i have never owned a 5 speed and mini new mini will have one. i always like cruise control for long trips, but is it really helpful in a car with a standard

 

Cruise control is always handy on long trips! Eliminates some of the driver fatigue for one thing.

Cruise control keeps your car at a set speed, which is very helpful for your gas economy.

The kind of tranny you've got is irrelevant. Wait until you're in your highway gear before engaging the cruise control.

 

thanks i thing i will get it!!

 

Yea, I think a cruise control is a must in any car. Especially if you do lots of long highway drives.


Also, a vehicle without cruise control will likely have a lower resale value when compared to a similar vehicle with cruise control.

 

Yeah, I frequently use my cruise control on highways or streets where I want to follow the speed limit. It helps with my speeding tickets (haven't got one yet in a year of MINI driving!) and on long distance drives it does make life easier. 5spd manual in my Cooper.

 

The cruise control in my lexus had this feature where lets say you had the cruise set to 60, but then started going uphill, so the car would speed up to stay at 60. Didn't do anything for downhill. Does the mini do that? Or does the cruise in the MINI just mean that it sets whatever rpms for whaatever gear you are in now, regardless of speed.

 

i just type in an address on mine and it takes me there.

 

RPM's. If it's a short downhill, it probably won't matter. If I'm coming down the side of the Sierra's, I wouldn't want CC engaged.

 

All typical cruise controls work this way. The reason you speed up going down a hill is that the only function the cruise control has control over is throttle position. It would be the same thing as taking your foot off the pedal at the top of a hill. If the hill is steep enough to overcome engine braking, you're going to speed up.

At the very high end, adaptive cruise control systems are now being developed that can maintain a minimum distance between you and the car in front. I assume, but don't know for sure, that these systems have the ability to control the vehicles brakes as well. If so, then it's possible that these systems could control down hill speed better than a typical system as installed in our Minis.