RE: Mini Remastered by David Brown Automotive

[Carlson W6]

If they wanted to get a lot of us Petrolheads excited AND the eco friendly hipsters in Hoxton they should have stuck the electric engine from the little Tesla Roadsters in.
A far more exciting proposition.

[Venturist]

cookie1600 said:

I guess they will be for WAGS of the wealthy, who have husbands who would like them to have a little town car.

Any decent bodyshop could take a Heritage body-shell, a recon A+ engine and some fancy seats and trim and build something just as nice for £25k to £30k max. Why not even slip a half decent Vauxhall, Honda or Toyota engine and 'box in and give it real reliability, smoothness and economy.

Pretty cars, but I'm owt at that price.

You nailed the first bit but got lost on the second. This isn't really for people like you and I, this is to buy for your girlfriend rather than a new Fiat 500. It's for people who want a chic little car, not Mini enthusiasts.

Yes you could build it cheaper but then you'd have to also organise the build. Source a shell, source places to do the work, source the engine, orchestrate it all...
Or instead you can hand DBA a cheque and drive away in the end product.
If you have to worry about the price this isn't for you.

Good idea doing it on the Mini, suspect they will do very well with these.

[kambites]

I see i as being much the same as Eagle E-types, Singer 911s, etc. Just further down the chain.

It's a small market, but it's definitely there.

[PoopahScoopah]

Well, these aren't aimed at somebody like me (I'd venture they aren't aimed at a fair percentage of the PH audience either!) and thankfully the purchase of one will never be a dilemma I'll have to worry about, but I've got to say that they've made a right dogs dinner of that interior. Oh sure, it looks nice and well crafted, but it is thoroughly out of place in a mini! Singer know how to do this right. DBA could have toned this right down and still made it exquisitely crafted but sparse and simplistic like a mini should be, but instead they've made it look too "tuner". As someone said before me "vajazzled", I think that sums it up perfectly.

Why would you need a gopping great sat nav in the middle for occasional tooling about Knightsbridge?

[SonicShadow]

FWDRacer said:

SonicShadow said:

How much do original Mini Coopers go for these days?

Good completely original Mk1 Cooper-S is north of 35K GBP.

Still great value compared to this retro pastiche garbage imho.

I know where my imaginary money would go then!

[monzaxjr]

75k? Harharhardehar. What a load of deluded pie in the sky hairy bks. Apart from the ludicrous dreampt up in a lunatic asylum price that sat nav and dash set up is utterly honking. You would have to be a right Gene Hunt to buy one of these.

[John_S4x4]

I presume this would be SP Fuel injected and electronic dizzy rather than Twin SU's and points dizzy (shudder - I still remember the Mini's having ice cream tubs/bags over the distriputers )

[mybrainhurts]

Max_Torque said:

in a time when we they are talking about banning EU5 diesels from our roads.....

I hope that's what you meant...

[cookie1600]

Venturist said:

You nailed the first bit but got lost on the second. This isn't really for people like you and I, this is to buy for your girlfriend rather than a new Fiat 500.

Blimey, a £50k to £70K Fiat 500 sounds even less appealing than shelling out that much for a wheezing 1275 Mini with 4-speed! I take your point about commissioning someone else to do the work, but where's the fun in that?

This to me is a the equivalent of a Gucci handbag, nice to look at I'm sure, but totally impractical on today's roads, not worth the extra money and probably with dreadful depreciation (and complete with rust in the sills, roof channels and 'A' panels in 10 years time).

I think I'd rather save £30k/£40k and have something like this:

https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/22723/lot/342/?ca...

Or this:

http://www.gcminis.co.uk/products/rover-mini/mini-...

Or this:

http://www.gcminis.co.uk/products/rare-odd-minis/m...

[GarageQueen]

can't understand their thinking putting that dirty great sat nav multimedia unit in there for something thats only used for short trips and quick blasts

[GranCab]

The SatNav is there to get you from Brompton Road to Old Bond Street

[alolympic]

A pointless pimping exercise when one of the pleasures of Mini ownership is personalising it exactly as you wish.
Even so, it wasn't looking bad aesthetically....until the photo of the rear lights.

[saaby93]

Haven't read the whole thread but are there any rear headrests? or rear seats?

Isnt the Nissan Micra engine descendent from the A series so a reasonable choice?

[coffee007]

If they start with a new shell then you can see why the price is so high given the small numbers to be built.
Agree though it should be brought up to date with a more up to date power train spec.
Very cool to look at though.

[rallycross]

thats not a good mix of old and new
it should have 100+ bhp, 5 speed and be fast enough to terrify modern cars/drivers round roundabouts/twisty roads and up to 80 mph.

[bloomen]

All other coverage has mentioned a 5 speed box is fitted.

[RichB]

Like his Speedback I find this rather pointless. In the same way that a decent DB6 costs well under £500k a very nice Mini Cooper would be well under the £75k being bandied about for this car. if I was looking to spend a significant sum on getting the Mini experience that's what I would do. If I wanted a modern town car with electric windows, a/c etc. I'd simply buy something new.

[Mr2Mike]

John_S4x4 said:

I presume this would be SP Fuel injected and electronic dizzy rather than Twin SU's and points dizzy (shudder - I still remember the Mini's having ice cream tubs/bags over the distriputers )

A marigold rubber glove over the distributor was always a favorite, one finger for each HT lead.

[Mr2Mike]

saaby93 said:

Isnt the Nissan Micra engine descendent from the A series so a reasonable choice?

The old Nissan Axx engine range had considerable influence from the A-Series and are better engines in most respects, e.g. 8 port head and 5 bearing crank. Unfortunately they don't have the same dimensions (Nissan engine is ~100mm longer for starters) so fitting one onto a mini gearbox would be a lot of work. If you are going to wedge a transaxle onto the end of the engine (rather than underneath) then you have to start chopping up and modifying the shell and subframes, so at that point you might as well choose a more modern engine/box combination.

[SlimJim16v]

It would've been better using a 'bike engine and sequential box, which has already been done on real Minis.

Front looks OKish, apart from the grille, but can't see the m back on the st mobile version.