Ok. I have a problem that I don't recall ever seeing mentioned on NAM. It's not a new problem for me, Alice is 3 1/2 years old and the cruise has worked this way since I've had the car.

I have the MF steering wheel coz I wanted cruise control. It saves me from speeding tickets on long drives. The manual states
"To decelerate
Press button 4.
If you are already driving with active cruise control, the speed is decreased by approx. 1 mph (2 km/h) every time you briefly tap the button."

Tapping the button doesn't do a thing. Never has. Every car I've driven with cruise control, tapping the decelerate button works as the MINI manual says it should. Holding the button eventually (after a second or 2) starts the speed dropping and the cruise sets to the speed when I release the button.

I've had it in at Desert MINI for this twice now, with them agreeing that it doesn't work as the manual says, but that they can't find a problem. Mark (the mechanic) even took me for a drive in his brand new MINI and showed me that his behaves the same way.

I guess, what I'm looking for is numbers on if anyone else has noticed this on your car, or if your cruise operates as documented.

 

Mine works fine, although it takes a pretty hard "tap", more like a soft push, to increase/decrease the speed. Try that and it should work OK. If not, call your dealer. Jimbo

 

The problem is related to the controlling software and in fact your dealer may not be able to do anything about it until a software fix that addresses the cruise control is given to them.

The cruise control operation in my '04 MCS was very erratic (I had the old 2 spoke sport MFSW wheel) and the system could not keep the set speed on different road levels.

In my current '05 6MT MCS (With the 3 spoker wheel) the cruise control, I feel works much better and it is more accurate than in my '04 MCS ever was. I just came back from the Dragon and had plenty of opportunity to use it in the interstate during our 2,400 mile roundtrip. It is not 100%, still has some minor annoying glitches, but the factory software is much better indeed.

Now, the cruise control works fantastic in our '02 MC CVT. It seems to me that MINI has been more successful with the programming of the cruise control operation on cars equipped with automatics vs manual transmissions.

 

My CC works as advertised, 2 spoke thumb bump. I've checked and appreciate the 'one push for one MPH' feature. Holler at 'em until they fix it!

 

C4, it holds speed ok, the only problem I have with the cruise is that -1 mph function.

Eric, well, like I said, they can't work out what's wrong. Mark's car arrived new off the boat during AMVIV and operates just like mine. I have the original 2-spoke, he has the 3-spoke with playstation controls.

I'll pass on that other MINI owners have their cruise working as it's supposed to.

 

Hey Andrew!

I'd love to go out and check mine right now, but rodan is on it way to see Danielle at Desert Mini as we speak (type). See my tire thread. I hardly ever use the cruise but seem to recall that mine works like yours. The answer is to never slow down! Hope I can test mine tomorrow.

 

OK, tried the CC on the way home from the tire adventure. No small feat given the traffic in LAS this time of day.

With CC set and stabilized, a hearty push of the (-) button would indeed slow the car one mph. A quick blip was not enough. Could not, however, get a 1 mph increase. The car would accel one mph but then go back to the previously established speed. To get an increase, I had to hold the (+) button long enough to accel to speed + 5, and then after release, the car would settle on +2 or 3 mph.

I almost wish I didn't know this! Anyway, hope this helps.

 

Oh joy. You have the opposite problem to me. My + button raises my set speed by about 1mph as advertised. Maybe we should go see Danielle together.

 

Great idea, but I can't afford it for a while. Had to pay full fare for a new tire yesterday. Guess those lighted door sills will have to wait a few more months.

 

My newer MFSW will do the proper +1MPH increase and needs to be really forced to bring any type of noticeable decellaration, but will slowly reduce speed.

But the CC will accel on its own at rando intervals, I know I can't reproduce it so I wrote it off as character and the car wants to go faster.

 

I have an 05 MSCS 6 speed. My cruise has never worked properly either. I confirmed it when I had an 06 MC dealer loaner & the cruise on it worked perfectly.

My cruise doesn't even maintain the speed properly. It varies by around +/- 3MPH with hills (sometimes as much as 5MPH). To increase or decrease the speed I must do 2 taps +/-. Also when I accelerate to pass the car should go back to cruise speed when you let off the gas but mine rarely does so I have to do a lot of resetting. The resume is also buggy & rarely works.

I have had cruise control on 2 manual transmission cars in the past & both worked flawlessly. Hopefully they will get a fix soon but if this has been going on for years it doesn't look good

 

You'd think that BMW engineers would have had enough practice with CC that they'd be able to get it right 1st time.
My 91 Talon 5-speed had cruise that worked perfectly (after I replaced the vacuum hose).

 

A possible issue with your situation may be the electronics are not properly debouncing the (-) button on your car.

You should be happy with +/- 5MPH in your car. Before twincharging, my car might vary as much as 10MPH while on cruise climbing and descending hills. The more power I got, the better my car was at holding the MPH. I can climb hills and decend hill with four grown adults in the car and my car will hold the MPH fairly steadily within 2-3 MPH or so

 

Uhuh. The MC loaner I had kept within 1-2 MPH (mostly 1MPH) of what it was set at (that's an MCa, low power engine). The same was true for my other 2 manual speed autos. When you set your cruise control, + 5MPH can cost you a ticket so that's not acceptable to me I would think my S has more than enough enough power to keep at cruise speed & it doesn't take power to slow the car down when it goes over the set speed. My cruise just doesn't react properly plain & simple. It might be a computer thing I dunno.

 

Dom...Mark at the dealership said he put the car on the computer and verified that the button was making the correct readings when the button was tapped and when it was held in. He's a good guy, and I don't think he was lying to me.

 

Bummer.
You coming to In-N-Out on Thursday?

 

For speed increase, I give it the hearty bump and then tap the button again to 'set' the CC at the new speed.

 

I agree. I wish that were the fact. All I know is that with twincharging my MCS I got the added benefit of better and more consistent cruise control operation even with a full car. :-)

 

Don't think he was lying. Do you know at what point he was measuring the signal? Sometimes if a button is noisy, the reading will show up multiple times to the computer. If not debounced, then the computer will react to it multiple times. You can over debounce the button, where the computer filters out your real button "click". Or the button is so noisy that the computer cannot even make out if it was line noise or a click of the button.

fake oscilliscope of a "noisy" button below:

5V........+--+.........+.+....+-------------------+...............................
...........|....|.........|.|.....|............... ............|...............................
0V-----+....+------+.+---+...........................+----------------------

If you're using a mutlimeter or a continuity tester, you won't get the detail above. You'll see the button working.

With computerized electronics the processor will see this as three separate events. But with debounce circuitry, this will then become one click of the button. However the debounce circuitry could see this as two clicks close together and send that along to the code. The software can also have debounce programming code, and then misread this as no click, two clicks, or a single click depending on it's code.

 

We had pretty much come to the conclusion that it was almost certainly software, but I'd never seen any posts on NAM about this issue, and yet Mark's brand spanking new MCS did the exact same thing as my 3 1/2 year old car. Hence the questions. Unfortunately, as nice a guy and good a mechanic Mark is, he's neither a software nor electrical engineer.

 

my 06 does both the +1 and -1 correctly. accurate to the mile. I don't know what's wrong with it... but it sounds switch related to me.

 

Just another data point for you:

I use my CC a LOT (long highway commute). '03 MC manual, CC works flawlessly. +/- buttons work as advertised, with just a light press. On hilly roads, speed doesn't vary more than 2 mph (usually 1 or zero).

In the few years I've been on NAM and mini2.com, there have been many many threads about this problem. The only consistency is that there is none. The CC sucks for some, works perfectly for others, and no one seems to know why.

 

My 03 MC 5 speed cruise works great also. Every car I've owned for the last 20 years or so has had cruise, and MINI's works as good or better than any of them.

 

06 MCS, October 05 Build. No problems at all with the cruise control. It works as advertised and is better than the cruise control in either of our two other cars.

 

My 05 MCS cruise will hold speed fine but never resets to the same speed after tapping the brakes or hitting the gas to speed up temporarily. It is always slow by several MPH. Irritating, but not the end of the world.