Ryephile. You have the trump card if you decide to use it. The fact is these cars are like sex and you being a guy are not going to turn away....they are able to treat you quite badly because of this. You have a right IMHO to know why there was a delay and honestly if it was a data entry error they should tell you and compensate you for the wait. You have spent a ton of money on their product they should treat you like royalty and you should not let "what is normal in the industry" happen to you. You are clearly a smart guy and should be treated better!
Hey maybe well can get a deal on 2 electric cars!

 

No, I don't have a "right" to know, I can only try to use it as a negotiation tactic aimed at the incompetence of the factory management. In the end the car still passed factory QA to exit the doors at final and has the same Warranty, it just comes down to the warm fuzzies willing to be given by the OEM for acknowledging an error in their fairly transparent process.

I know the realities of the manufacturing process and dealership situation and have bought so many new cars that I'm not emotionally blinded by any excitement or enthusiasm. Unfortunately it makes buying a car a fairly nap-inducing process compared to years ago. I'm not contractually obligated to buy the car if I don't want to. I'll weigh that option when I do the inspection. I have no intention of trying to screw the dealership, they're not at fault here. I'm hoping and expecting them to help turn the screws on MINI to morally make the transaction "right". It can be a very simple resolution if MINI wants it to be. It's really up to them.


I do like the idea of teaming up for some electric goodness though.

 

MINI obviously lit a fire under someone's chair, because my JCW is already on a boat. Received by WW today, loaded on the Honor. Scheduled to depart tomorrow and arrive in Baltimore on 26July.

They must've driven it directly from the Gift Shop straight on the boat, LOL.

 

Got it! Coming from my 2004 JCW, it is so different. Lousy traffic on the way home, so not much room to crank it up, but it is a torquey SOB. Shifts nice. Need some more time to get totally comfortable with the clutch, but that will come. Sport suspension is good. Can feel the expansion joints, but better than the old R53. Lot's of tech inside to get programmed and set up for me. That's it for now. Time to go for a drive!

 

Congrats Jon on having the first JCW 6MT in Michigan! Good to hear that it's so-far so-good.

I imagine the traffic was terrible, going from Southfield to Canton in rush hour is awful, yuk!

That Rebel Green is super dark, isn't it?! You can just barely see the hue against the black wheels and trim. Check back in a bit so we can live vicariously through you.

 

Congrats MoBoost/Jon, the car looks brilliant. Enjoy each shift and beyond.

Indeed it looks dark, judging from google image search it depends on the amount of light available..

Two colours for the price of one?!

 

100 lbs is no joke - I'm the same way about not wanting cars with a roof. Aside from extra weight, there's the potential for rattles and leaks down the line. I like simplicity.

'Tis why my GP is perfect. No back seat, no sunroof, no complicated electronic tomfoolery.

Just me, the car, and the engine. It's wonderful.

That being said... the panoramic roof is awesome when it's open.

 

That's what the Wallenius Wilhelmsen Track and Trace website says today for my VIN. The car must be so jacked that not even the shipping company wants it. I can't help but laugh and how screwed up this has gotten.

 

That is a complete drag.

 

2016 JCW - Thunder Gray - Only have production number and that's take a month to get so far ..

 

One of the reasons I won't be ordering into after the first of the year. Always glitches in the beginning of a model run. Does make one wonder with so many problems with the JCW cars. I've never had one iota of problems with my two ordered MINIS. Both JCW cars too.

 

One reason I've bought both mine of the lot. Here's what I'm looking for, call me when you get ahold of one like it or close to it. Works for me.


That Rebel Green is a cool color. Must be why they can get $1000 for it lol.

 

Rebel Green is incredible - looks black in most lights until it's bathed in sunlight - then it's a stunning shade of British racing green.

 

I was finally able to pull up my VIN in the decoder and lo and behold my production date is 16.07.2015 which is my birthday. How cool is that? I am already lovin this car!!

 

I might be mistaken on the meaning of "returned to shipper". Based on some extensive searching and Google-fu, it might be understood as "the ship was overbooked and this one didn't make it on and it'll be rebooked for another ship". Looking at the Booking number, 215 of the 260 MINI's listed were "returned to shipper", which seems like a fairly big booking mishap, but I also have no idea how they organize their booking schedules.

We'll see if my car is rebooked for another boat in a timely manner. If so, then there'll "only" be the 4 week mystery delay my car spent at the factory.

 

The same thing happened to me - booked then "returned to shipper."
K Line has a ship leaving today or tomorrow I believe but K-line provides NO booking information.

Update:My JCW has been loaded on WW's Tysla this morning,7/19. Arrives Baltimore 7/28.

 

Looks like our JCW's are on the same boat. That means 2 of the 4 JCW's on that boat are accounted for.

 

So I got an answer from MINIUSA via my dealership. They showed me the email thread on their monitor with all the names and titles. With the amount and level of people involved, I find it very improbable that it's a hoax.

It appears that the reason my Oxford plant tour was cancelled is the same reason my car was stuck in limbo; a distribution labor strike that was around the same time as the London Underground labor strike. Apparently I raised such a stink about my car that the dealership overlooked that several other MINI's they had on-order were also being delayed, so it became just as important for them to understand what was going on. The labor strike resulted in a bunch (at least hundreds) of MINI's left at both the plant distribution yard and at the port. Mine just so happened to be caught up in it. MINIUSA is adamant that none of the cars caught up in this have any flaws, but understandably my dealership will put the JCW up on a lift and let me closely inspect it top-to-bottom.

I can't account for why some people have gotten MINIs through to the USA though. I can speculate that some scabs came in and did some work but left many cars behind, but that's just a guess.

 

Ryephile - Satisfying!
Totally sounds like the truth. Sit back and have a drink the wait will be shorter than you think.

 

Interesting information and good to know. Explains why I had to wait so long for my July build slot car to get out of the dreaded "scheduled for production with no confirmed date". Isn't that status kind of a contradiction, saying it is scheduled but not having a specific time when they are going to do it?

Anyway, at long last my car is finally in production. Hoping I may still get it before September, but not holding my breath. All I know is with all of the BS with the dealership and MiniUSA (which has continued by the way but I was too angry to write about it without the post getting me kicked off this site) they better have some kind of incentive for me to even accept the car.

GregoryK, I have to admit that my issues seem piddling when compared to yours and I hope all parties make things right in your situation and do so in a timely fashion. Best of luck and hopefully we will all be motoring in our new JCW's soon.

 

Glad to hear that there is light at the end of the tunnel for you guys. Labor strikes can really mess up slot of things. Glad I won't even be ordering until January. Hopefully all these problems will be over.

 

Rye, is yours a 2016?

 

Nope it's one of the last 2015's built. It's one of those super duper rare 2015 JCW 6MT's. Funny part is the boat it's sharing MINI's with are mostly 2016's.

 

[QUOTE=MoBoost;Lot's of tech inside to get programmed and set up for me. That's it for now. Time to go for a drive![/QUOTE]

You know, seeing your all black JCW, I wonder why more MINI customers don't order black on black, red on red, or thunder grey on thunder grey. I think that if one is spending $1k for an optional paint, why not get the whole car in that color, as in Lapisluxury Blue or Rebel Green. One can do some wrapping on the roof, put some stripes on the bonnet and boot for accents, do some wheel work. I'm leaning towards doing just that.

I've always been a blue guy, my 38 Ford Hotrod is Kona Blue from Lincoln. That's also why I've thought about going another color, as the Lapisluxury Blue is very close to my hemi hotrod.
Beings as it is a British car, the Rebel Green, which looks very BRG to me, is a standard for Brit cars in the past, from Jaguar, to MG.

 

Ran my VIN through the decoder yesterday and was looking it over. When I put my order in, the Configurator had not changed yet and I had the rear foglights specced. The VIN decoder shows those even though I will have a 2016 vehicle. Last time I checked they were still in the Configurator too even though they said they would not be available. Will be interesting to see what happens.