I Have a MINI Cooper SD Roadster!

[David87]

Hoorah! Sort of.

Due to my own new MINI being delayed for a few days, I am the lucky custodian of this 1,200-mile old MINI Cooper SD Roadster loan car. I've only driven it for about 40 miles or so thus far, but I have already formed some opinions on it:

The Good

• It feels like my Wife's MINI Hatch in ergonomic terms (this is a good thing).
• It's very easy to drive.
• The chassis seems pretty stiff, with little hint of the chopped roof through the steering.
• It feels nicely made.
• It is plenty fast enough for most people.
• The boot is surprisingly capacious.
• The child in me likes the electronic spoiler that raises at speed. There is also a button to raise it manually if you are a cock.
• The Hankook run flats on this particular car give a much less crashy ride than the Bridgestones on my Wife's car. Both run 17" wheels.
• On the way home I came across a Renaultsport Mégane R26.R and Ford Focus RS Mk2 and having no roof allowed me to appreciate their aural delights!

The Bad

• It sounds like a Transit.
• Sounding like a Transit and having a roof that folds is not a good mix.
• Its handling is somewhat less exciting than the Hatch (I assume partly due to the heavy 2.0-litre diesel up front and partly due to the roof mechanism).
• Despite the diesel torque advantage, it is significantly slower than a petrol-powered Cooper S.
• It doesn't pop and crackle on the overrun like a petrol Cooper S.
• It's quite blustery over 100mph, but the little wind deflector panel thing that goes between the rollover hoops works wonders..
• The engine is almost completely joyless in its power delivery.
• I'm not sure I like driving with the roof down - I felt a little 'on show', if you see what I mean.

The Ugly

• Well, just look at it. Actually, I don't mind the way it looks and is far prettier than the weird Coupé.

In summary:

• At the moment, I can't see who would ever buy this car.

More thoughts to follow. I need to try it with the roof up. Maybe I won't mind the diesel engine quite so much when I can't hear it clattering the whole time. Some photographs:

Edited by David87 on Saturday 26th October 14:29

[amoeba]

Who? Women.

[rallycross]

Its real shame they started making an S with a nasty diesel engine.

[J4CKO]

Plenty of people seem to buy them, see loads round here, they are known as "women", I would entertain one with a roof but a convertible one is perhaps a step too far into female territory.

One of the mums who drops off, retrieves their kid from our house was telling me how her Cooper SD was amazingly fast "Because its a Cooper and a Diesel you see", I just nodded.

[LaurasOtherHalf]

J4CKO said:

Plenty of people seem to buy them, see loads round here, they are known as "women", I would entertain one with a roof but a convertible one is perhaps a step too far into female territory.

One of the mums who drops off, retrieves their kid from our house was telling me how her Cooper SD was amazingly fast "Because its a Cooper and a Diesel you see", I just nodded.

but fast is relative isn't it? it's pretty rapid compared to my other halves beetle but should your misses drive an m5 it may feel a little lacking.

i'll say most people would think a cooper sd was a pretty quick little car

[Kolbenkopp]

LaurasOtherHalf said:

but fast is relative isn't it? it's pretty rapid compared to my other halves beetle but should your misses drive an m5 it may feel a little lacking. i'll say most people would think a cooper sd was a pretty quick little car

Should be roughly 1.4 tons vs. 140 PS and IIRC almost 300NM torquies. Does not sound glacially slow to me, but also no match to what is a hot hatch today. Dunno why one would want a Mini Roadster to do *lots* of miles in though. Strange car, even stranger engine choice?

[ModernAndy]

I can see why some think they're fast as it does pull very strongly being a reasonably powerful diesel in a small car but they're not performance cars really. Have driven the SD hatch and thought it was a bit of a laugh with the low down torque surge and would be happy to get one as a hire/courtesy car but I'd have an older petrol S over it any day of the week, particularly with the works kit under the bonnet.

[RacingBlue]

Got to be honest - I'd feel like a right tw*t driving one of these with the roof down. At least yours is relatively subtle, which can only be a good thing.

[DanielSan]

So one of its best points is it allowed you to appreciate someone else's got hatch they've bought for less than the cars value. Interesting....

What have you bought?

[Patrick Bateman]

Diesel convertibles are just a complete non-starter for me.

[GC8]

Wtf

[GC8]

Please post photo of mangina.

[soad]

Patrick Bateman said:

Diesel convertibles are just a complete non-starter for me.

Ditto. But I suspect General Public don't see it that way.

[0a]

It's sad that the cooper badge has been reduced to a trim level on a big heavy car like this

Edited by 0a on Saturday 26th October 18:30

[GC8]

Sadder still that this abomination has been made. Worse that it has been bought by a PHer.

[Evil Monkey]

GC8 said:

Sadder still that this abomination has been made. Worse that it has been bought by a PHer.

It's a loan car dude!

[anonymous-user]

Give it back...

[GC8]

Evil Monkey said:

GC8 said:

Sadder still that this abomination has been made. Worse that it has been bought by a PHer.

It's a loan car dude!

Good point. I had completely missed that as I started to shudder almost immediately upon seeing the damned thing!

[Benbay001]

Op, you have my greatest sympathy.

[New POD]

How often have you red lined it ? I thought the whole point of a curtesy car was to carry out extremes of development testing ?

So go outside, start the Cold engine, straight to redline. Hold it in first, with foot on clutch, remove foot from clutch.

Come back to PH and explain why the clutch/or drive shafts haven't failed yet.

It's a MINI, so they probably haven't done extended extreme reliability testing properly, and it's down to you to do it for them.