MINI Cooper MINI?

I thought this was silly. Shouldn't it be mini MINI Cooper? I guess it's not common knowlege that MINI is the make and Cooper is the model. Either way, it's a mini MINI. ;-) And the look on Conan's face every time he knows a writer's sketch is stupid is priceless. Plus that MINI has two stubby antennas. Weird. Scan to about 18 minutes in if it doesn't queue up.

Dragon Bound

Yup, that's right. I was bitten by the dragon bug last summer when I drove through but now I wanted to see what it's like when a whole bunch of MINIs take over. Registration is seems fairly low so well see how it goes. It might be nice for the roads not to be over saturated. Either way, I am excited to get down there and ride that dragon roller coaster!

Happy Birthday, I Think...

Not sure what I would celebrate as the birthday of my MINI; the built date or the delivery date. But a couple of days ago (3.18) marked the day my DS/B MCSa was completed at the factory and awaiting transport to the states. Three years so far and no signs of letting up.

2008 Spring Forward Drive

The annual CMMC Spring Forward Drive took us on a nice trip this Sunday up to Lake Geneva where we met up with the Milwaukee MINI club and ate a good lunch at a restaurant I like to go to a lot, Houlihan's.  After a quick stop at Culvers in Burlington, WI, we headed for some nice side roads on our way to Lake Geneva. Check out the pictures below.On a side note, there was a "MINI Motoring Against Cancer" Banner at the event which raised almost a thousand dollars for the American Cancer Society. The banner will be heading out to AMVIV and hopefully out to the dragon in a couple months.

Motoringfile NewsRoom

The MotoringFile NewsRoom was introduced today for all your MINI related and general auto news.  While still in beta form, it looks very polished and worth a bookmark or two.  dcMINI even made the list right on the front page, bottom center of the MINI news section.  Thanks Gabe.
A similar website has been in existence for many years, GoMotorong, but it seems that Mark Volgar might be selling (or has sold) the site according to dbmini.us.  Here's what Mark said about his RSS MINI site

I don’t hold claim to RSS feeds nor do I think that GoMotoring has claim that I made reading RSS feeds better. What I will say is that while numerous technophile users out there don’t see a need for my site, most users are very happy that I provide a one stop NEWS PORTAL for MINI related news. This shows in my repeat visit stats on the site. I never wanted to compete with NAM or MF, I just wanted to make the average MINI owner a spot to get all their information from one location and be able to go the site with the information they wanted to read.

When I got my MINI I surfed at least 15 sites a day and very few of them had anything new to say. GoMotoring took care of that problem for me and has now been quite useful for many, many MINI owners in the same way

I used to do the same almost everyday.  I would check out GoMotoring first, scan the page for any changes, and read any new items.  The problem for these types of sites is that personal RSS readers are a lot more convenient.  I now use Google Reader and I am glad I do.  I have all the RSS feeds for all the sites I like to visit, including a few non MINI related ones, all in one place.  And in addition I can mark items as read so they do not show up the next time I check for updates, a real time saver. GoMotoring used to be a time saver for me compared to visiting each site individually and checking for updates.  Now Google Reader is even faster and customizable.

It seems that there are a number of MINI related sites that are transfering ownership in one way or another.  NorthAmericanMotoring was recently sold and MINI2 was bought out a year ago I think.  A lot of things are changing and hopefully for the better.

New IPhone Button for dcmini

Those of you with an iPhone or iPod Touch can now add dcmini to your home screen with a cool new icon.  I gave it a shot and it seems to work fine.  I hated having a super tiny preview of the webpage itself show as the icon since the content usually changes from time to time and the icon doesn't.  I starting to see more and more sites be iPhone friendly and decided to do the same for dcmini.  Give it a shot and let me know what you think......   

boy do i miss warmer temperatures... it's freezing! :-)

It's My B-day and I'll Drive If I Want To

That's right.  The big two-nine came today and with great pleasure.  Since winter is in full swing, I usually do not get to drive the MINI so much... by choice.  But the weather is springlike today and just a little wet so I just couldn't resist.
I decided the MINI could use a little run through the puddles today on my ride to work. The temperature is just about right for the engine to zip in and out of traffic.  The MINI is just so peppy on days like today.  And with the  slick roads, it makes those empty parking lots just that much more fun.  Happy New Year everyone!

The 20,000th Mile

This passed weekend, my MINI tacked on its 20,000th mile! That's well over 10,000 miles with a pulley, intake and exhaust on an MCSa with no issues to date. Here's a choppy video I captured of this moment on a Chicago expressway.

Starved Rock 2007

With the leaves turning those wonderful colors, it was time for the annual Starved Rock Run. What a great drive right in my own back yard. And this time the club had it planned just right with a nice brunch at a resort lodge nearby. I had a great time. Here are a few pictures of the event.

Holy Crap! The Dragon is Awesome!

Absolutely the best road I have ever driven. Hands down. This winding road demands full concentration and the utmost respect. I highly recommend it if you can make it there. I will most likely be attending next years MINIs on the Dragon if at all possible. It's that good. Here are a couple of picts of the pre Dragon part of highway 129. We just couldn't take any pictures during the really curvy parts because we needed to hold on. I did add the pictures from Killboy.com, which I will be ordering full res shots soon. Enjoy!....... and btw, you should go to the dragon..... now! :-D

MINI Road Trip 2007 (part 2)

First off, I just realized that this is post #101. Posting has been extremely fun for me and hope to continue for some time to come. Thanks to everyone for visiting.

Road Trip 2007:
Continuing on from Part 1 of the road trip, we made stops at a few more locations. The first part we stoped at Springdield IL, St. Louis and then Memphis. This half we visited Nashville, the Smokey Mountains, and Cininnati. Check out the pictures below. And with the stop to the Smokies, a visit to the Dragon was inevitable. ;-)

MINI Road Trip 2007 (part 1)

Road trip USA... in a MINI. So far it's been just great. We have traveled through Springfield IL, St. Louis MO, Memphis TN and Nashville TN. With temperatures reaching well over 100 degrees, we have been staying cool. There's still a lot more traveling to be done. With no exact route planned, we have ultimate flexibly. Next stop, The Smokey Mountains. Check out the pictures to far below.

DSG: Not Anytime Soon

All you MCSa heads out there, don't hold your breath waiting for a DSG type tranny in a MCSa. It seems that there just isn't any resources to develop this under the BMW roof. And nothing currently in development could be adapted to the new MINI. Here's an exerpt from Motoringfile's interview with MINIUSA product manager Jeff Stracco:

MF: A lot of posters want to know if MINI will be getting a DSG or equivalent.

Stracco Speaks: The only real manufacturer of Dual Clutch Transmissions right now is VW. They don’t have a supplier, they manufacture the DSG themselves. Their front wheel drive box is actually manufactured by VW under license from Borg-Warner. They can afford to manufacture it themselves because they have huge volumes with VW, Seat, Skoda, etc. But, as you could imagine they are not prepared to manufacture those for anyone outside the VW family.

Everyone else has a dual clutch gearbox “In development” or something like that. Or if they have one, it’s not appropriate for a MINI. So it will be a while yet.

I am not an expert in market feasibility but I would think the "business case" would be very strong seeming that the market would include everyone from a novice motorer to a well experienced driver. The fact that the DSG transmission could produce faster shift times and ultimately faster cars would get me (and many other enthusiasts) very interested.

For more info check out:
GTI Test Drive [ dcmini ]
VW DSG [ Carpages.co.uk ]
DSG Auto [ dcmini]
Direct Shift Gearbox (DSG) [ about.com ]

Portillo's 7.11.07

Hot Dogs and MINIs, what a combo! For what seemed like a casual gathering of a few enthusists set up in a NAM thread, we had a very large crowd show up. I also met up with Juan, of blu-iguana.us fame, who happened to be in the area with his indi blue cooper with well over 100,000 miles on it. Wow! And he gave me a poster with a ton of his pictures! Very cool... I'm getting that framed soon.

I had a blast talking with a couple new faces as well as some passers by. I hope we can make this a regular event.

CMMC 4th of July Parade 2007

What better way to show off your MINI than in a parade! There was a total of eight MINIs that showed up to churp their tires, rev their engines and decorate their MINIs for the crowds at the Skokie 4th of July parade courtesy of the CMMC. My grandfather happened to be in town so he rode along with me and he said he had a blast. It was great fun and great weather. Check out the club post for more picts including mine or just enjoy the slide show below. Happy forth of July to all! Hope yours was as memorable. :-)

One Hand on the Wheel....

How funny is this!! I went out to buy a mattress set for my mom and needed to get it home. I wasn't expecting to have to take it at the time but since her home was less than a couple of miles from the store, it didn't seem like it would be a problem to toss them up on the roof for a quick drive. With a little twine and a strong fore arm, we made it home with out a hitch. I never thought I would be one of "those people", but it needed to be done to close the deal. ;-)

My First Flat on the MINI... Awww

On my way home this evening, I heard a loud thumping like something got caught in my wheel. I pulled over and didn't notice anything so I drove off. A few minutes later, my tire pressure light went off and I knew I must have run over something bad.

When I arrived home, luckily only a couple of miles where this happened, I heard a loud whistling from my rear driver's side tire. And this is what I saw:

It's a house key that had a key strap attached to it. I think I'll keep it as a momento. Now I get to track down a place to repair it. fun stuff. :-) click the picture for more photos.

Since I didn't want the MINI to ruin the run-flat, I jacked it up and took the wheel off. I then tossed it in the trunk of my other car. As I walked away, as a matter of habit, I set the alarm. When I came back I thought I would level the car out since it was jacked up pretty high. As I let the car down a bit, my alarm went off and scared the crap out of me. Its good to know that the alarm is in good working order. I didn't think it was going to be that sensitive but I'm glad it is.

Going Green [Video]

Sometimes being MINI can mean a lot of things. One of the side effects of being an architect is that we tend to cater to people who are well off and/or are not interested in reducing the size of their project. This house with regards to its size is certainly not very MINI. As an offset, we look at other ways to reduce the impact of a project as a whole, not only financially but environmentally. With that, there is often a little up charge for going green initially, but in a short time it most often pays for itself and them some. But what is even more rare is having a developer invest into such a concept up front. Here is a project I worked on that exemplifies just that. It was also featured in a local NBC news segment, Going Green. Check out the video here. If you are using Safari, it seems a little buggy with the video. It works fine with Firefox.

HD Dice iPod Kit

My Previous Setup:
One of the first mods I added, back in April of '05, was the OEM AUX input ($42). This was a simple, easy and inexpensive way to get my tunes off the iPod and into the car. It was much less expensive than the often buggy Dension Ice-link Plus at the time. After a short while, a ground loop became an issue and would cut out the AUX every so often. To solve that added the Belkin Auto Kit ($40) that I received as a Xmas gift back in December of '05. Since then i've been jamming my tunes without any problems. It was a clean set up, just one cord going from the cigarette lighter to the center coin tray, and it kept my iPod charged and ready to go. It even paused when I turned the car off so that I could resume it later.About HD Dice:
After a while I grew tired of not being able to advance to the next track with the steering wheel controls. In addition, I kinda always wanted to see the song info without having to access the iPod itself. Then along came Dice, and their new and improved HD Dice Ipod Integration Kit. I became aware of this product from a NAM Q/A thread started and maintained by Tom of EAS. So what's different from the regular Dice iPod integration kit? Well nothing really in regards to the iPod. The module is definitely larger but the iPod interface is pretty much the same from what I can tell. The big difference is the 'HD' for High Definition Radio. Being in a large metropolitan area, Chicago has pretty much most of its over the air radio simulcasted in high definition, but having a regular radio would never be able to receive the HD signal. With the HD Dice, you can not only get all your ipod features, including displaying current track info on the stock head unit display, but also listen to HD Radio. Some stations also have hidden channels, such as HD2 that have different programming and some surprisingly have uncensored content. The device itself emulates a CD changer so it connects to the CD changer connections in the boot.The Install:
The DH Dice iPod Integration kit is very simple to install. The hardest thing I encountered was fishing the cables through where I wanted to run them. The HD Dice comes with two items, the control unit itself and an HD radio antenna. The instructions suggest that the HD Radio antenna be installed on the side of the front windshield but I thought that would be horrible to look at. After-all, I have my iPass mounted on my rear windshield because I would hate to look at its white creamy color every time I look forward. So I installed the HD Radio antenna in the fixed rear sunroof pane and fished the wire down the rear 'C' pillar and back the the boot. From there, I connected the module to the antenna in the side cubby hole, since this is where the CD Changer connections are. Now the challenge was to get the iPod connected so that I could have it at the coin tray by the e-brake. To do this, I needed to buy an extending 8 pin MINI din cable in addition to the iPod connection that for some reason is an option to the kit. So I fished these cables under the carpet lining, under the rear seat cushions and ultimately to the e-brake. It's not so hard once you get going, but with all this said and done, it took me about a couple of hours with a bit of trial and error with where to run the wires exactly.HD Dice Reviewed:
Overall, the sound from the iPod and HD Radio is superb. Definitely better than the AUX input, cleaner and sharper. With the AUX input, i noticed sometimes that the highs and lows would sometimes sound a bit muffled. Certainly not very noticeable but now it is a bit more evident when comparing the two side by side. The interface of the HD Radio is a bit slow for my liking but it gets the job done. I went with the HD Dice because they currently have a rebate which basically covers the added cost from the regular Dice iPod setup. But what really makes this worth it is seeing the iD3 tags on the head-unit, and using the MFSW controls to advance to the next track. If I wanted to select a specific song, I still can navigate from the iPod which would be the fastest way. Overall, a very good upgrade to get iPod control and iD3 text on your head unit.

EAS Support:
I just want to say that Tom over at EAS was more that helpful. In fact, I did shop around before buying from him, but in the end he was the the one who offered a whole lot more than just a sale. He is easily contacted and usually responds to any questions on the NAM Q/A thread within a few hours. Big thumps up to him.

The Great Parallel Park-Off

CNET, in typical tounge and cheek fashion, have a great little episode that features a new R56 MINI Cooper S in a parallel parking challenge. Check it out.