What are the thoughts here on the Mini standard A/C vs the Auto A/C. My wife has the Auto in her Toyota and I had the standard on my Silverado. I am more old school and prefer the plain old A/C -- I have tried searching this question here and have found little - so, what opinions do YOU have, that have been running the A/C this last summer...

Situation has risen where I may be re-ordering my Mini - and one thing I may change is the A/C.... Ordered the Auto but not real convince I will use it... Just today I was having to adj and adj the wifes - thats when the question came up ...

 

on mine i have a button that says auto but you can set the temp or you can switch it to manuel

 

i ordered the auto... i like how i can just set the temp and it adjusts the fan speed for me. Another thing is i think it looks ugly with the normal ac.

 

My '06 MC had the standard AC, but my '07 MCS is equipped with the Auto AC... I love it! I was skeptical at first, but have found that it does a great job of getting to the proper temp in a hurry, using whatever fan speed is necessary. If the car is boiling hot when I start it up, the fan blows on high until it catches up, then it throttles back gradually. It's been plenty hot/humid here in Texas, and I'm very happy with it!

 

I like the auto A/C. I change the setting depending on the ambient temperature, but that is it. I have always liked the set-n-forget approach to things that really do not contribute directly to driving the car.

 

I had auto AC in my BMW and loved it.

I had to take what The Man had for the mini,
which was manual. (I dont think it looks ugly)

You end up jockying with it fairly often, like going
from freeway to stop and crawl to country road.

I end up jockying with it quite a bit with the tribe
loaded in the car. But for all i know I would have
to do this with the automatic.

 

My first MINI was Manual, second Auto, And third Manual....I don't miss it. I just didn't see spending the extra $$ for something I can adjust myself. And it is not that often. Go with the Manual and spend the $$ on something else...And you don't have to worry about another electronic gadget breaking!!!

 

Off topic: But why might you be reordering? Your MINI's boat ride is almost over.

 

I have the auto and I love it. I only got it as part of the premium package but now I would do it again. I love just setting it to a temp and not having to cut the fan up and down and move the temp back and forth because it gets too cold and then to hot then too cold again etc.

 

Wasn't going to order auto, ended up getting an already built one with it, and like it. I have very few options, but it is nice.

 

I ordered the manual. I have auto in my two other cars. No biggie, and it saved $300.

 

I ordered the Auto because not only was it part of the package, but I think it looks cool and I'm a very gimmicky kinda person

 

I went with the manual when I ordered my MINI, because I'm not into all of the convenience items. I don't mind adjusting the temp, turning the wipers & lights off/on, putting the key fob into the ignition, etc.

 

I went with the auto, because, I'm basically lazy and don't want to mess with too many ***** while I'm driving. Saftey issue, of couse.

I've always liked it in all our vehicles. I really don't think it's worth any more money all it does is crank the fan on high when you hop in on a hot day and then slowly decrease fan speed to a more reasonable and maintaining speed later in your drive.

But, like I said, I'm lazy.

 

Yes, Auto for me also. I like how the readout blends in with the Nav screen "hi tech look"

 

Thanks for all the fast posts on this question. I was in the area of EB Mini last Sunday and made the mistake of stopping by - they had a PW with LL with cream color line. This was the combo I was really thinking about but could not see it in person - the configurator did not show it well - My MA was there and said "if thats what you want, we can re-order - it will push ownership back by about 4 weeks???" 4 weeks is no big deal - I am going to San Francisco today and will stop by agian to "sit" in the Mini (That Mini is optioned BIG and has a MSRP of 38K on it" I did not spend much time sitting and looking/feeling the inside" So, after this mornings visit - I may or may not reorder.

As far as the manual/Auto A/C. The auto was never really that big a deal to me, so - that cost just may go towards the LL - The LL/cream color line/black piano does look nice

Interesting thing on the configurator - when building this set up.. The configuator shows the cream color line or the dark gray color line as "INC" and no extra cost - the MSRP on the configurator shows one price but when printed up = all of a sudden the color line shows $200 and the MSRP is now $200 more than on the configurator???????

So, when building a Mini - and the MSRP states a price - be sure to print it out and compare the two MSRP's....

again, thanks for all the fast posts on this subject... I am of the old school when it comes to the $300 fan...lol....

 

There's one other factor that could possibly sway someone from auto to manual a/c--usage. I have auto a/c in my current non MINI. I have it set at a certain temperature and whereas I may change the number here and there, I only turn off the auto function when I need full power. I set it and forget it like Ron Pompeil. In my gf's non mini with manual a/c, the a/c spends most of the time off as we live near the beach in Socal. Therefore, I assume that if people are getting the auto a/c for its ease of operation, they too are using the a/c anytime the cabin is warmer than the temp setting and thus using more gas.

 

I too was tempted to order the manual AC, but decided to include it and got the package. The Automatic AC in my previous and current vehicles all fuction well. The auto AC should function similarily and adjust fan speed as well as discharge air temperature. The Mini brochure and configurator also states that the auto AC gets an activated carbon filter versus a microfilter for the cabin. I do not know if there is an actual difference though as I am waiting for my car's boat ride to end this week.

Delivery soon, I hope!

 

I favor simplicity and low cost. The manual A/C works well and is easy to adjust. I like the control the manual A/C on/off button provides. I prefer to have active control over the A/C function rather than the "set and forget" mode of the Auto A/C. Both options are fine, but the manual gives more direct control over the A/C, at the price of a little more fiddling.

 

Mine was part of a package, during the summer I found myself manually adjusting the fan speed anyway. For some reason, the AC seems to be a little on the weak side, or could it be the 95+ temp's here in Houston we experienced.

 

One thing I didn't mention which probably weighed into my decision not to get the auto A/C is that I had a lot of problems with my Auto A/C in my existing 96 328i. IMHO manual switches tend to be more reliable.

 

I live in Toronto.. Really only need two settings:
Max Hot - 7 months
Max Cold - 5 months.

I liked the auto feature, but here its $520.. and the LSD was $650. That made it so much easier..

I am looking forward to driving the car.. leave the adjustments to my beautiful better half.. if you have one, save the cash too.

 

I have auto, it's fine, and I like the Max button too. But it's no earthshaking thing by any means. Harley said above the had a Mini listed at 38K. How can that be? Mine was pretty optioned at 30 (but no nav). I see if I get Nav and iPod ($1000 right?) that's 33. I don't know where I could put another 5. Maybe it had JCW aero and expensive wheels on it. 38k puts it in 328i territory.

 

I'm running through the same thoughts when optioning my MINI.

Having had some bad experiences with my only other exposure to auto AC (in my current car, a 97 BMW 318is) I'm a bit leery. I had the control module go crazy nutso on me and would randomly decide to: work properly, do nothing, or randomly crank up the AC (this was in the winter too) and not accept any inputs whatsoever.

Plus to get what I want out of it (a steady stream of hot or cold air) I always feel like I'm having to trick it. Any time the temp is set to a reasonable level (~70-75F) it spits out tepid air. To get anything properly cool you have to drop it down waaaay low, and the only way I've found to get full hot is to hit the defog button (even setting it to 85 will get you some non-heated vent air mixed in).

My other main complaint is that the default auto setting that's supposed to adjust where the air blows (windshield, face, and/or feet) tries to send air to all three locales which results in zero air pressure. The only way to be able to feel it on your body is to override the auto setting.

Anyone have any of these sorts of issues with the MINI system? I haven't been able to take a long enough test drive yet to really check it out.

 

Don't forget around $1000 for the automatic, plus all of the packages, and JCW add ons.