The doors' second stopping point allows the doors to open about 6 inches too far.

Water pours in through the windows if the roof is wet and I open them.

The backseats take up precious cargo space.

People call it cute on a daily basis.

 

Agreed. And when they do their headlights are right in your back window. I had the darkest tint put on the back window just for this reason.

And why is it mostly women in SUVs who do this to me?

 

If I answer your question with my honest opinion, my post would would likely get reported. I'm not sexist or anything but as you said "mostly women in SUVs do this to me."

 

Sorry. I should have just kept it to myself. LOL

 

I've already gotten a warning for stating my opinion on here I'm just trying not to get banned

 

Hm, how did you do this? I tried using Search as well. Even the Chevy Impala that I'm renting from Enterprise has this feature from the factory!

 

There are relatively easy solutions to this one, at least. Remove the seats--there are at least one or two places that sell cargo platforms to replace them. And we have one member here who build his (her?) own.

 

god i hate this. my gf did this and just watched all the water pour into the seats. im like CLOSE THE DOOR!

 

Re 1277 & earlier: Try driving a Miata (which is actually 10" longer).

 

The only thing I don't like so far is the lack of a rear interior light when I open the clubman rear doors.

 

After 2 years with my MINI, I've found the only thing about it that still annoys me is the lack of gauges to monitor things like coolant temp. Ah well, guess I'll just have to add those myself.

 

Easily number 1: my crappy vinyl seats

 

Jeez, I didn't know I had any problems with my car until I read this post. ;-)

 

My Clubman has a rear interior light. But it is near floor level on the left side, and easily blocked by anything that is stored in that area. Especially if you are just opening the right door.

 

I love my crappy vinyl seats

 

I hate my T50 disk screws

 

I hate that people call my car "cute"

 

I HATE the giant blind spots on my cabrio. I "hate" that the seat belts rest in such a narrow space between the seats and the door. DH husband has to open the door to put his seat belt on.

 

I have found an issue that should easily be improved - tire noise. The MINI on some pavements is prone to a lot of tire noise. I would guess a little insulation in the right spots would cut this down to a more reasonable. The more porous the road surface the greater the tire noise.

The best option I have so far is to turn up the radio :-)

 

Loud seat belt chime

 

my check engine light, it's on more than it is off lol

 

- Mirror **** on the driver door. Adjusting it with my left hand is very awkward. Also lots of fun to hear passengers ask what I'm doing with my left hand...

- Armrest is useless. Can't store anything decent in it, I don't use the phone thing that's built inside. Have to keep lifting it up to use the rear cup holder, which can hold a gym water bottle. I shouldn't have gotten the armrest. But it was the ONLY option left that I didn't pick! Can't call the car 'fully loaded!' without it. Wait, I can put Kleenex in there for when I'm crying as I think about my monthly payment

- MINI Connected. I love the display screen. Worth it even though I don't use an iPhone. But why doesn't ALL the info show up there? The most important car info is still displayed on the cruddy little display behind the steering wheel. Talk about dysfunctional technology. I need to make a laminated cheat-sheet on how to decipher the garbage that's displayed on the teeny little screen behind the steering wheel, and hang it off the signal turn handle so I have easy reference to it.

- Trunk light. In the bottom left corner of the trunk, and always covered by something so it's totally dark in the trunk at night. Perfect reason for me to always have to carry a flashlight, I always meant to do that!

- Heavy, long doors. The doors are awesome, don't get me wrong. Nice heavy construction. But am I the only one who has to move the seat back so I can get out of the car without having to open the door really wide? It's kind of hilarious that a car considered 'mini' needs so much room to open the door. I have to calculate where and how I park because I don't want the door to go swinging out and destroying someone else's car door. The MINI's doors can do some serious damage with their heft. Doors that opened upward would not be a bad idea for the MINI.

- Small steering wheel. I need to get a steering wheel cover. The wheel is seriously a lot thinner than anything else I've driven. It's so dainty it begs me to extend my teacup-drinking pinky fingers as I go full throttle down the highway. Not a biggie, but the army tank doors do not match with the delicate size of the steering wheel in my opinion.

- Joysticks and too many buttons. On my old car's $100 stereo, I could not only change songs, but skip entire albums with a single button press. The MINI Connected, you have to wade through countless menus. There's not enough time to change music at a red light. I'm also to scared to fumble with the air conditioner buttons while driving as they are nestled down in the depths of the front cup holders, I have to sort of scrunch down to look at the tiny buttons. You have cool overhead switches, a semi-useless MINI Connected in the middle, then the really important stuff like door locks, fog lamps, air conditioner, all stuck way down where you can't get to it if you decide you want to put bottles in the cup holders. Should I drink water today, or do I want to use the car switches instead? Decisions....

- Car stereo. Did I really HAVE to take the CD player? I never ever touch the car stereo - I use a USB stick and MINI Connected to play the songs. Precious dashboard space, wasted on a useless car stereo. Should have been an option instead of a default purchase. Everytime I look at the CD player I think I bought an old car.

- Rough plastic trim around the roof. Do you use microfiber cloths when cleaning the car? I do, and they snag on that plastic trim. It has a rough, grippy texture that I've never seen on any other car. Use a cheap cloth and you'll have tiny little ***** of cotton/polyester flaking off of the cloth and sitting all over the MINI. Who thought of this amazing texture that's unique to the MINI design? Just so awesome I cannot even repeat the words that come out of my mouth when I quick detail my MINI every morning with my flourescent microfiber cloths.

- Water in the jambs. After some rain, I wipe off the MINI and when I open the doors, the hood, the trunk - there's water sitting in places I don't expect. Even after wiping things dry, I open the trunk and water is dripping off the raised door from I don't know where, onto the bumper. Close the trunk, re-open, and there's water STILL coming down from someplace in the trunk door. Nice!

I haven't owned my MINI for even a month yet, but I love it to death, despite these shortcomings. I actually catch myself smiling everytime other drivers start tailgating me as I'm cruising down the road, then I go blasting away in what seems like turbo speed, only to have more tailgaters line up behind me. I'm always being told the car is cute, that it looks so fast as I zip through traffic, and everyone is amazed it's not an S or JCW, but JustACooper. A day doesn't go by when someone asks to see inside the car and the second they open the door, yep... the door already impresses them. The MINI really is like an army tank.

Just gotta do something about that mirror adjustment ****. Makes me feel like I belong in the short yellow bus everytime I try to use it with my left hand, but I feel even more concerned when I have to reach over with my right hand to do it! 'Are you OK?' "Yeah... I'm just UH! F-fix... aahh... fixing the mirror, there! whew..."

 

Keal - glad you justified my decision to not get mini-connected.

Re the mirror controls, I think that's fairly common - one of our other cars (Subaru) has it on the door, another (old Miata) on the dash left of the wheel.
Fortunately, I've been able to find a happy position and just leave them there. Maybe convex overlays would help?

Agree on the switch position, doors, and gutters; might take some sandpaper to the latter.

 

1: The worst is the amount of water falling in, when you open (even a bit) of your window.
2: The amount of **** the rear window is collecting (all the rear actually)
3: the wipers does not go "on" when using windshield washer
4: crane my neck to see the traffic light

But over all, I love driving my R53

 

Hey,
Try this. It's a little plastic lens that sticks to the top inside of your windscreen. I got one, and I can see the light without bending my neck, and I'm weell over six feet tall...

http://www.lightinsight.com/