R56 Pre-LCI to LCI Interior Swap/Conversion
 

Hey everyone,

I don't have any pictures of the swap in-progress, but I can confirm that this does indeed work - with some serious fiddling. You'll need to buy the following 3 parts, but I recommend also switching out your tach/speedo for the black one at the same time for convenience:

• 51169206836 11-15 MINI COOPER CENTER CONSOLE COVER DASH TRIM R5X (https://www.allmagautoparts.com/coll...sh-trim-r5x-83)
• The black cd player/radio (no part number, none on Allmag right now) - BUY THIS TESTED FROM ALLMAG OR ANOTHER SUPPLIER WITH A WARRANTY - I had one with a bad screen and had to redo installation, but at least I hadn't put my panels back on yet.
• For Manual A/C: 2011-2015 MINI COOPER A/C TEMPERATURE CONTROL PANEL 43 64113456811 (https://www.allmagautoparts.com/prod...43-64113456811)
• For Auto A/C: 64113457397 64113456237 11-15 MINI COOPER AUTO A/C CONTROL SWITCH PANEL R5X 140 (https://www.allmagautoparts.com/prod...-panel-r5x-140)

The swap is as easy as take apart the dash, unplug and plug-in EXCEPT FOR THE A/C CONTROLS & SWITCH PANEL. This is not for the faint of heart. You're going to have to swap the circuit board, screen, and backing from your old controls to your new ones because the internal components are different. You can use everything else from the new unit. You'll need to cut the middle of the new unit's rubber backing for the screen to fit, just make sure you don't cut where it pushes down onto the circuit board or else your buttons won't work. I probably took the circuit board out close to 10 times before I got this right, but I had zero guidance whatsoever. There are little white plastic pieces that are going to fall out...DO NOT LOSE THEM- your A/C and front/rear defroster will not work if you don't have them sitting inside the back of the button.

If I had one piece of advice, TEST, TEST, TEST, and don't break your battery terminal T-bolt...Happy to help anyone who is considering doing this swap - just post here! I'll keep this forum alive because I know that more and more people will start doing this as time goes on and more of the LCI interior parts become available. To all those that try this, good luck!

-Alex

EDIT: AUX is not working. Will troubleshoot...eventually. I want to figure out how it works first - not sure what exactly my Aux cable goes to back there, and I really don't want to start messing with the wiring.

Why do this swap?

No money for a new car any time soon, and I like the look of the black interior.

What is LCI? Maybe I am just ignorant lol

So I did this a little while back and had some interesting results. Everything worked except I'd lost front/rear fogs as the donor car/ihks panel did not have them. I went to program them back in after transferring the toggles over and found that communication was closed due to a gateway issue. The stereo/radio unit still thought it was in the donor car, and therefore wouldn't communicate with the other modules. I'm sure this would be different were you to buy new units and code them accordingly, but just thought I'd share this for anyone that plans to do this with used parts. I ended up compromising by keeping the lci ihks panel, switching gauge faces to lci jcw faces, and using my original pre-lci stereo/radio module.

OK, cool. Its just that in all of your write-up, I didn't see the reason why this swap was done. Thought maybe you were having some issues.

Whatever floats your boat and makes the experience of owning your MINI even better. Trust me, I've done all kinds of things to mine for no other reason that I could, and I wanted to. And I could even afford a new one but I much prefer the R56 anyway.

LCI is the updated R56. You have to check VIN's, but generally speaking 2007-2010 is pre-LCI and 2011-2013 is LCI.

Interesting, I did not have this issue. I don't have rear fogs, and it's going to cost me $$$ for wiring and coding. It's pretty much the only upgrade that I'm going to straight pass on. It does annoy me that I don't have that 4th switch though...

Good point - I should have added the reason in. I'll probably update it later. I like your style! This is my first and last MINI...I much prefer the R56 as well.

I forgot to mention that I did mine with used parts from multiple donor vehicles too...

And you've successfully coded the vehicle since the retrofit? Just curious. If you haven't, would be interested to see if you have the same results when trying to get in to code the ihks/ihka panel.

Found this post and thought I'd add up some info for the readers. I originally did this and sent the photos to Dustin at Allmag. I'd be willing to bet that Alex got to see the photos I sent. When I bought my climate control I bought one that had all 5 buttons due to the fact that it's how my own car was configured, with the fog lights in the back of the JCW aero bumper.

The new climate control has pins on the back of the circuit board and the plug sleeves are mounted on the back of the climate control "carrier". I used my old backing because the pins and plug sleeves are mounted directly to the board in the old models. I basically just used the front of the LCI black climate control and all the other components are my original ones. The radio itself works fine but I lost my iPod plug function, USB direct to stereo function, the aux input and microphone for the Bluetooth phone connect. I never used the voice function in my car so that didn't matter to me and almost never used my phone in the car so that doesn't matter either. I carried CD's in the car for years and have a nice collection of music so I really don't mind that I have less function. I'm doing a new stereo install with a nice Helix DSP unit. The "Director" has USB input and the DSP has Bluetooth connect so I won't be missing too much once it's all said and done.

I've ordered my car and picked it up in December of 09. It's a 2010 car. I've been looking at the silver controls for a long time and really like the look of the LCI cars. I wanted the change desperately but didn't have any interest in selling my car. There was only one way to do the climate control and that was to just swap out the guts and just use the outside black box control unit "carrier". I bought the exact match to the one I had in my car so it was just an easy swap. All the buttons work their normal function. Alex was good in saying that I did cut out the old LCD screen from the chrome ring. I gently pulled apart my old one to get the display out but was concerned about the new chrome ring so I just cut out the old display to save the tabs from breaking. If you want all 5 buttons just keep looking until you find the right unit and you won't need coding for the fogs in back.

Here's the photos.
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.nor...267f3b4ad0.jpg
Here's what it looked like before I started the process. Not stock but still have the silver controls and radio.
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.nor...e5cbbaa1f9.jpg
This is the 2011+ post LCI climate control board. You can see the pins on either side of the large board at the bottom and ribbon cable that comes from the display at the top.
https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.nor...8fd6383d11.jpg
Both displays, my old one is already in the new carrier chrome ring ready to be put back in. Wires and plugs from the old, ribbon cable from the new.
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.nor...dc416734f5.jpg
Old board and display with a new facelift.
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.nor...1133846110.jpg
You can see the old white plug sleeve on the left there and this is my old backing. The new backing had the plug sleeves attached to it directly to fit over the pins on the board.
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.nor...120bd994b6.jpg
Finished with those mods and here's the outcome. Everything works. I bought black faces from Outmotoring for my tach and speedometer some time ago and can thank Alpha Motoring for selling me the GP2 Dash. My 2010 now has a 2011 LCI facelift with some really nice extras. Even with a little less function on the CD player, the radio works great as does the CD player so I can listen to music just like I always did just not from my iPod at the moment.

I wish I'd seen the pictures! That would have made things easier :) I sourced parts from Dustin as well!

2 questions regarding this swap.

1. Are steering wheel volume controls still working?

2. I have manual climate control, is there a module there is easily swappable so I can swap to the auto climate control when doing this retrofit?

Thank you.

Hi Kenneth,
1. Yes, the steering wheel controls are working just fine as intended.
2. "My understanding" is that you can swap the manual control out for the same one in black without issue. If you want the upgrade you might need to get an old one coded to your car then do the swap. I'm pretty sure there isn't an "easily" swapped module due to both hardware and software upgrades... other than the manual one..that might be the way to go...

Be sure to post before and after pics and state any issues if you run into anything...

Good luck!! :)

Thanks for that!

If I understand correctly, the difference between auto and manual climate controls is only in the control panel and coding? If there is no additional climate control body module I should be able to get a local shop to do the coding (or do it myself if it can be done via NCS expert)

I'm grabbing both preLCI and LCI sets off a wrecker so I can do the swap without destroying my climate controls in case I fail. Apart from the climate control screen, I'm hoping everything else will be relatively smooth!

That would be the whole unit pretty much and then the coding too. No idea if you can get it done with NCS. I've never tried coding my car... Best of luck with it!!


Looking forward to seeing the change and hearing what you had to do to make it work..

Oddly enough it seems to be plug and play for this guy without the screen swapping.

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

I was never interested in the NAV unit. I more preferred the large speedo. Although it was good to read about the Mic placement. I'll have to look into that a bit more. I've almost got the aux cable figured out and the only thing not working then would be the Mic for using Bluetooth with my phone...

So wait, to do this swap you don’t have to swap the actual huge central speedometer unit to an LCI one?

You do not, but the speedo's fascia may have to be changed if your old display is the single lined one.

I think mine is the same, but maybe the buttons at least need to be changed? or did i totally waste money :D

Forgot to update this when I did the swap originally: My aux just worked with no extra fiddling.

Ahh gotcha thanks. Just rechecked and indeed the speedo I bought includes the radio (hence why I thought the buttons made up part of it). So - cool. At least I got something useful for my purchase. Planning on doing this when I get all the pieces together, so thank you for putting up all the info!!