Hi everyone,
I recently joined the mini family by getting a good deal on a 2004 Cooper with 100,000k. I recently replaced various gaskets including the head, intake and exhaust and various seals around the car for preventative maintenance. I bought ARP head studs as a do plan on boosting the car with a tighter pulley and possibly a tune in the future and figured it’d be safer to invest in better head bolts. I’m in the market for an oil pressure and boost gauge (mechanical and preferably matching the tach and speedo orange). I was also wanting some advice on some (relatively) cheap mods. I’m already familiar with “one ball” and redirecting a specific bypass valve to get better supercharger response and reduce “yo-yo”. Any input/thoughts are welcome as I’m new to working on cars and am doing this with my buddy who’s worked on Minis for years. Thank you

Welcome to the site, look at the R53 section there are allot of good how to articles and a post about upgrading out R53’s.

I wanted the mechanical gauges purely for ease of installment because there’d be less wires to run and already have a t valve in place to tap for boost. And here’s a pic of her on some nice low profile enkeis

I was checking out the one on your website. If I combined the 2% overdrive with a 15% belt reduction would that equate to a 17% reduction overall? I was looking into a 15% but am only going to be on the street and worry about overheating my supercharger. I would be okay with the power gains of a 17% but will hold off it it risks damage.