howdy
#1
09-13-2005, 06:14 PM
howdy
Hello all. Nice to meet you. I'm yet another new guy. So here's a little background:
I was born just a few days after Mt. St. Helens blew up. I claim it as my own personal omen.
I've lived most of my life Orange County, CA, where I currently reside. I had a short stint in the Snata Barbara area (technically Goleta, although it was across the street from Isla Vista and over a mile from the nearest developed part of Goleta). While there, I picked up a degree in chemistry with a minor in physics. My original plan was to major in physics, and maybe pick up a minor or second major in chem (my organic classes frustrated me) but then I realized I simply don't have enough of a love of line and space integrals to finish through with physics but I do have an undying pyromaniacal urge so I just went with the chem. And after the organic classes, it got interesting again. (and smelled better)
I recently placed an order on a Mini Cooper S. I have been looking at these little cars for several years, anticipating the day I'd finally be able to get one. My family thinks I'm crazy, but I like it. I also want to buy a house but the real estate market fills me with dread. I will either have to leave the sunshine and beaches or get a post graduate degree to afford one.
I am currently employed as an R&D and production chemist in the aerospace sealant industry. It is surprisingly similar to the tire industry. If you're ever really bored, ask me about vulcanization.
I love the new Mini but I hate almost all the dealers I've tried to deal with.
The car that I ordered is a 2006 Mini Cooper S in British Racing Green with a silver roof and stripe, anthracite dash and headliner, gray space cloth seats, the cockpit chrono pack, and a limited slip differential. I despise Xenon headlights and heated seats and don't like the feel of leather or leatherette seats and prefer to do the driving myself rather than have a computer do it for me, so I couldn't really justify any of the packages to myself. And while I'm sure the JCW package would be fun, it's mor than I would want to spend and puts out more boost than I can honestly believe an engine would stand up to over a long period of time.
I remember reading about the new Mini several years ago, and being impressed by its stats and wanted to drive one, knowing that it would essentially be a playskool my-first-bimmer, but I figured it would be as cramped inside as the larger BMW's. Being 6'5 and well over 350 (don't let it fool you, though... when I express a desire to lose more than 20 or 30 pounds, most people think it would be too much. They say, but you're not really *fat* you're just *big*), I have a lot of trouble with most cars. So when I actually went to test drive one back in 2002, it was mostly out of novelty. I figured I'd make a spectacle of myself trying to shoehorn myself into one of the smallest cars on teh market. I can take myself lightly most of the time, and I like to entertain. But the joke was on me. It was one of exactly two cars for under $30,000 that I actually fit in, and was probably the second most comfortable car that I did not modify for my own ergonomics (the other under-30 G is the GTi, but I don't like its looks, suspension, and acceleration characteristics and the most comfortable late model car that I've been in is the new mopar hemi sedan family. But none of them compare to my old nova. Nobody under about 6'1 can reach the pedals in that beast.
) and basically, after test driving, I was sold. So now that I'm steadily employed, I'm buying.
so anyway, this seems like a pretty cool board.
I was born just a few days after Mt. St. Helens blew up. I claim it as my own personal omen.
I've lived most of my life Orange County, CA, where I currently reside. I had a short stint in the Snata Barbara area (technically Goleta, although it was across the street from Isla Vista and over a mile from the nearest developed part of Goleta). While there, I picked up a degree in chemistry with a minor in physics. My original plan was to major in physics, and maybe pick up a minor or second major in chem (my organic classes frustrated me) but then I realized I simply don't have enough of a love of line and space integrals to finish through with physics but I do have an undying pyromaniacal urge so I just went with the chem. And after the organic classes, it got interesting again. (and smelled better)
I recently placed an order on a Mini Cooper S. I have been looking at these little cars for several years, anticipating the day I'd finally be able to get one. My family thinks I'm crazy, but I like it. I also want to buy a house but the real estate market fills me with dread. I will either have to leave the sunshine and beaches or get a post graduate degree to afford one.
I am currently employed as an R&D and production chemist in the aerospace sealant industry. It is surprisingly similar to the tire industry. If you're ever really bored, ask me about vulcanization.
I love the new Mini but I hate almost all the dealers I've tried to deal with.
The car that I ordered is a 2006 Mini Cooper S in British Racing Green with a silver roof and stripe, anthracite dash and headliner, gray space cloth seats, the cockpit chrono pack, and a limited slip differential. I despise Xenon headlights and heated seats and don't like the feel of leather or leatherette seats and prefer to do the driving myself rather than have a computer do it for me, so I couldn't really justify any of the packages to myself. And while I'm sure the JCW package would be fun, it's mor than I would want to spend and puts out more boost than I can honestly believe an engine would stand up to over a long period of time.
I remember reading about the new Mini several years ago, and being impressed by its stats and wanted to drive one, knowing that it would essentially be a playskool my-first-bimmer, but I figured it would be as cramped inside as the larger BMW's. Being 6'5 and well over 350 (don't let it fool you, though... when I express a desire to lose more than 20 or 30 pounds, most people think it would be too much. They say, but you're not really *fat* you're just *big*), I have a lot of trouble with most cars. So when I actually went to test drive one back in 2002, it was mostly out of novelty. I figured I'd make a spectacle of myself trying to shoehorn myself into one of the smallest cars on teh market. I can take myself lightly most of the time, and I like to entertain. But the joke was on me. It was one of exactly two cars for under $30,000 that I actually fit in, and was probably the second most comfortable car that I did not modify for my own ergonomics (the other under-30 G is the GTi, but I don't like its looks, suspension, and acceleration characteristics and the most comfortable late model car that I've been in is the new mopar hemi sedan family. But none of them compare to my old nova. Nobody under about 6'1 can reach the pedals in that beast.
) and basically, after test driving, I was sold. So now that I'm steadily employed, I'm buying.so anyway, this seems like a pretty cool board.
#2
09-13-2005, 06:54 PM
6th Gear
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#3
09-13-2005, 07:12 PM
BRG and silver.....whoa that MINI will be HOT!!! Good job thinking through all the options and getting what YOU want. Packages are a good value for sure, but I found there was always one or two things I didn't really want so I opted out of packages and went item by item. In the end, even my modestly appointed MINI is both "all me" and still "all MINI." It's true...whether lightly of extravagantly appointed there's no MINI like your MINI!
#4
09-13-2005, 07:20 PM
:smile: Welcome to NAM, effusant! I love you even though you mentioned my very most be-hated car, the Nova! GRRRRRRR! 
My hubby owned two of them over the years, and I can truthfully say that I hated them with all my heart!
Who did you end up ordering your MINI from? When is it due? Love those specs!! BRG/S will be awesome!
Clover
My hubby owned two of them over the years, and I can truthfully say that I hated them with all my heart! Who did you end up ordering your MINI from? When is it due? Love those specs!! BRG/S will be awesome!
Clover
#5
09-13-2005, 07:21 PM
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Join Date: Aug 2005
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#7
09-13-2005, 08:49 PM
Welcome! Your car sounds super-classy. The chrono pack really weirded me out when I first saw it, but I think it looks great with a dark interior and a dark green or blue car. How long is your wait?
I trust that you will be jumping into all of the threads with titles like "I'm 6'2" and 250 - will I fit?"
By the way, I spend a lot of time doing health/safety and regulatory compliance work at biotech and research labs. I'm the guy that tells you to put your safety glasses on, and don't pour that acetone down the sink, and I'd better not see any food wrappers in the trash near your lab bench.
The chrono pack really weirded me out when I first saw it, but I think it looks great with a dark interior and a dark green or blue car. How long is your wait?I trust that you will be jumping into all of the threads with titles like "I'm 6'2" and 250 - will I fit?"
By the way, I spend a lot of time doing health/safety and regulatory compliance work at biotech and research labs. I'm the guy that tells you to put your safety glasses on, and don't pour that acetone down the sink, and I'd better not see any food wrappers in the trash near your lab bench.
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#8
09-13-2005, 09:01 PM
thanks for warm welcoming.
I'm glad that it turns out I'm buying an '06, because I really like how the silver top looks. Now I hope that the stripe looks as nice in person as it does on the (very occluded) pics on miniusa.com. I haven't seen any other pictures of it anywhere yet.
From the pictures on miniusa.com, it was a complete toss-up between BRG, RG, and SB. Online, the RG looks slightly brown to me (which I like) and the SB has some green, pushing almost to a teal. But apparently, my monitor is not calibrated quite the same as the graphic designers' at Mini. From the samples I saw in-store, I'd say the RG is more a deep charcoal, just a fraction of a shade lighter than anthracite, and the SB is a midnight metallic blue. They're both great colors, but I would like to have seen the RG slightly lighter, and maybe with a little bit of a color shade to it, and the SB really could use a hint of green for a little more sophistication. So I went with my old standby. My buddy told me that after the nova, he can't imagine not having a green car.
The order process has been kind of painful. I first talked to Crevier, and walked out nearly in tears from laughing so hard at their quote of $5995 over stick for any MCS. Then I went to carsdirect.com, and they put me back into touch with Crappier (oops. slip. or WAS it?) and I received an offer of $1500 over. Around the same time, I found this site and I knew that I could find cars priced at MSRP, so I told the rep I was in touch with that I found a list of socal markups (didn't tell him where, though) and he basically told me to take a hike. If he had been willing to come down, I would have bought there. That is the lot where I first saw the new Mini (except for the importer on harbor by OCC that always has lamborghinis and aston martins and stuff like that -- they had a mini 6 months before any BMW lots opened Mini dealerships). So I visited Long Beach and South Bay. On my first visit to Long Beach, I didn't get any service, so I started an order from South Bay, and they started playing games with me after taking a $1000 deposit. Since they didn't order the car when they accepted a deposit, as well making several other incompetant moves, I am in the process of getting the money back. I've spoken with the sales manager and general manager, and they've both been very understanding and have told me they expect to have my money back soon but I have a written statement from them saying I would be charged back today, and so far that hasn't happened. If it doesn't show tommorrow, I'll make one more call to them in an attempt to rectify the situation, and then if I still don't see result, I'll start legal proceedings. So anyway, the short answer is that I ordered from long beach. It took like 5 minutes, in and out, and to top it all off, the sales rep was quite attractive. :D But they said I'd be put on a list and probably won't get a producion number for 6 weeks, and that the build will take another 10 weeks.. c'est la vie. I've waited almost 4 years. I can wait another 4 months.
So then in my first post above, I forgot to mention I intened to get some aftermarket rim, too. I'm looking for a set of wheels that looks really nice but is also light (<16lbs). So far, I think I'm leaning most heavily toward something like SSR Competitions but I have a long list of suitable alternatives and will weight price heavily into consideration.
Now the Nova. Don't hate on the Nova. They had the potential to be great cars. They had all the engine and drivetrain options of the Camaro, with almost exactly the same frame and a much simpler set of front-end body parts. So it amounts to being the same car with less hassle invovled in working on it. Mine has a 350 bored .05 over, a Muncie wide ration 4 on the floor putting power to the rears through a 2.73:1 diff shod with 16" steel and chrome Corvette rally wheels. And the interior is all redone for the big'n'tall. I've got buckets from a mid-80's honda mounted 3" off the floor and about 14" behind the stock mounting holes. Making the brackets for that was my favorite part of the rebuild. I started with 1"X1/8" steel rod, a hammer, and an anvil and ended up with some nice W shaped brackets that mounted to the bottom and side of the floor pan with a horizontal plane to hold the seat rail. The body work was fun, too. The whole project was pretty cool. The only things that weren't done by my brother or me under his guidance were boring the engine block and shortening the drive shaft. Everything else was in our parents' back yard and garage while I was in high school, so that I could learn about cars and have one that was fun and comfortable. Here's the final result:
For those that are wondering, I am in Westminster, in the far north end where the line kind of blurs between Garden Grove, Westminster, Seal Beach, and Huntington Beach.
You can bet I'll attest to the amazing amount of front seat space in the Mini. One of buddies told me "You can't buy a Mini. You're the least 'mini' person I know." Maybe in stature but certainly not in style.
And I'm the guy who likes to seal dry ice in small containers and set them near coworkers (seriously, we're all insane in my lab. 80-90 % of our time in the R&D side is in materials conformance testing, most of which is quite tedious. I actually ENJOY the production side of my job, even though the warehouse is usually noisy and hot. The heavy physical labor is oddly relaxing.)
I'm glad that it turns out I'm buying an '06, because I really like how the silver top looks. Now I hope that the stripe looks as nice in person as it does on the (very occluded) pics on miniusa.com. I haven't seen any other pictures of it anywhere yet.
From the pictures on miniusa.com, it was a complete toss-up between BRG, RG, and SB. Online, the RG looks slightly brown to me (which I like) and the SB has some green, pushing almost to a teal. But apparently, my monitor is not calibrated quite the same as the graphic designers' at Mini. From the samples I saw in-store, I'd say the RG is more a deep charcoal, just a fraction of a shade lighter than anthracite, and the SB is a midnight metallic blue. They're both great colors, but I would like to have seen the RG slightly lighter, and maybe with a little bit of a color shade to it, and the SB really could use a hint of green for a little more sophistication. So I went with my old standby. My buddy told me that after the nova, he can't imagine not having a green car.
The order process has been kind of painful. I first talked to Crevier, and walked out nearly in tears from laughing so hard at their quote of $5995 over stick for any MCS. Then I went to carsdirect.com, and they put me back into touch with Crappier (oops. slip. or WAS it?) and I received an offer of $1500 over. Around the same time, I found this site and I knew that I could find cars priced at MSRP, so I told the rep I was in touch with that I found a list of socal markups (didn't tell him where, though) and he basically told me to take a hike. If he had been willing to come down, I would have bought there. That is the lot where I first saw the new Mini (except for the importer on harbor by OCC that always has lamborghinis and aston martins and stuff like that -- they had a mini 6 months before any BMW lots opened Mini dealerships). So I visited Long Beach and South Bay. On my first visit to Long Beach, I didn't get any service, so I started an order from South Bay, and they started playing games with me after taking a $1000 deposit. Since they didn't order the car when they accepted a deposit, as well making several other incompetant moves, I am in the process of getting the money back. I've spoken with the sales manager and general manager, and they've both been very understanding and have told me they expect to have my money back soon but I have a written statement from them saying I would be charged back today, and so far that hasn't happened. If it doesn't show tommorrow, I'll make one more call to them in an attempt to rectify the situation, and then if I still don't see result, I'll start legal proceedings. So anyway, the short answer is that I ordered from long beach. It took like 5 minutes, in and out, and to top it all off, the sales rep was quite attractive. :D But they said I'd be put on a list and probably won't get a producion number for 6 weeks, and that the build will take another 10 weeks.. c'est la vie. I've waited almost 4 years. I can wait another 4 months.
So then in my first post above, I forgot to mention I intened to get some aftermarket rim, too. I'm looking for a set of wheels that looks really nice but is also light (<16lbs). So far, I think I'm leaning most heavily toward something like SSR Competitions but I have a long list of suitable alternatives and will weight price heavily into consideration.
Now the Nova. Don't hate on the Nova. They had the potential to be great cars. They had all the engine and drivetrain options of the Camaro, with almost exactly the same frame and a much simpler set of front-end body parts. So it amounts to being the same car with less hassle invovled in working on it. Mine has a 350 bored .05 over, a Muncie wide ration 4 on the floor putting power to the rears through a 2.73:1 diff shod with 16" steel and chrome Corvette rally wheels. And the interior is all redone for the big'n'tall. I've got buckets from a mid-80's honda mounted 3" off the floor and about 14" behind the stock mounting holes. Making the brackets for that was my favorite part of the rebuild. I started with 1"X1/8" steel rod, a hammer, and an anvil and ended up with some nice W shaped brackets that mounted to the bottom and side of the floor pan with a horizontal plane to hold the seat rail. The body work was fun, too. The whole project was pretty cool. The only things that weren't done by my brother or me under his guidance were boring the engine block and shortening the drive shaft. Everything else was in our parents' back yard and garage while I was in high school, so that I could learn about cars and have one that was fun and comfortable. Here's the final result:
For those that are wondering, I am in Westminster, in the far north end where the line kind of blurs between Garden Grove, Westminster, Seal Beach, and Huntington Beach.
You can bet I'll attest to the amazing amount of front seat space in the Mini. One of buddies told me "You can't buy a Mini. You're the least 'mini' person I know." Maybe in stature but certainly not in style.
And I'm the guy who likes to seal dry ice in small containers and set them near coworkers (seriously, we're all insane in my lab. 80-90 % of our time in the R&D side is in materials conformance testing, most of which is quite tedious. I actually ENJOY the production side of my job, even though the warehouse is usually noisy and hot. The heavy physical labor is oddly relaxing.)
#9
09-13-2005, 09:11 PM
Originally Posted by effusant
Now the Nova. Don't hate on the Nova. They had the potential to be great cars. They had all the engine and drivetrain options of the Camaro, with almost exactly the same frame and a much simpler set of front-end body parts. So it amounts to being the same car with less hassle invovled in working on it. Mine has a 350 bored .05 over, a Muncie wide ration 4 on the floor putting power to the rears through a 2.73:1 diff shod with 16" steel and chrome Corvette rally wheels. And the interior is all redone for the big'n'tall. I've got buckets from a mid-80's honda mounted 3" off the floor and about 14" behind the stock mounting holes. Making the brackets for that was my favorite part of the rebuild. I started with 1"X1/8" steel rod, a hammer, and an anvil and ended up with some nice W shaped brackets that mounted to the bottom and side of the floor pan with a horizontal plane to hold the seat rail. The body work was fun, too. The whole project was pretty cool. The only things that weren't done by my brother or me under his guidance were boring the engine block and shortening the drive shaft. Everything else was in our parents' back yard and garage while I was in high school, so that I could learn about cars and have one that was fun and comfortable. Here's the final result:
I know all the stats...still hate 'em! I can see that you are going to be a whole lot of fun on the site! Cool!
BTW, I have purchased two MINIs from Long Beach MINI and love their sales team. Best experiences I've ever had with a dealership.
See you around, effusant!
Clover
#11
09-13-2005, 09:43 PM
I'll have to offer a ride when I get it back on the road. If a couple of first gear 0-60 runs or a few spirited corners in the beast can't change that option, nothing will.
That car was a major factor in the blue tarp protests that resulted in the sound wall being built between Vally View and Goldenwest on the 22. At least, I'm pretty sure that they got tired of me buzzing by late-night on the weekends. They all went up after I got a little frisky with a mid-80's camaro one night about 4 or 5 years ago. So Novas are good, for something, right?
That car was a major factor in the blue tarp protests that resulted in the sound wall being built between Vally View and Goldenwest on the 22. At least, I'm pretty sure that they got tired of me buzzing by late-night on the weekends. They all went up after I got a little frisky with a mid-80's camaro one night about 4 or 5 years ago. So Novas are good, for something, right?
#12
09-13-2005, 09:52 PM
Originally Posted by chrisnl
Come now, Clo, you can admit it - that there's a purty car! 
Originally Posted by effusant
I'll have to offer a ride when I get it back on the road. If a couple of first gear 0-60 runs or a few spirited corners in the beast can't change that option, nothing will.
Just kidding, effusant!! Your Nova looks awesome.....ours was barf-gold, with a super-rust patina! Clover
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