Hey all....I've just noticed something about my build sheet info, obtained from the "Owners' Lounge", and what I am seeing on my car? The build sheet states the interior as "Leather Lounge, Championship Red". My Lounge Leather seats are black with red welting and my upholstered door and dash accent panels are red (see pic). Do you think my car originally had red seats too? Another thing, when I searched "Mini/Lounge Leather Seating" on Google, the photos show some of the front seats as having sewn in pleats in the butt area which match the stitching on the seat back. The photos are of both left hand and right hand drive Minis. At some point did Mini delete...or add...these pleats to the lower seat cushion? My car is low mileage (14k) and the drivers seat bottom is already showing a loosening of the leather...which is weird looking. Is it possible the pleats were designed to prevent this from happening. Any ideas?

 

It's so hard to tell because there are so many different combinations, you'll be lucky if an other roadster owner will have your interior (unless it's the more popular options).

What I do know for sure is that MINI makes adjustments over the course of the MINI yours offering. We had ordered the MINI yours white seat with the black strip in the middle. Originally those seats had side walls with a pattern on it. It was for my wife and she liked it a lot. When we received the car, the patterned was not there. That's because MINI has a tendency to simplify its offering has the car range ages. They start with something snazzy to attract. Then when cost is better understood, or the popularity increases or decreases, and they make some small modifications to simplify production. I didn't mind because the seat are less feminism that way and I do drive the mini often. But my wife wasn't to thrilled about what happened since she specifically asked the question at the time of order. But in the end we worked out a deal with the dealership on a second set of wheels for the summer, and with free mounting and balancing.

Long story short. Adjustments to the decoration changes from production year to year...

 

All of the lounge leather seats I've seen in the past had the white piping, so maybe the championship red is just referring to your piping. The seat bottoms with the full pleats are European cars that don't require passenger occupancy sensors in the seat cushion. The pleats interfere with the sensor so the US and Canada got the partial pleats.

 

Good points. Never thought about the pleats interfering with the sensors. Gosh, lots of cars/trucks have plush, pleated seats including our Ford SUV. Wonder why BMW couldn't get them to work in this car without having to produce two upholstery designs?

 

Our MINI yours has black piping. I don't see how the color would affect sensors any differently.
Now the pleats I can appreciate more so. I didn't realize that and found images of our satellite gray mini yours seat that shows exactly that pleat distinction. Interesting...

 

Put the last 7 of your VIN into http://bimmer.work and it should show an interior representation of your car.

 

The site, for some reason, will not accept my VIN. Keep getting the message "something is wrong" even after going thru the proof many times. T432595 are the last seven. Let me know if you have better luck. Thanks!

 

Looks like there's something wrong with the back end they all use. Try again in a day or so.

 

 

Gentlemen, thank you for the info. I find it very interesting that Mini would designate black leather seats with red piping as, "Leather Lounge, Championship Red". Maybe all of the 2013 JCW R59's with lounge leather seating got black seats with only the color of the piping to be determined by whomever was ordering the car. We're any other (other than black) lounge leather seat colors offered for the JCW Roadsters in 2013?

 

BMW VIN Decoder not working for me. :/

 

The factory code is the not what they were called in marketing terms. You have the championship lounge leather seats that are black with red piping. That's what they look like on any JCW mini. I have them in my Paceman too. They were never red .You also have the chilli red interior pack whereas I have the piano black interior