It was drizzling this morning on my commute. Not enough to warrant the rear wiper, so I switched on the rear defroster. On the cars I've owned in the past, this is usually enough to evaporate most of the water collecting on the rear window. However, I noticed it didn't do much of anything.

After arriving to work I pulled the fuses from inside the car and checked F16 and the fuse was fine. Is the MINI's rear defroster just that weak?

 

Hi,
I drive on '02 MCS, and my de-mister works pretty good. The rear wind-shield begins clearing within 10-15 seconds or so, and within 5 minutes the window is clear.
I know that aggresive cleaning on the inside of the glass can break the fine wires that make up the de-froster grid.

 

I have also had situations where I turned on the rear defroster to clear a mist from the rear window on to find that the road grime on the class was just as hard to see through when the glass was dry.