A friend of mine in central Wisconsin called last week to tell me about a MINI he saw "totaled" after it ran off the road avoiding a Deer.
This got me wondering what the attrition rate is on 2002 and 2003 MINI's and how many of the 23 or 24 thousand 02s have already bit the dust. Maybe, just maybe, someone out there is keeping count on the unfortunate few who s MINI's have met their end.
I read about a water flooded MINI in Philly, Pat C in Chicago had one totaled, and some unfortunate person must have lost one to the recent hurricanes in Florida. Any thoughts? Maybe we should start a running post to tally the dead, and or recoupe the good parts left, if no list is started yet.

Jeeves

 

Its odd that you posted this yesterday... I just got in an accident with my 2003 Cooper today. Not sure whether he'll be totaled or not yet. I'm still quite shaky and upset about it, but once I'm feeling somewhat better I'll probably be posting pics/story.

 

Oh no, vunderbrah!!! I'm so sorry, sweetie. Are you okay? Were you hurt at all? When you feel up to it, please tell us your tale of woe.


Clover

 

Well, I know of one MC40 that was written off.

 

After repairing a stone chip on my July build 2002 Cooper I'm happy to report one 2002 that still looks like new !

 

imavunderbrah,

How sad for you. I hope you did not sustain any injuries or aches that didn't show up till the next day.
Again, sorry to hear about your MINI. I still think there should be an on line talley of the lost MINIs. At some point, several years from now 02s and 03s may become somewhat scarce.

Jeeves

 

imavunderbrah sorry to hear about your 03.

On the other hand my 02 is running strong and has zero defects so far other than a couple rock chips in the windshield.

 

Thank you everyone for your concern and nice messages! :smile:

One of the most ironic parts - saturday afternoon, in prep for our MINI run of Michigan International Speedway on Sunday, I spent at least 5 hours washing, claying, rewashing, Zymol waxing, polishing arches, cleaning the interior, etc. etc. I was noticing some stone chips on his bonnet and had the touch up paint to fix them. I suppose I'll need a bigger bottle of touch up paint now. At least he was looking good and got one final hurrah (115mph on MIS) before the end... no, I didn't wreck on the speedway.

Once I get the pics off my camera I'll start a thread to stop hijacking this one. But, go ahead and add one dead 2003 Cooper to that list of nonsurvivors.

-stefanie

 

FWIW, last week in my 02 MINI, I came around a corner at night in Malibu, saw a deer in the road, and jammed on my brakes in time to only nudge the deer a few feet. No damage to the MINI and the deer sprinted off into the darkness.

I can't think any reason the 02/03 MINI attrition rate would be an outlier and be abnormally higher or lower than that of other cars.

 

Oh no....what happened????

 

The few 02s and 03s we've mentioned in these few posts only equal 0.015% of the U.S. MINI's imported for those 2 years. That being said, this is just the ones a half dozen people have heard about. I'm not saying we MINIs have a higher or lower accident rates. I suppose you could make a case either way, track people/higher, versus collectors/lower, but I say we are about the same as everyone esle on the road for fender benders. We just don't have as big a base number on the road as say the Camry and mini van people do.
So every MINI counts as a higher % of the total.
Lets be careful out there!
Personally, I feel safe on the track than I do driving around town.

Jeeves

 

i was at the scene of vunderbrah's accident, but outta respect for her i won't say anything until she wants me to...

 

My '03 MCS survived this "nudge" with a deer in May of last year and got a great new paint scheme out of it!

 

posted (not so) short bit on michiganmini. I'll add to it later.

Whoa - thats quite the 'nudge' and impressive repair work. Good to see its back to normal, if not better :smile: