HELLO FELLOW NAM MEMBERS!I live in Akron, Ohio and for the past week it has been below freezing, and & E does not rank high enough to achieve a spot in the garage. (In my mind she does...but dad thinks the 1954 Jaguar, the 1980 MGB and the 2002 BMW rank higher) ANYHOW! In the MINI manual it says not to leave the car sitting to warm it up, and that you should move the car slowly and warm it that way. When I do this my car feels....spongy. This is the only way to describe it. The throttle is less responsive, the clutch is harder to depress and slower to kick back in. I have no problem driving my car this way being that it is winter and knowing that the car will warm up deciently quick. Just want to make sure everyone else has the same issues.THANKS!2004 MCS MC40 Monte Carlo Edition #281
~Neal Levy

 

cold mornings? its 50 here now!!!

i have the same problem.

i just let it sit with the heat on for about 5 min and its fine, no problems.

 

Either way, your ok...just wasting gas by letting it sit. The other thing is that the MINI doesn't exactly have a high cold idle and sitting at 1100 or 1200 rpm isn't going to warm you up very quickly. The best way to warm it up would be to drive steady at 2k rpm or so. Just make sure you don't rack it out when cold.

If you think that's a problem, my other car is a Honda Insight...the engine has so little friction, when the temps drop close to freezing, I'll actually see the temp gauge drop if I'm cruising at too low an rpm. A nice reminder to downshift and get it back up close to 2k . I've also seen it drop when sitting at a stoplight, especially if the heater is on higher than normal. Oh, the pains of getting 65 mpg... Luckily we're in Florida and that doesn't happen too often.