A wonderful 1:20am good morning to you all.

Round 1......ding

I'm taking Delivery of a Hyper Blue MCS in mid December of this year and I have to say I havn't looked forward to Christmas this much since i was 10. Try stickin a piece of coal in that Claus! Anyway i digress.

I'm also packin up and hittin the dusty trail. I'm moving from San Antonio Texas, to Tucson Arizona.

I'm Excited about the move but I can't help but wonder how my new buddy the Cooper S is gonna like the desert. So i was wondering if there were any fellow desert rats out there who could give me some desert MINI survival tips. Now Hyper blue may not be the best color i know but blimey I'm tired of making concessions when its the bloody color i want. Just some sound advice on keeping 'er clean and how to live in the sand would be great.

...ding Round over...the lovley ladies may now walk around with the round number sign and the floss in the bums.

 

Welcome to NAM, Kujo S! Check out the regional forums and club forums in the Southwest. You'll find MINI folk in Phoenix, and probably in Tucson, too! They'll undoubtedly have some good desert survival tips for you!

Ding....round over...now the Chippendale boys strut their stuff with their cute bums flexing....LOL!!!


Clover

 

Kujo S,

This is a new car club in Arizona, come check it out.

http://www.dynamicminicollective.com/board


Kalvin

 

I don't, by any means, live there. But having spent a few weeks driving around it I offer the following: Vacuum out your airbox often. :smile:

 

Kujo, there are a bunch of MINI owners in the Phoenix area (many of them are cool to hang out with) and I haven't heard of any of them complaining about any "desert related issues". I'm in Las Vegas (also a desert area) and have encountered no related problems in 2 years with my MCS as my daily driver.

Get window tinting and a sun blocker for your windshield. Well worth the money.

 

Congrats and YOUR MINI WILL LOVE ARIZONA!!!

BEST roads
BEST twisties
BEST weather

all that equals the BEST driving conditions...and we go on group drives monthly! it's a blast

 

Car Tip #1: California Duster for keeping the dust from layering up on the car.

Car Tip #2: When parking car in the sun, Sun Shade and crack the sun-roof to let excessive heat out

Car Tip #3: Don't leave windows rolled down during monsoon season. It may look like a nice cloudless day, but them WHAM, all of a sudden you've got a downpour and blowing dust!

Person Tip #1: Drink tons of water

Person Tip #2: Don't touch anything shiny on the car after it has sit in the sun (OUCH )

Person Tip #3: Eats lots of Mexican Food. (Just a personal preference I suppose )

Yes, there's lots of MINI owners in Tucson and many more in Phoenix that can't get enough of driving around AZ.

 

Thanks guys I was getting some pretty scary info from the guys around here.

Had a couple of weird urban myth sounding stories flyin at me as well. Like, people in arizona have to keep their bonnets open whenever they park because it gets too hot in the engine compartment or something like that, and that dust storms will tear the paint off of your car, what else..oh and that nobody owns a MINI that isn't some shade of white or silver....

Yeah i know most of these got to be horse pucky but i'm sure that getting under some shade and changing the air filter more than i would here in good ol' texas is gonna be a good idea.

Oh and about the MINI drives I'm THERE, You'll recognize me by the only blue Union Jacked Mini zigzagging back and forth trying to shake the seguaro arm off his bonnet because he never seen one of them thangs and it looked soft and squishy

 

Kujo, this one is true. dust storms can tear the paint off of the car. Sand blasting. This is why you'll see the smart one pulled over off the road during a dust storm so the speed of the car doesn't increase the cosing speed of the dust/sand particles.

Here's a good resource: http://www.azcentral.com/relocationguide04/

 

I've seen allot of Black/Black MINIs runing around town in Tucson. Yes, black gets hot. Do not tuch the paint when it sits out. It will be (as the Pascua Yaqui Tribe says) Hot Hot Hot. Cracking you windows open is good but watch out for the sand storms as well or you will get sand all over you seats. A good vacume cleaner, with a good filter, will take care of this. There are more carwash places than you can throw a dead cat at around here. Dust sticks to everything and a clean car will be covered in dust with in days. If you have a car cover, it helps, but you need to keep it out of the wind dust collects under the cover. Also, when you put on or take off the cover, anything metal you touch latter will result in a zap. Another thing to remember, Red is the first color to fade due to sun damage. Fist thing you should do when you get here is go up Mt. Lemon or down Picture Rocks Road. Lots of twisties and good views.

 

Echo on the "don't touch anything shiny" remark. Put a sock on your shifter Seriously!

 

Arizona highways are also notorious for road debris. A friend of mine picked up her brand new all-PW MCS last week from MNS and took something from a passing truck on I-10 N of Tucson, whatever it was hit her bonnet right by the air intake and the windshield. No clearbra. Less than 150 miles on the odometer, and already a pocked bonnet

This kind of stuff happened to me for six years when I lived in Phoenix--never had so many hits from debris on my Toyota, and I've lived in every western state minus Utah. Jimbo

 

Dark window tint is the best advise. You may want to wait until you get here, our tinters know what's legal and what's not.

You are moving in the winter which is the best time to move. You can slowly get used to the heat.

Look forward to meeting you.