Hello All,

I plan to check out an R52 MCS tomorrow. It is a 2005 (11/04 build) with 137k miles on it and the current owner bought it from a friend who owned for 10 years for his daughter to drive, but she couldn't master shifting a manual - hope the clutch is holding up!

The top currently only moves to the sunroof position. Current owner noted a broken latch and replaced both sides. Prior to that the top wouldn't operate at all. Hunting through 5 pages on this forum, the top moving to the sunroof position and stopping is a common problem, but solutions seem to vary. could be switches on the back tray or it not properly locked in place, possibly cables are stretched?

Wondering if some of you experts could give a few pointers as to what I can inspect to see if this is something easily remedied or if it will be many dollars (I looked up the cassette on ECS and it's a whopping $3900!).

From the pics the car looks good, the roof is in good shape and the price is quite good. Maybe adding an R52 to the R56 and I should sometimes have a functional MINI and some open top motoring too!

cheers
MacMini34

 

I believe the most common problem [as was mine] is the micro switch on the rear parcel tray if it only opens to the sunroof position and the red indicator light blinks, if you remove the parcel tray and with the boot open, have someone hold down the micro switch, you will feel it click, then try to open the top again with the switch, I had to add a bit of rubber to the parcel tray where it contacts the micro switch because my tray was slightly warped, also make sure both locking levers for the rear section are fully closed
Russ

 

Mine was a broken plastic thing, no replacement part so I had to mcgiver it with a thin plastic strip at the back with jb weld. reshape it with a Dremel. It worked.

 

Update, well I didn't get to see the car and it sold - twice. Kinda funny story. First person offers to buy car, but wife nixes purchase, hmmm, us car guys often have that issue. Owner emails me to say car back on market and then within a few minutes of seeing that email tells me it's sold again. This time a mechanic bought it but said clutch was going so I guess I dodged a clutch job which I'm not too keen to tackle yet. New buyer still paid full asking price so I guess seller did all right.

Bur now I'm hot on the idea of an R52 and there's a nice sidewalk edition at a dealer about 100miles away, albeit about 2x what this one was going for. But an R57 6MT showed up on FB marketplace for a similar price. Hmmm supercharger or another turbo?

cheers
MacMini34

 

bummer!! as far as supercharger over turbo I love my supercharged R52 JCW Cooper S and would not part with it, when you hear that whine at 3500 its music to your ears
Russ

 

What he said. Reason number 3 for running up the top: My co-pilot/navigator is whining about being too hot or too cold and I can't hear the SC.

 

Hi R52 folk,

So another '05 R52S in Hyper blue (nice - not grayscale) popped up on Facebook and I was able to see it and do a quick test drive this morning - no not with the top down because it's a wee bitty cold over here at present!

Impressions. The clutch was surprisingly heavy - is this normal for R52/53? I don't think there's any slipping - I got it into 5th and tried revving and all seemed fine but I was in a residential area and so kept it to about 30-35mph. The steering was also very firm but I presume if the power steering problem had surfaced it would be even heavier.

There was some rust by the right rear taillight - anyone know if this is a modest cost fix? Rear bumper had seen better days but could be refinished to tidy up. Front bumper was off. There was a 2 finger gap on left side between hood and bumper while right side was completely tight. Is this because it wasn't put back right after being in service mode or more indicative of a bump? Front end was otherwise ok with just a few chips. Both rear taillights were a bit fogged but left more so than right.

Roof works although it wouldn't go back up completely for me. I noted that there were a couple of small gaps in the rubber ridge line above the doors on both sides. Could this be from folding? But otherwise roof looked ok. The rubber strip on the rear end below the roof wasn't cracked at all!

It was running aftermarket 18in wheels but the ride seemed quite good. Owner says he still has original wheels.

The strut towers looked ok but I'd definitely add plates to them if I acquire it.

Exhaust was fairly loud and burbly so I think it's an aftermarket but owner wasn't sure.

I need to remind myself that this is an 18 year old car (build 03/05) and so not everything is going to be perfect. It's got just under 94k on the odometer.

Thoughts, comments. Asking is $5750.

cheers
MacMini34

 

If its clean, and low miles.

 

That is not a well taken care of Mini. The clutch is not supposed to be heavy and the roof sounds like it's going to break anytime soon. My advice: walk away and spend more money and get a Mini where everything works right.

 

Well, I set a budget and it looks like I'm not going to find a decent car (yet) within my budget. There are about 50-60 R52 S's countrywide so not many out there. And I'm aiming for a manual transmission so that drops that number by around 60%.

This one looks the pick of the bunch, but adding another $2k to ship it from West to East really blows the budget. Then again, road trip...

https://www.cargurus.com/Cars/invent...348386684/NONE


Cheers
MacMini34

 

looks nice, here in oz that would bring about AU $18k
make a lower offer to cover tras cost they can only say no
gl Russ