain plug
Cabin Filter
Air Filter (not upgrading the intake quite yet)
Oil (Something nice, like Royal Purple or Amsoil)

As for mods, these are my plans and I am very open to suggestions. This is going to be a daily driver, but I definiltey want some mild performance mods as well as a few other things:

-Alta 15% pulley and ignition package
http://www.altaperformance.com/products/show/623/Ignition-Pulley-Performance-Package-
-PIAA Super Silicone Wipers (ones I have now are terrible)
-TSW Lowering Springs
-HSport Rear Camber Arms
-WMW Rear Wiper Delete
-WMW Short Antenna
-Upper Strut Reenforcement plates (My upper mounts are mushroomed yet, would like to keep it that way!)
-Powerflex Control arm bushings
-Powerflex Tension Bushings
-4 new tires (Either Hankook V12's or Continental DSW's... currently has Federal ss595's but rears are unevenly worn)
-Seafoam

That should be enough to get me started. Maybe have a little get together at my place for some pizza and beer/beverages for anyone who would like to hang out, meet up, or even offer some overlook/advice. I am a DIY'er and plan on doing as much of the work on my Mini as I can. I did almost all my own work on my MR2's and my other previous cars so I have a ton of tools and I'm not afraid to follow a walkthrough article!

Anyways, this is long enough, so if you read the whole novel, thanks! Right now I am waiting on the title for the car as the fellow had to pay it off, so it isn't registered yet, but as soon as it is, I will be at as many of the meets as possible!

Look forward to meeting all of you!

-Jimmy

Welcome Jimmy  You're going to love that car 

Hey, Jimmy.  Glad you made it.  You can check our calendar on the home page, as well as under "Hampton Roads" or "National Events" for the latest happenings.   

Sounds liek ya got some good plans there. As for tires, might I suggest the Continental  DW tires, not the "S" type. The S's are all season and honestly we really don't get enough snow and ice around here to worry about that. AND, with all those mods, I surely wouldn't do an all season. I've had the DW tires on mine and just put set number two on after 27K miles. I was real impressed with them on some of the roads I ran in western VA yesterday. Very quiet, very predictable and fairly sticky. Go to tirerack.com and do a side by side comparison of the DW & the DWS tires and I think you'll see the very slim trade off for marginally less tire wear will be offset by better handling and responsiveness.

I believe Adam, (JumpingJackFlash) has run the Hankook V12s. I personally have no experience with them.

I can tell ya on the springs, My kid Tyler has teh H&R's on his 2nd gen MINI and while it sits good, I think it's too low. I have the Eibach's on my Clubbie and the stance is about where I want it and the ride and performance is good. I do hear that the TSW springs are the hot set up for 1st gens.

I'm on my 2nd set of Hankook Evo V12s.  They don't last quite as long as the Ventus V4 ES', which might be out of production by now.  But they are all fairly sticky and quiet, even after about 20K miles on them.   

By the way Adam, those only work when they're all still on the ground! However, tread wear is greatly increased, when the tires are pointed towards the sky.

Ya'll are terrible.      At least I recycled the ones off my old '02 MCS.