Innehållsförteckning för August 2018 från Mini Magazine

Whoa, what a scorcher, and no, I'm not just talking about the amazing summer we’re experiencing as I write this. Oh no, it’s the feature cars that are generating all the heat! Attention to detail best sums up all our feature cars. Firstly there’s our cover car, Nick Shaw’s turbo Clubman. With its Japanese styling cues, it's something that we’ve not seen before. Look closer, and it's the unique and custom styling touches that hit you. I’m a particular fan of the custom, wireless buttons behind the steering wheel and in the door panel. Next up is Jack Cookson’s red and white HL, which on first glance looks standard. It is, in fact, a very clean, smart saloon and I'd urge you to read the feature, which starts on P44,…

Nick Shaw always wanted a Classic Mini as his first car and eventually bought a 1991 carburettor Cooper at the age of 21, which became his daily. Nick admits he couldn’t leave his first Mini alone and it ended up mutating into a matte black, turbocharged Clubman with a flip front! Unfortunately, despite Nick’s efforts, his first Mini became too rusty to fix and he quickly needed to find a replacement for his work commute. “I bought this Clubman off eBay from a local guy in August 2006, again it was my daily and was fitted with a standard 998 engine,” Nick explains. But, it wasn’t long before he was yearning for more power, with his 1293cc turbo engine fitted over Christmas of that year, during the break from work.…

COST GRK1028 .700” master cylinder rebuild kit - £6.37 GMC172 or 171 Master cylinder - £72 DIFFICULTY Early cars had brakes operated by rods or cables like a bicycle, but these gave way to hydraulic systems. The simplest system sees a pedal-operated master cylinder transmit fluid to the wheel cylinders in the individual brakes – a single line circuit as one master operates all the slaves. Should any component on this type of system develop a leak, all footbrake braking effort can be lost as the fluid drains away, which is why having a good handbrake isn’t just an MoT requirement… For safety reasons the twin or split circuit was developed, with braking effort being divided between pairs of wheels from a master cylinder with two pistons. In the event…

Things had slowed up on the race car build, so with a deadline looming, I hatched a plan to get back up to speed. Paul Thompson said “bring it round and we’ll get it done in no time” - an offer too good to refuse! Former champion Paul lives Mini 7 Racing and is an all-round helpful chap. The only issue was space, as four Minis into one double garage is a bit of a squeeze. So I popped over, picked up Paul’s 1293cc Miglia and did a temporary swap for the lesser-spec S-Class. As much as I’m determined to build the car up myself in the single garage, it’s a real luxury to have space again. Also, two people on a build is far better than one, and far…

My aim was always to go rallying, so although racing Mighty Minis at the time, with that in mind, I purchased this Mini in 1999. It was tired so we rebuilt it and entered the 2000 Safety Devices National Rally Championship. There was a steep learning curve transitioning from the circuit to rallies, mainly in learning how to trust pace notes. The first multi-venue event we did was on Epynt where the roads are narrow but widen into passing places over crests, which certainly jangled the nerves! With Anna McColl on the notes, we got into the swing of it and ended the season with a class win. Our main opponents were the Selby family with a stunning eight-port Mini. We had a quiet year in 2001 due to the…

History; it’s that human side of a car that turns a machine into something so much more interesting. Hints of previous owners, of road trips and restorations, and lives lived behind the wheel. Or, in the case of this ’64 Cooper S, a grainy photo of the car with all four wheels off the ground, and its first owner at the wheel during the 31-years she hung on faithfully to it. The sort of unusual chapter that throws up more questions than it does answers. “It came with the car,” explains Jonathan Diggines, the Mini’s third owner in just over half a century on the road. “It would have been her; a real typical Seventies shot of a Mini in mid-air before it was restored by its second owner years…

With the good weather comes the start of the car show season, and many Classic MINI treasures are put back on the roads after the long winter lay-up. But what about security when your Mini is parked up in your garage? Well, one of the new trends that’s making its way from the U.S. is fitting an internet camera in your garage. “In the U.S., camera surveillance within the automotive sector has been the norm for a while and now the topic is on the rise in Europe as well,” says Katharina Wild, security expert and member of the board at Smartfrog – a leading European technology company focused on home surveillance, with users currently in 178 countries. So how does it work? Well, modern internet cameras are fitted with…

For the 35th consecutive year, the Mini Cooper Register served up a fine show in the grounds of the National Motor Museum, Beaulieu. If you’re a Mini Cooper fan like me, I really can’t think of another show where the sportiest Minis are so well represented. This is not just because of the sheer variety of clubs around the show, it’s also down to the displays put on by the Registrars of the Mini Cooper Registers. Whatever you like, road, race and rally Minis are catered for at this show. However, this year, the displays in the main areas weren’t just about fast MINIs, but equally interesting weird and wonderful Mini-based kit cars. Called ‘Plastic Fantastic’, there was something for everyone on show. From a rally prepared GTM, to a…

MINI OF HIS DREAMS Name: Ollie Scull Car: 1000cc Mayfair Location: Bristol Ollie was brought up around Minis, and after passing his test, his first Mini soon followed and was quickly modified. Realising that his only limitation was his imagination, many Minis followed. Ollie’s heart was slightly broken by a rear end shunt, but it gave him the inspiration for this mega Honda-powered build. From there, he decided exactly how he wanted it to look, and four-years later, this is the result – the Mini of his dreams! Although he can’t take credit for the paint or the mapping of the engine, everything else he fitted, modified, adapted or fabricated himself for this car. CHOPPED CLUBBY Name: Pete Hughes Cars: Chopped Clubman Location: Tamworth Pete’s had this Clubman for 13…

Jack was just six-years-old when he first decided he wanted a Classic Mini, and regular visits to numerous British Mini Club shows over the following years with dad Darren, kept that dream alive. However, it wasn’t until early 2009 that Jack’s dream of Mini ownership became a reality. “We started the search for a Mini that we could do up together to make it Jack’s first car, and after scouring eBay we eventually came across a 1000 Mini HL with just two previous owners, the last for only three weeks,” dad Darren explains. Although it hadn’t been on the road for nearly 10-years! On closer inspection, this Mini had been welded in a few places, but as a car it was all there – an ideal project to strip and…

1 DAN DUTCH’S MINI THIRTY • Joining forces with his dad Dave and uncle John, Dan Dutch from the Isle of Wight wowed the crowds at the National Mini Cooper Day in 2015 with one of the most breathtaking Minis we’ve seen. Dan completely rebuilt the bodyshell to phenomenal standards before reassembling the car with incredible attention to detail and some amazing custom parts. Painted in Renault Intense Red with gold Force Racing rims and a full-on home-brew 1380 motor, it’s surely the best custom Mini Thirty of all time and has also made a splash in the wider modified car scene. What’s more, it’s his very first car! 2 ANDY KNIGHT’S CHOP • Built in deepest Somerset, Andy Knight’s ‘Chop’ creation is arguably the most popular show car of…

Q My 1275 Mini Sprite was running a bit rough, cutting out sometimes and drinking loads of fuel, so I took it to a mechanic friend and he tuned it up for me. But my question is, what does the vacuum advance actually do? He disconnected it and said it wasn’t need as my engine is modified. It has a Stage 1 kit and a ported head. If it’s not required then why was it fitted when new? James Baskett A The vacuum advance is there to provide extra ignition at idle speed and light throttle openings typically used when cruising at medium speeds. This helps give a smooth idle speed, requiring very little throttle angle to get the engine at the required rpm level. At medium cruising speeds it…

“The rubber spring is ideal as it provides a non-linear spring rate in a compact package” The Mini was fitted with two types of suspension over its life; the hydrolastic system which was advanced for its time but expensive to produce, and the system which people call ‘dry’ as it did not rely on fluids but rubber springs. Both systems were created by Dr Alex Moulton, a friend of Alec Issigonis. The creation of the Mini’s rubber spring was instrumental in enabling the suspension to take a tiny amount of space within the car. It also gave the Mini fully independent suspension, which is a key part of the Mini’s handling prowess. How this works is that the suspension arm pushes a metal cone which then transmits the force into…

The Mini Cooper S, which posted the first international rally win for BMC, will be on show at this year’s Bradford Classic. Classics at The Broadway is an addition to the annual classic car show on 11 August, and will feature two car displays outside the shopping centre along with films at the Light Cinema. The 1964 Mini Cooper S in question was driven to victory by Barrie Williams in the 1964 Welsh International Rally. For more details of Bradford Classic, check out the website at http://thebradfordclassic.com.…

The first Mini Barn Bash, organised by the Ipswich and Suffolk Mini Owners Club, took place over the weekend of 1st-3rd June at the Stonham Barns Leisure & Shopping Village. The venue has many facilities and also houses the Mid Suffolk show ground. Onsite camping was included within the ticket price for the weekend and attendees received a welcome pack and drink courtesy of event sponsor, The East Anglian Mini Centre. Friday night was spent unwinding in the newly christened ‘Leaky Gasket’ bar! Saturday began with the treasure hunt-style run, Classics on the Quay. Attendees then headed back to the barn for a showing of The Italian Job on a big screen with home-made pizza. Saturday evening was party night with DJ and ’60s band The Austin Beats packing out…

The story behind Barry Davies’s fascination with Minis starts when he was 17, as he had a project Mini to mess around with. However, he admits that socialising and women got in the way and this Mini went off to live in pastures new. Barry’s interest with our favourite little car was ignited again, when whilst living with his wife’s parents, he spotted this Mini abandoned in a garden, four houses up the road. He had always told himself that he was going to buy it, and when its owner sadly passed away, Barry got in touch with his wife to see if he could, and £400 later, it was his. Over the eight years Barry has owned this Clubman he’s unbelievably put four different engines in it, and yet…

The Mini, in all its diverse variations, has been many things to many people for nearly 60 years. When Sir Alec Issigonis set out to design a revolutionary new mode of transport he could hardly have foreseen the impact which his achievements would have across every level of society. The innovative concept of a compact body shell, with front and rear subframes supporting the engine, drivetrain and independent suspension, was highly adaptable and gave rise to a wide range of vehicle formats, all hitting the mark with the public as they took to the roads en masse. Within months of its appearance in the showrooms this small car, designed for the ‘district nurse’ in its Basic and De Luxe versions, morphed into two Estate models, a Super, a Cooper, the…

Sometimes, it doesn’t pay to think about things too deeply. If I’d really sat down for more than five minutes and actually considered the pitfalls that could lie ahead, I’d probably have retired to the sofa and booked a nice relaxing package holiday. But instead, I decided to take a car that had been screwed together by youth offenders and was nowhere near finished, rush to complete it and then drive 4,000-plus miles to Eastern Europe. What could possibly go wrong? Back in 2010, the magazine bought a red Mini Mayfair to embark on a joint venture with Ashfield YOI near Bristol and the city’s S&B Automotive Academy. The college would shot-blast and weld it up, and the YOI would put it back together. But with the latter now an…

“The last type of engine mounts that Rover supplied were very poor fitting copies” ENGINE MOUNTS Q I’m refitting a standard 998 engine into a 1975 Clubman. I can get the engine mount holes to align with the subframe holes at one side but they’re about hand an inch too high on the other side. No matter what I try I cannot get both sides aligned as I cannot get the engine to settle low enough into the subframe. Can you provide any advice please? Rod A If you are refitting the engine with the original genuine Rover engine mounts, then in theory there is no reason why this should be such a problem. All manual type gearboxes are the same width irrespective of the engine capacity strapped on to…

I finally got my racer out this year but not to a race track. Under suggestion from the MkI Performance lot I decided to go to what is the longest hillclimb in the UK, at Harewood in Yorkshire. It’s less than a mile, which is tiny compared with what is available on the continent, but we live in hope as public roads can now be closed for competitions! It’s traditional for folk to start hillclimbing as something competitive, as it’s not as demanding and expensive as circuit racing and it’s also the final resting place for folk in their 80s who want to have one last sporting fling. Hope I’m not there yet! The racer had its newly rebuilt engine and ’box so it dutifully got run for 20 minutes…