My F56 JCW was ordered from MINI of Clear Lake on 12/19/15, built 2/4/16, and is now awaiting transport. My MA told me at the time of my order that the VDC in Galveston was going to be operational toward the middle to end of January. In the beginning only customer ordered cars will be coming through there. It's a longer boat ride to Galveston than Brunswick, but it will spend less time on the ground transport.

Mike B.

 

Excited , looks like most are taken 8 weeks. As long at the VDC and the ports are not backed up or any strikes going on. Port H. was backed up a while back last year for strikes.

Brandon -

" Sport seat with Leather Dinamica Red " great option.

 

Thanks for the info.

 

Same thing I noticed, ordered my first MINI in 2005 and my third is now waiting for a boat..MINI could do a lot more with the owners lounge website which has not changed one bit in years.

I also miss the days when you would get random gifts from MINI soon after delivery of your vehicle....

 

Well, that's moving quickly.

Ordered: 2/5
Scheduled for production: 2/8
In production: 2/9
Estimated completion date: 2/17

 

Yes, was an 2005 owner and was lucky to see it built in a video, lucky 500 test subject, nothing ever came from it.

Good old days...

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...-purchase.html



Good info here : https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...pdated-32.html

 

How did the back seat hold up? Was it an F56? I've wondered how a current Mini would hold up in a rear end collision.

 

Somewhat hard to tell, as the seats were down to fit luggage.

But I do know that the repair shop, while trying to estimate what ended up being a total, put the seats back up. I cannot confirm whether or not they properly locked back in place, but nothing looked out of place. The interior really seemed to hold up without any issue. The driver/passenger door seemed undamaged. The back hatch, even though dented in, worked.

I was impressed with the way the cabin held up.

 

You have pics ?

 

Rear damage is a bit hard to see. I thought about taking pictures of the damage. I did not think about taking pictures of the lack of damage (from the side)...

 

[QUOTE=chrisfowler99;4174945]Rear damage is a bit hard to see. I thought about taking pictures of the damage. I did not think about taking pictures of the lack of damage (from the side)...

Its but a flesh wound... at least from the back. I guess its easy to total a car these days. Did the airbags even go off?

 

The airbags did not go off. Apparently because when hit from behind we were lifted up and it drove the bumper under the SUV that I ended up hitting. The front bumper is pretty much undamaged, and that's where the airbag sensors are. The hit was certainly hard enough to set off the airbags if the bumper had taken the impact. In the end, though, we were thankful they didn't go off, as we didn't hit the steering wheel or dash...

Above the bumper the hood/radiator was driven back into the engine, doing a decent bit of damage there.

I do not know if there was any frame damage. Repair estimate came out to be a bit over $16k. Probably would have gone higher if they continued digging in, but that was enough to total it.

 

Yikes, front and rear

 

Yeah...traffic stopped in front of me.

I stopped.

Nissan Altima behind me failed top stop with rather spectacular results.

 

In the paint shop: 2/17
Estimated completion date: 2/17

Moving along. About time to start checking which ships are heading to Galveston in the near future...

 

I was excited as well when my order when into production practically 48 hours after the order was entered, and it was done on time 8 days after that. Alas, since then its been sitting for 7 days waiting for transport to Southampton and now for a ship. If it doesn't get on the ship today it will sit there waiting for almost another 2 weeks! Not impressed so far with the distribution logistics (unless it gets on the ship today).

Update: It didn't make it onto the ship. Next one isn't for another 2 weeks. Very few ships go to Savannah. Bummer.

 

Mine has been awaiting transport to Galveston since 2/6. It did not make it onto the Independence II when it came through there last week. There are three vessels scheduled to come through Southampton toward the end of this week that are going to Galveston -- Bishu Highway (K-Line), Tosca, and Integrity (both W&W). Hopefully I will make it onto one of those.

Mike B.

 

I ordered mine on the 19/12/15 changed the color on the 27/12. It was build first week of Feb and loaded onto the TIRRANNA bound for Melbourne, Australia on the 12/2 ETA to Melbourne port is 16/3

I could not be more anxious to get this car!

 

Well it looks like I missed all three vessels this weekend that were headed to Galveston. That's 5 total (that I know of) since it's been at the port waiting. Starting to become unacceptable to me.

Mike B.

 

Bummer. I have to wonder what sort of mess there is at the port. I don't understand why they don't book a car on a ship as soon as they practically start making the car. That way that have passage booked on some ship. Dates can shift but at least there's obviously planning. Now it seems completely random, like some ship shows up and they decide at the last minute what cars get on what ship. Makes no sense to me. How can you run a shipping business in such a haphazard way.

I was wrong earlier w my car. For some reason I started thinking its port of entry was Savannah, but its really Brunswick GA. There are more ships heading that way, not 2 weeks apart. There's a ship there now (Integrity), but its late in the day and the car is still not booked on anything. There's another ship showing up on Monday (Tiger) thats faster. It only shows up at Brunswick one day later despite leaving two days later.

If the car doesn't make either one of these ships I will not be happy.

The Integrity is still at Southampton. What makes you say your car won't get on it today? I'm holding out hope that mine could, no matter how unlikely.

 

Ok. the Integrity is now leaving Southampton and our car is NOT on it. :(
Not pleased. Next chance is Monday.

 

Yep. I see that the tugs have it right now. My next chance is on the Resolve next week unless there is a K-Line ship that comes sooner that I don't know about. Oh well. Still not very happy. Three weeks to catch a ship is unacceptable.

Mike B.

 

Are you basing that just on the automated system or did you actually talk to someone.

The last time I ordered the automated system was still reporting that my car was at the port after 16 days. I finally talked to a person who told me it was on a ship that left 5 days earlier.

 

I spoke with someone at MINI customer assistance yesterday that told me I did not make it onto the Bishu Highway, a K-Line ship, and I was still at Southampton waiting for transport. For the W&W vessels we can use the track and trace link using our VIN numbers to see if we're booked, sent back to shipper, loaded, etc. I am coming up empty on that tracking site with all of those ships that showed were going to Galveston in the past week --- Independence II, Tosca, and Integrity. I'm beginning to think that coming into the port of Galveston is a detriment as cars that were built the same time as mine have already left the port. They went to Halifax, Baltimore, and Port Hueneme. Not all the ships that go to the east coast stops go to Galveston according to the schedule information that we can get online for the W&W line.
I agree that the MINI automated system is behind for tracking the progress of delivery. When we ordered my wife's MCS that system showed "awaiting transport" until it arrived at the VDC, never showed "en route". I had no clue that it was ever in transit. Hers was ordered 10/3/11 and we took delivery on 11/12/11. I believe it was delivered to Brunswick, GA. Mine has taken longer than that just to finish production, and now will have to wait at least three weeks (if I'm lucky) just to get on a boat. It's hard not to get upset as I have a substantial amount of the purchase price of this vehicle in a trade and now it's just sitting on a dock in England. (They have already sold my trade.) Oh well.

Mike B

 

The dealer had told us 6-8 weeks for our area. But we were amazed when 48 hours after ordering, our car went into production. 8 days later popped out. We thought we could get the car in 4 weeks! Record time. Now its been sitting at the port going on 2 weeks. Have seen so many ships come and go I'll be surprised when or if it ever gets on a ship. I haven't bought the car yet, only a smallish deposit. I've seriously started looking at competitive cars again. The longer this drags out the more likely we are to get something else on a lot.

Many of the ships going to Brunswick also go to Galveston so we're on a similar wait cycle.

We're really only 3 weeks into it, but add at least a few days for another ship, two weeks for the voyage once if ever gets on a ship, and a week transporting on land, through the VDC and dealership and we're looking at at least another 4 weeks, making it 7 weeks and counting. If they hadn't accelerated the order, we could have been looking at 9 weeks or so. All assuming we get on a ship someday.