What a great car the R53 Cooper S is!

[Kevin-sz0nv]

I am fortunate in having some nice cars but I wanted a cheap run around especially for the winter. I ended up paying £1500 for an 05 Cooper S with 133k miles but with a very good service history. The car had the bigger pulley, coil over suspension, factory sat nav, reversing sensors and a sports exhaust already fitted. It really does go and sounds brill. As usual I changed it a bit by putting on some proper tyres I bought a cheap 2nd hand interior cos I really don't like all black and I had the roof, wheels, mirrors and bonnet scoop painted red. I covered the rear boot lift in red also the chrome trim surrounds under the windows and headlights. I then added some red door handle and fuel cap covers and painted bits of the engine. Inside I got a 2nd hand armrest and painted the dash etc in the grey to match the body, a new gear knob and some other bits and bobs including the door logo lights that were a straight swap I've had it 6 months it passed its mot recently no issues and nothing has gone wrong.... Love it!













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|https://thumbsnap.com/ZeDqZAdC[/url]

Edited by Kevin-sz0nv on Tuesday 5th February 16:35

[and31]

you’ll have to speak up-I can’t hear you over the RED wheels!! Lol
Yes they are great cars,but I freely admit I couldn’t have one with all that red all over it

[cerb4.5lee]

They are great fun cars for sure, yours is a tad on the loud side for me colourwise though.

[denzilpc]

LOVE IT ! to many boring silver or black cars about nowdays

[Mr-B]

Keep looking at these on ebay, gumtree as they are so cheap now. Had a convertible Cooper S in 2005 and vowed I would get a hatchback at some point, getting tempting now at shed of the week money.

Your plate made me chuckle too, one for the juvenile snigger thread

[cerb4.5lee]

Mr-B said:

Your plate made me chuckle too, one for the juvenile snigger thread

I smiled at that too! Brilliant.

[R53rider]

Lot of red highlights involved, but different - I like it! Currently for the money you can buy R53s for they are a lot of fun for not a lot of money. Put your pics up on the R53 Owners club on Facebook, if you do Facebook. Well run, closed group and 4,800 R53 members.

[Vince70]

I’ve just done the same as I bought a lovely little 3 owner 90000 mile R50 cooper with JCW suspension with 11 months ticket for £350 for a winter hack as my last one ( Ti compact) I bought 4 years ago is just too nice for our salty roads so it’s now My back up winter car.
It’s great fun too drive I just need my fillings replaced come the end of winter because it’s fitted with orrible run flats.

A Z3 and E36 cabriolet are my summer cars and my work colleagues think I’m mad for having so many old cars but recently I needed to change my rad on the Z3 and while at it I changed the aux belt and water pump for the total cost of £65 with good quality parts while a work colleague has over a £600 bill coming his way for just a water pump on his modern so I’m sticking with the old motors from now on.

Also I find mini spares are so cheap as I fitted a new strut leg on mine as it looked a bit rusty and clonked a bit and it cost £16 delivered and You can do a complete service with a decent 5/40 synthetic for under £35 on a mini.

Next week I’m changing the gearbox oil as I haven’t got your posh getrag gearbox on mine so I want too keep my Chocolate Midlands box in good shape while it’s whine free but I couldn’t stop spending as every mini needs a set of wipac spots as standard then I’m fitting a parrot Bluetooth which I took out of an old Peugeot that was about to be scrapped.

|https://thumbsnap.com/aUYPmmVy[/url]

Edited by Vince70 on Friday 8th February 13:35

Edited by Vince70 on Friday 8th February 13:36

[wjb]

Nice buy OP.

I keep thinking about upgrading my veey reliable daily Cooper to a Cooper S, but knowing my luck the R53 will explode the minute the new owner of my old car drives away.

[Challo]

I had one of these a few years ago and loved it. I only got rid as it was our only car and was getting a bit tiresome on the runflats and super sport suspension.

Now we use the missus car for all family matters it’s only ever me in the car. With the purchase of a dog and potential child on the horizon I wonder if I could get away with it.