Most liked posts in thread: Project R53 :: 2006 MINI Cooper S

Meet the replacement for GP0173.









Needs:
- Cooling fan
- Passenger side motor mount
- Glovebox latch
- 3rd brake light
- Front hood emblem
- Sunroof gasket
- Sunroof front glass
- Dashboard top (previous owner got glue on it)
- Some TLC for the paint, and some PDR work on the hatch

Mods planned:
- OEM R56 JCW BBK
- Swap 17x8 wheels from GP
- Raceseng shift knob from GP
- Suspension (not sure if I'll go coil overs or springs/struts for simplicity)
- 215/45R17 Direzza ZIIs
- Rear wiper delete


But for $5k and only 49k miles, and a factory LSD, I can't go wrong.

 

Waiting for these not-quite-overnight sunroof parts from Germany has put a damper on my progress...

Hopefully the new sunroof glass brackets arrive before Christmas so I can actually go drive the car to the gas station and give it a full tank of 93.

Anyways, I was greeted to a surprise the other day when I arrived home: the Redline Goods shift and handbrake boots I had ordered had finally arrived!

This meant I could finally go about deleting the goofy factory armrest from the car, since I needed to install a new center console to properly delete the armrest.

Overall, I'm very impressed with the Redline Goods products - the handbrake boot required a little trimming to get it to seat into the console properly, but it's all good now. Stitching is top notch, and the leather is so much nicer than the factory leatherette boots the car came with (one of which had a hole in it from the armrest banging into the handbrake).

Was up way too late last night, but here are some photos:

 

Finally had some time to dedicate to the cars today.

Washed the wife's car first - filthy pig it was, especially after our trip to the cabin for New Years.



Then I set to work on wrapping up the sunroof repair on the R53. Finally finished, glass is installed and the sunroof works like a charm. Hopefully I don't experience any more leaks, either.



And of course, I celebrated by taking it out of the garage for the first time in 3 weeks and giving it a fresh fill of 93.

 

And finally, some real photos:

 

Good to know.

Since I picked up the Ranger for daily/beater duties, the GP has done nothing but sit in the garage - I've averaged one fill per month since May. My daily commute has me going up and down Route 1/95 and dealing with NJ drivers, not something I wanted to subject the GP to.

Also, it was making less and less sense to be making payments on my occasional driver/fun car, so when this came in on trade, I figured I'd use it to eliminate my loan balance and get into something that was still fun and would make a good project, and also keep me in the MINI world.

 

And... First mod already done.

 

I'll fill in some background - picked up the glovebox, dash, and sunroof glass on Sunday from a local guy who is parting out a 2005 R53. Found some gouges on the dash the guy made when he pulled it... so that wouldn't work. The glovebox was perfect, that was a fairly smooth install. But, when I removed my front glass, I found the front glass brackets were... a little fubar. So, what I figured would be a quick fix resulting in an otherwise healthy sunroof... was not a quick fix at all. Cue the rapid escalation meme.



So, this morning, I took the dash back to the guy, threw him another $50 and grabbed the entire sunroof assembly in hopes that the tracks on that would be in good enough shape to use. Nope...

That being said, the extra $50 was a good investment anyway, as it allowed me to look at the sunroof out of the car and figure out that I could pull the glass brackets out without dropping the entire sunroof. Hooray!

So, after I figured that out, I placed an order for new glass brackets (~$30/ea) through work, and set to work on partially disassembling the R53.

I pulled the visors, grab handles, rear view mirror, and the sunroof trim out - was able to drop the headliner down enough to check and see whether the sunroof drains were still attached (they were).

While I was in there, I zip tied the drains to the drain outlets on the sunroof cassette, and also re-seated the perimeter gasket on the roof sheet metal with some fresh RTV and a few socks to keep pressure on the gasket until it cures.

Oh! To my surprise, I was able to get the glue off the dashboard, huge win there. No dash replacement necessary now.

Photos below:

 

When it comes to keeping a car clean, she is a pig. :nonod:

 

Wouldn't be my MINI without it - it's a Raceseng Slammer in Mirror Red with the shift pattern engraved in the top.

I'll install the Helix short shifter eventually - need to tackle some other things first.

 

I was thinking about doing Stoptech Street Performance pads in the rear with the stock calipers and stainless lines.

I figure they'd be a decent pairing.

 

5 piston? :crazy:

Fixed that. Anyways, I found them on Summit Racing so far, seeing if I can find another source locally for a better price.

Centric Parts 142.34114 - Free Shipping on Orders Over $99 at Summit Racing - left
Centric Parts 142.34113 - Free Shipping on Orders Over $99 at Summit Racing - right

Ignore the images - here's the image off of Centric:

 

Good to know - I was going to ask what brakes you were running on yours.

I'm still throwing around the idea of going with the R56 calipers and 294mm rotors, I'm doing some research to see how well the R53 master cylinder plays with the R56 JCW calipers.

GP gets traded in tomorrow - spent the evening last night pulling some parts off. Also found out my Helix short shifter will transfer right over, which is a nice surprise!

Additionally, I was going to order a new armrest lid for this car, but I'm going to convert the center console to an armrest-less setup instead. Parts work out to be about the same for the leather lid vs the armrest-less console. And I hate center armrests in MINIs.

 

Also, brake plans just changed, significantly. Called Centric and the calipers I wanted are only a R&R item - that is, they only do them on a special order basis, and they require a return core to send them out.

So, I'm not really into doing an expensive BBK... looks like I'll be doing a poor-man's BBK. R56S calipers and 294mm rotors instead of the 4-piston Brembros and 316mm rotors.

Not sure what other options exist under $750 for a front BBK.

 

Well, I know all the glass needs to be removed. So, I'd have to budget for new glass, because the odds of getting the glass out intact is very slim-to-none.

Otherwise seems pretty straightforward once you drop the headliner and trim and remove the glass. Drill out the welds, remove the top, weld the new metal on, paint, then reinstall everything.

If I did that, I'd get the whole car re-painted, too.