Hello,

my name is Tobi and I'm located in Sarasota Florida area.

I'm German (Munich area) and moved to Florida in 2010.

I had two new Mini (one Cooper S and one JCW r53) back in the day.
My back then gf, now wife loved both Mini's to death.

Fast forward to 2015. We live in the US and my wife drives an 2011 BMW X5 Diesel and I bought her an older e46 3 series convertible as a mile sucker.

Well the e46 is not my wife's favorite to drive as the previous owner had several performance upgrades installed to support his supercharger.
He removed the SC but left the SCC race clutch, SCC flywheel, SSK etc in the car. Very hard clutch feel and not comfortable to drive.

I think to keep the happy wife, happy live relation in place, I need to replace the e46 with an Mini.

I found a 2008 r56 Mini Cooper S, 6MT with 65k miles and one previous owner for a good price.

I pulled the data from the VIN
This car seems to be the perfect fit.

Is there anything I need to look out for this model year?
N14 engine problem? I read about the carbon build up but I probably can't check this.

Thanks

Tobi

Welcome to NAM, Tobi! Here is a good thread on NAM with some more information on the N14. Hope some of this helps you with your decision. Good luck! If you have any questions, feel free to ask!

Thank you for the link.

Well this sounds terrible.
A lot has changed since I had my Mini's. I remember when people said to hold off for the r56.

It sounds actually that bad to forget about the car even everything else sounds perfect.

My pleasure. There is a lot of good quality information on this forum with regards to fixes/repairs that arise with each gen MINI. Just keep up on the maintenance and fix things when they need to be fixed. If you're DIY inclined, it'll also help save you a lot. Otherwise, I'm sure others will give you some great input about the purchase as well. Good luck!

Welcome to NAM Tobi

Thanks. I'll read into that.
Thanks

It seems my wife fell in love with the r56 Mini. If carfax sounds good we probably will go and take a look the car this weekend.

Looks great! Hopefully everything works out and you get to pick her up.

Let us know if you ever want to upgrade her lighting!

Congrats and Welcome!

yes, that could be one of my first mods.

Thanks for the welcome..

I'm thinking right now to clean up my toys all together using the Mini as kick off. Anyone needs an M3, Z4, X5D, 3series or a R6 Bike?

Congrats, very nice interior , even the wood wheel, very rare.

Thanks! ECS my destination of money disposal.

We didn't went to check out the Mini in Miami.

The seller (dealer) never shared the carfax, never replied to me but send my wife a text message with a cover letter for car check. reported 2014 but not more info. This seemed to shady for me to drive 5h and be surprised.

I need to keep looking.

ECS my destination of money disposal. Nice quote.


Sorry it looked like a shady deal. Good luck on the search.

Small update, we drove two Mini's this weekend.

One 2010 Cooper S at a rice burner barn (Toyota dealer) what was in terrible shape.
All plastic faded, worn, cracked and smoking from burning oil and one at BMW what was pristine.

Put an offer to the table for an 2010 MT r56 with 27k miles at BMW.
Lets see what they can do with the price.

Thanks for the update , looks really clean.

Also has the black center web spoke wheels , very nice.

Good luck! Looks like that one is in pretty good condition and has some low miles.