Oli's MCS - Grey Caramac Disaster Toilet

Thought it would be about time that I started a project thread, and put up a couple of pics, so here goes...

After months and months of searching for a DS / B MCS, with climate control air con, MFSW, trip computer, cruise control, half leather interior and s-spokes (eek!), I eventually found one...

Bought in January 2008, from a bloke and his wife in Coventry...strangely, it had been used to commute up to his place of work in Loughborough...literally 2 mins walk from my house! Car at the time had 37k miles on the clock, and looked like this:








In May 2008, it was joined by Monty the classic:




June 2008 we went on The Lakes Tour:



Snake Pass in The Lakes killed my brakes, so opted for the GTT Spiroslots, and painted my calipers red at the same time.


August 2008, and I woke early to take a trip to the MINI tuner who can't be named, for new Powerflex wishbones bushes. Had a nice drive down in the awesome sun shine, spent a couple of hours there then started my drive home, just as it began to rain. Took it easy all the way home, as it was sheeting it down, and instead looked forward to testing the better bushes another day...however, 2 minutes from home, the back end went on a roundabout! After a couple of left right corrections, it was too late and went nose first into a road sign, which fortunately stopped me from dropping 6 foot into the field in front:








After a £4500 insurance repair later (luckily BMW claimed in two parts...) and what seemed like an age, I had the car back, but this time with an Aero front bumper.

September 2008 I joined MT.

December 2008 I was rocking around with GP red mirror caps...and yes, mahoosive stock wheelgap! With is also the first time I found out that my gearbox (or at least linkages) doesn't like freezing weather.



Also the time I was tempted to go with an Audi / Golf GTI front end look, but didn't:




Some time in 2009 I bought a set of wheels off Sy (blaze6) - Magline 8 HF602A (17x7 ET40) in black, 6.5kg per corner, with Toyo Proxes 4 215/40/170. That's when I sold my s-spokes to some poor soul!


May 2009 took me to MINI United, where I met a number of MT members for the first time at camp MT:



Somewhere here I one-balled my OEM exhaust.

October 2009 and I visited 1320 for a healthcheck and dyno run - 62k on the clock, one ball, Pipercross panel filter - 160+ psi on each cylinder, 192.3 bhp with 150.8 lb/ft...152 whp :mellow:


At some point in 2010, I bought a set of Koni adjustable dampers and M7 springs to banish my wheelgap...or at least 50% of it anyway...along with a set of Whiteline adjustable control arms! And the Milltek back boxes, which I connected to the OEM centre pipe:




Somewhere along the lines, I've also added a dave.f intake, lower OMP, upper OMP (sold), OEM single CD headunit (replacing the tape deck, but complimenting the CD changer) a boost gauge and a scangauge. Also replaced a leaking sump gasket, a wobbling damper pulley, a worn belt, a knackered rear wheel bearing and a yo-yoing bypass valve...and painted my side vents and spot lights black.

Everything I've added / replaced on the car has been done on my parents driveway, bar the control arms and wishbone bushes - love a challenge, but sometimes regret it midway through.

So that more or less brings us up to date, and gives me chance to post some pictures from today:









Future plans I hear you ask?
- Improve the looks...not sure about the wheels anymore. Maybe colour code the headlight surrounds, side vents, door handles and petrol cap.
- Improve the braking...still undecided between R56 calipers or R56 JCW Brembos.
- Improve the performance...pulley and IC at some point.

EDIT - Ignore the chrome boot handle ::getcoat:: Temporary MOT fix. Will be replaced with another dark silver one soon.