Innehållsförteckning för January 2022 från Mini Magazine

Winter is a time of renewal and rebirth, or so the saying goes. And as the last of the leaves tumble from the trees and the children start to get excited about mince pies and whatnot, you find a different face looking out at you from this intro page. Hi, I’m Dan, and I’ll be your new guide through the fragrant vistas of classic Mini culture. Regular readers will be used to the twinkle-eyed spirit of Gez Hughes sitting in the big chair, and I’ll be doing my very best to live up to the outstanding efforts he’s achieved with Mini Magazine over the years. I’ve got a few fun ideas for you, but don’t panic – I won’t be changing the fundamentals of the mag. Think of it as…

SPIRIT OF ’66 Sale price: £21,950 Photos: Car & Classic ■ This unique curio, which passed through Car & Classic’s online auction platform in late October, represented something of a niche proposition. The 1966 Morris had undoubtedly been built to a very high standard, but rather than go for a concours resto the person in question had aimed to create a subtle but potent bespoke custom. According to the auction listing, the restoration work added up to 1,200 hours, and it’s estimated that building another car to the same standard and spec today would cost in excess of £50k. The donor car was a low-mileage example, showing 7,500 miles or so on the clock, and the brief of the project was to craft ‘a Mini that could be rapidly and…

Amy Jones may only be 17 years of age, but already she’s become a huge fan of the classic Mini. That’s thanks in part to her dad, Danny, who’s proved to be a major inspiration when it comes to all things automotive since as long as Amy can remember. He also happens to be pretty handy as a mechanic too! When Amy reached the age of 15 and thoughts of her first project came to mind, it just had to be a classic Mini. “I’ve always enjoyed working on cars and helping my dad in the garage since I learned to walk,” Amy recalls. “When I reached the age of 15, I asked my parents if I could buy my own project car.” Knowing he was a true petrolhead, Amy…

Having owned more cars than it’s perhaps prudent to admit in public, and having bought and sold motors of all ages for 28 years, you might be surprised to learn that I’ve never ‘owned’ a Mini. In fact, scratch that, I’m surprised too. I’m taken aback mainly because in my pantheon of cars that are both awesome and iconic, yet affordable, I’d say that the Mini would probably rank second after my beloved Beetle – a car I’ve never been without an example of since the age of 16. I’ve sold dozens, of course. I’ve retailed loads, traded a few and taken wonderful examples in part exchange. And every single time, I’ve made sure to do an extended test drive, marvelling at just how much fun can be obtained from…

SHIFT CAR CARE WATERLESS WASH £16.99 Bringing with it a new approach to the concept of environmentally friendly and economical alternatives to traditional car wash methods, Shift Car Care is introducing a range of waterless wash solutions. The flagship product, Shift Waterless Wash, is an advanced formula infused with polymer technology to ensure that cleaning paintwork, vinyl, glass trim and wheels is completely safe and scratch-free. It offers a simple spray-on-wipe-off application and, in addition to fully cleaning surfaces, immediately installs a quartz-based ceramic coating to stop water and road grime sticking. • www.shiftcarcare.com LONGSTONE TYRES PIRELLI CINTURATO CN54 From £82.80 The Pirelli Cinturato CN54 is a handy addition to the Longstone catalogue, as many Leyland Minis were fitted with 145/70 R12 tyres as standard, and this makes for an…

Ashley Abraham is supremely matter-of-fact about his vivid Mini’s nickname: “It was green when I bought it, so it made sense to call it ‘Hulk’ and the name just stuck,” he grins. “Everyone I know refers to it as that. It also makes me angry sometimes…” Well yes, it wouldn’t be any fun if it was easy, would it? And perhaps the most impressive thing about this perky little saloon is that it’s Ashley’s first proper crack at modifying. Believe it or not, he’s basically got it right first time – although not without a little trial-and-error along the way, of course. This has been a thoroughly in-depth and sleeves-rolled-up sort of project; occasionally infuriating, always intriguing, and representing a frankly astonishing amount of effort. “Hulk is the first car…

Due to the uncertainty surrounding Covid, please be aware that events are subject to change. Keep an eye on the organisers’ websites to stay up to date with any developments. ■ 2nd December Ace Café Kicking off at 6pm, the monthly meeting for Mods and Minis descends upon the popular North Circular venue www.london.acecafe.com ■ 5th December Haynes Motor Museum The Breakfast Club meets return to the Yeovil museum. It’s pre-book only, so make sure you have a ticket before rocking up. www.haynesmotormuseum.com ■ 8th December Caffeine & Machine Themed events are always fun at the iconic Warwickshire café. December 8th will be ‘FWD Thinking’ – not specifically a Mini event, but we’re counting on you guys to head over and represent… www.caffeineandmachine.com 2022 ■ 1st January Brooklands New Year’s…

Rolls-Royce. Jaguar. Bentley. Possibly some kind of limo. These are the names you think of when someone says ‘wedding car’. But Joe Matthews decided he wanted something a bit different. He’s loved Minis for quite some time and, what with his dad Steve being a mechanic and having restored a number of Minis in the past, there really was only one way to go. Although we get the feeling it may be slightly more work than Joe was planning on… “When we got it, it looked alright. But as we looked deeper we realised it needed more work. Then we cut the front off and… yeah.” Joe smiles and shakes his head here. “It needed a new front.” Ah. A story we’ve heard many times before. Good from far, but…

The sun shines on the righteous, so they say. And in between extensive bouts of biblical weather, Mini Day at Brooklands managed to not only remain dry, but also remarkably sunny. (Well, until mid-afternoon when it started henting down again – but you can’t have everything.) This day out was a breath of fresh air for so many Mini enthusiasts who’d been clamouring to return to the hallowed banking, with so many shows having been called off in 2020. As ever, there was a huge and diverse turnout, even in spite of the ongoing fuel crisis that was cocking everyone’s plans up at the time; we heard tales of enthusiasts syphoning fuel from their modern dailies to ensure their Minis had enough juice to get to Brooklands, and the number…

COST From £200 TOOLS REQUIRED Crypton tuning hardware and software TIME TAKEN 1 hour DIFFICULTY Engines like to run regularly, it keeps them happy. But this 998 hadn’t been used in a while, making it distinctly not happy. This ’85 Mini is a new car to me; its previous owner had been using it on a fairly regular basis, although a leg injury then meant that he couldn’t drive the Mini and it sat unused outside his house for a while. I bought it on trust (!) and had it trailered to my place; I drove it for a couple of miles and it was obviously a bit sad, running on three cylinders and generally struggling… and then I got struck down with Covid and had to isolate, so again…

In a new series, we’ll be casting a spotlight every month on some of our favourite special edition Minis. Because, let’s face it, there have been quite a few of them! This time we’re looking at the Jet Black, a limited-run curio with a pretty self-explanatory name. Based on the Mini City, the quirky little special you see here came with all-black paint and interior, and a plenty of alluring model-specific extras. Just 1,000 were allocated to the UK, and it’s estimated that only around 300 survive today, which makes them rather sought-after. Among its plentiful charms, the Jet Black came with a mixtape of ‘original soul and chart hits’ but, amusingly, you couldn’t play the cassette in the car because it only came equipped with a push-button radio. No…

Oh, it was good to be back. The Goodwood Revival is one of the most exciting and diverse race meets on the calendar, and the fact that Covid had knocked it on the head in 2020 meant that we really were champing at the bit to return. Sure, last year’s livestreamed Speed Week filled a hole, but there’s nothing quite like being in the paddocks at the Revival, swathed in period garb and enveloped in cigar smoke and Castrol The Revival gathers together the kind of cars and bikes that would have competed at the iconic circuit in the period 1948-66, and of course this involves plenty of Minis. This time period represents the dates the track opened after the Second World War, and the time it shut down when…

The spectre of the Z Car looms tall in modified Mini folklore. These tearaways have been ripping up the Leyland rule book for years, scything holes in shells to stuff superbike engines in, chucking grunt to the rear wheels, and generally living like there’s no tomorrow. This brand has always been the punk of the Mini scene, the counter-culturalist, the outsider… and yet today, quite unexpectedly, the brand has grown up. The two cars you see before you, in a worldwide exclusive, represent Z Cars’ new dawn. A forthright step into the future, taking all that people think they know about these outlandish machines and refracting it through a premium lens. Imagine a restomod in the vein of a Singer 911 or Alfaholics GTA and you’re not far off, although…

Sometimes a chance encounter can have a dramatic effect. So often it’s a case of being in the right place at the right time and making the most of the situation. One seemingly average day, Darren Needham was working in his kitchen and bathroom shop when the conversation with a customer turned to the subject of cars. Once a 1976 Leyland Mini that might soon become available was mentioned, Darren’s ears suddenly pricked up and before he knew it he’d bagged himself a new project. “My first car wasn’t a Mini, it was the Mini’s roomier relative, a 1000cc Metro,” Darren recalls. “I ended up turning it into an MG replica using parts from a donor car with a blown engine.” The lookalike theme continued with a 1.3 Astra which…

The Mini, an iconic car which most of us have grown up with; to us they are so much more than a small, functional, vehicle, originally created in response to petrol rationing. So much so that we’ve taken this ‘practical solution to a lack of resources’ and raced it, rallied it, restored and customised it, road-tripped in it and created memories with it. The Mini is well and truly part of our petrol-hedonistic lives. But I wonder if you’ve considered how significant the Mini is in pop culture? From films and photoshoots to art cars and furniture, the impact of this little icon has a huge influence - way beyond the car scene itself. Where to start? As someone who is well and truly immersed in pop culture, I really…

998 POWER MODS Q I’m going to be fitting a Stage 1 kit to my 998cc Mini, and I’m wondering what sort of gains I’m likely to see from adding a Stage 3 head? Clearly it’ll make a difference, but will it be a significant one? I’m envisaging something along the lines of a 20bhp increase, but I want to make sure I’m not wasting my money. Maybe it’s worth just going with a set of 1.5 rockers instead? Chris H A This is a pretty well-trodden path, and we’ve got a whole load of results on file from various bench tests of upgrades of this nature. For example, with a typical high-comp 998 A-plus engine, the results from fitting a Stage 1 kit and re-testing, then a Stage 3…