I asked this question on a thread, but I thought creating a new thread would be good for others looking for answers.My question is about the suspension set ups on the Cooper S. What are the differences between the suspensions? How noticeable are the changes in feel between each one? As far as I know there are 4 different set ups but please someone with more knowledge and experience let me know.Just as the title says for the MINI Cooper S Base, Sport, JCW, or GP suspensions are the setups that I am talking about.

 

Here is what I know from reading stuff here:

There is a cooper, cooper S, cooper S sport, JCW, and GP2 suspension. The GP2 is the only one with coil overs, that is a special case. Ride height is adjustable. I don't know if the sway bars are different from the GP2 to the JCW.

The JCW model can actually be ordered with the normal Cooper S suspension, Sport, or JCW suspension. The JCW suspension has red springs and different shocks than the others. The springs result in a 10 mm lower ride height than the Cooper S or Sport. I think that the sway bars are thicker than the Sport Suspension.

The sport suspension has different shocks than the Cooper S, and the sway bars are larger as well. I don't know if the springs are a different rate or not.

The details are available by searching this forum, or the Mods:suspension forum. It may take a while to find details (like what size the sway bars are), but the info is there.

Have fun,
Mike

 

The Cooper also has the Sport Suspension option. The Sport suspension is supposed to be the same on the Cooper, Cooper-S and JCW. We've had all three.

The springs and sway bar are supposed to get stiffer as you go:

Cooper -> Cooper-S/JCW -> Sport -> JCW

I measured the sport suspension sway bar as:

Fr 23.5mm
Rr 18mm