What did you do to your MINI today?

Good luck. Sorry, it happened. Some people suck.

On a windy day at work, a piece of a palm fell on my roof and left a few little dents. I bought a dent puller and light board. Haven't had a chance to test it out though.

 

That sounds about right. My battery does that when the temp hits the teens or single digits. It's a bit more than 10 miles to most of my destinations, so my return home is full capacity.

 

Last time I was in, the tech said maybe it keeps waking itself up. The records suggest that it woke itself up 3 times on boxing day, though I went nowhere near it and had the fobs in a cupboard...

 

Mine will drop from 100 if it is a little below freezing. It usually warms slowly and recovers as I drive. I'm in NC, so far below freezing is unusual... A timed charge before departure is the next best thing to the warm garage that I don't have...

 

I had my software upgraded for the battery recall. No noticeable difference in performance, other than not starting out in sport mode until I can get in bimmercode (assuming I remember my changes). Had a loaner ICE non-S w 13k mi on it for the day. Really missed my SE.

 

That sounds very normal, and is similar to what I experience. A 9-mile drive is nowhere near long enough to warm up a cold-soaked battery. The SE does not have any automatic battery conditioning, unlike the BMW i3.

 

I mounted my wheels with Blizzak snow tires on today. Temperatures have dropped into the 20s, and there is a forecast for snow at the end of this week. I'm looking forward to seeing what the car is like in snow. This will be the second season, ahh, second month on these tires. (They were used for one month last year.)

I'm finally getting the hang of putting wheels on that use lug bolts instead of lug nuts. (Decades ago in my youth, I had a Chevelle that had to have its wheel studs replaced because the car had spent too many winters in New England. Lug bolts would have made life easier.)

 

Took a Countryman SE for a test drive this week. Extremely well composed and well balanced for everyday driving. Probably not ideal for autocrossing.

Steering feel and ratio was outstanding! U-turns were much more crisp and easier than the 2-door SE (I don't single palm to crank the steering wheel when banging a U-ey). I also appreciated the 8 inch ground clearance during my urban overlanding adventure over the terrible lumpy ice roads.

When you use the gear lever thing, there is a Reverse-Neutral-D/B mode. D creeps you forward like automatic transmission and B is for 1 pedal driving. I really dislike the auto creeping and much prefer 1 pedal driving. The other weird thing is you can't turn off the Countryman SE until you lock the vehicle? I'll have to revisit that later.

 

If you turn the fake key, 'OFF' will be displayed at the top of the screen. And even when off, the radio still plays. I'm always having to verify on the display that the car is actually off.

 

The radio turns off when you open the door (or when both doors are opened if there's a front-seat passenger), right? That's how the "radio-ready" mode works in my 2021 MINI Cooper SE.

 

U01, not F56 SE or J01.

 

Sorry, you're right.

 

Yeah it was just super weird that the radio/display stays on in the U25 SE until you lock the vehicle. In the F56 SE you can just double tap the toggle to completely power down. I still think the U25 SE is still very good despite mediocre DCFC curves. The interior space is pretty much the same size as a F15 X5 (2014 to 2018) - the boot space might be even slightly larger thanks to the boxy U25 shape and smaller rear wheel wells.

So jealous of @SameGuy because there are awesome January rebates right now. Roulez-vert gives up to $4,000, plus $4,000-$4,500 from MINI, plus $1,500 loyalty, and $5,000 from the iZEV program. That could be up to $15,000 before any dealer negotiations on the U25 SE.

 

That soon?! Wow I better make a decision...

 

No there's only about 71.8m left as of Dec 31, 2024 in iZEV. It will be exhausted by the end of this month or earlier...3 weeks or less is about right.