Thank you! Great presentation of the tour! Does the Mini also come with the thick shiiping wax and anything like the BMW's?

 

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>>Great job!
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>>SCoop
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>>PS Love those felty thingies! They look like cars in bunny suits!
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>>_________________
>> My MINI makes me want to do the happy dance!

I agree. Now I know why Snoopy is doing the happy dance -- he has been chasing the MINIs in bunny suits.

Earl

 

NICE presentation!!

 

very well done!

 

The MINIs come with a plastic film on their bonnet and hood to protect those surfaces from atmospheric fallout.

 

Dave,

Many thanks for your pictural tour of the Hueneme facility. I felt like I was there too! Tell me, was this a special tour that only the BMWCCA put together or is there a day of the week that John Q. Public can sign up to see the sights. If so, I'd love to tour the facility while on vacation to Calif.

 

For those interested in touring the BMW VDC, there was a flyer passed out at the event that said the L.A. BMWCCA was considering doing this same tour over again as part of the national BMWCCA Oktoberfest to be held in Pasadena July 5-9.

Yet another great reason to Join BMWCCA

 

Excellent pics and tour Dave! Much appreciated! :smile:

 

"The 7-Series, 5-Series, and 3-Series are all shipped with a thick waxy coating. This coating is removed with a very hot power car wash. The wax is then recovered and separated from the water, and then it is used to fuel the burners that heat the water for the car wash."

That's really, really cool. I'm pleasantly surprised to hear of BMW instituting such an innovative and environmentally conscious effort. Anyone know if other carmakers utilize a similar process?

Thanks, Dave! Phenomenal work. :smile:

 

Chris,

Here are a couple other examples of BMW recycling:

Aluminum wheels that are damaged get the lip broken (so they can't be retrieved and reused) and then those are recycled.

Those white felty shipping packs are compacted and sent to a company in L.A. that uses them to fuel their boilers.

Dave

 

I wonder if there's a collector out there, who's more extreme that I am, who'll want the "white felty shipping pack" to keep with his pristine X3. Aren't collectables more valuable if you hang on to their original packaging?

Very nice pictorial!

 

My in-laws were there also. They were in the Pistacio Z3, maybe you saw them?

 

Great "insider" pix! Thanks!

Regards,
Red

 

ecellent pics and write-up. poor old mini that got crushed. hopefully it is not any of our member's car. mini is travelling in second-class section, heh

 

w00t awesome post

 

I don't remember seeing that car in the parking lot and that would be pretty distinctive. That Pistacio color reminds me of Bianchi's Celeste Green. :smile:


As for that MINI with the roof repair, it might have been interesting to find out the VIN and see what happens to that car down the road. Unfortunately, the VIN and the rest of the car were covered.

 

Great photos! Very insightful! :smile:

 

What a great job on this post. I have a question about the 6 series convertible. Does the back window drop straight down? also, where does the roof fold, does the trunklid lift up to allow the top to fold, like a vette?

 

I'm not able to answer that question. All three 6's were locked. No one was able to get into any of the cars - though at least a dozen times the alarm on the 6 with the top down went off as someone tried to open the door using the inside hand lever.

A couple more thoughts on repaired cars at the VPC:
Just because they were trying to repair a car doesn't mean it was going to be sent out to a customer. The repair still has to be inspected afterwards and get approval that it meets BMW's specifications. So we really don't know what the future holds for that MINI with the crushed/repaired roof. The people I spoke with at the VPC took a lot of pride in the quality of their work and the finished product and were adamant that if a car couldn't meet spec it would be scrapped (we were talking about cars with frame damage at the time).

Dave

 

Someone in SCMM asked me about delays at the VPC, here is a cut and paste of my response:

Your MINI could have had a longer than desired stay at the VDC for any number of reasons.

For one, the center "finishes" 400 cars per day, but it can store 3000 cars on the VDC property. So there is a week's worth of cars right there. Then there are all the cars down at the dock that haven't been brought up to the VDC yet. That's the most palletable answer.

The next most "desireable" delay (if there is such a thing) would be that there was a campaign (BMW's word) for your MINI when it got to the VDC. Basically that means that in the time it took for your car to leave Oxford and reach the Port Hueneme VDC, MINI made an upgrade to your car. The campaign cars are set in a special area of the VDC to get brought up to the most curent revision (whether that's software - v. 36, or hardware: seat mechanisms for example). Your car will not be released until the campaign is completed. Therefore if it's a hardware issue and they run out of parts, the VDC has to wait until parts get shipped by BMW/MINI to the BMW parts warehouse in Ontario, CA, and then wait some more for the parts (usually a day) for them to go from the warehouse to the VDC.

To elevate things a little sometimes they may need to replace parts. This could be anything from broken interior trim to engines. There was a 760Li at the VDC getting an entirely new engine. Our guide did not know what the reason was for the replacement. Since all these parts are being replaced with BMW parts and assembled to BMW specs, even the engine swap wouldn't have to be reported, as the VDC is part of the manufacturing chain and the parts are installed to BMW's satisfaction.

Minor bodywork: replaceable body panels (bumper covers, hoods, quarter panels, trunks) are sometimes repainted or new parts need to be installed due to "shipping damage." As it was characterized to me, this type of work would not qualify as going toward the 3% limit for disclosure because new replacement parts are used and it can all be repaired by BMW to BMW spec.

Major bodywork: this would be things like frame damage and that MINI with the roof that they were trying to repair. If the frame is too far out, the car is destroyed/recycled. That MINI with the roof being fixed may or may not reach a customer. The repair isn't completed and it would still need to pass inspection. To my knowledge only this type of damage would count toward that 3% disclosure.

So you can see in the vast majority of cases, there really isn't any need to worry about what happened at the VDC. That said, you can be sure that from now on, when I buy a new car, I'll be asking the dealership if any disclosures were made to them about damage at the VDC.

Hope that sheds some additional light on things.

 

I was also at the tour but received different information regarding cars with 3% or more body damage (such as the topless MINI). Acording to the BMW tech, these cars are not delivered to the dealers, but repaired and then put into the BMW corporate fleet. They can be used for demos, media, or company cars. After that they are sold as used vehicles, but probably not (the tech wasn't positive) as dealer select units.

 

You mentioned the wax coating and the felt cover for many models of BMW's. I was wonder if the mini shipped with any sort of protective coating?

-Alex

 

That's interesting to hear. It sounds like everyone wasn't on the same page that day about the 3% damage bit.

If MINI Division gave more details on to this forum, this would seem to be a simple point for them to carify.

 

Thanks for the photo tour!!
Do the MINIs come over with a protective coating of wax, or the felt cover?

 

The MINI come with a thing plastic covering on their bonnet and roof. I gathered this was like a vinyl or static film. While I was at the VPC, I did not see a MINI that hadn't already been processed through the car wash, so no pics of the MINI in shipping form.