Wilko R53

Hello there and welcome to the mini side of the forum. I tend to go on another forum for most of my mini related questions as it is a mini specific forum. 17" down to 16" seems to be the trend at the moment, and deffinately junk the run flats. For spirited driving, most people tend to go for either team dynamics wheels as they are pretty light, or wheels made by a company called rota. Again, these wheels are nice and light. The reason behind choosing lightweight wheels is that the weight reduction improves the handling a lot. Most people tend to go for a tyre within either 205/50/16, or 215/45/16. Again, with ditching the run flats, a tyre like the Federal 595 RS-R you will get a more forgiving ride, with plenty of grip, and no an excellent tyre for grip in the wet. When going with non run flat tyres, this gives you a feeling of a softer ride, which then means you can slip on a lovely set of coilover suspension and lower the car to improve the handling even more. If I can recommend you one place to have your mini worked on, it will be Minicraft down in Sussex. They charge a lot less per hour labour than anywhere I know, they run a 480BHP R53 mini which is their old Time Attack car, and also run a 300BHP R56 mini in this years Time Attack series, so they certainly know what they are talking about with regards to minis. Any more questions, p.m. Me.

It's more than likely a leak coming from the third brake light at the top of the bootlid. It's a pretty common fault apparently.

Nothing wrong with the little mini cooper s. I can seriously embarrass a lot of these so called flash cars with their big power engines, big brakes, and sports suspension with my lighter car, big power, big brakes, fully set up suspension including corner weight set up with my mini cooper s. Depending on spec, you can easily achieve between 250-350 BHP depending on how deep your pockets are, going up to around 500 BHP. The thing is, with 250 BHP, and a well set up suspension system, coupled with a great set of tyres on lightweight wheels, and a balanced brake setup, on a circuit the little mini can easily match cars with more power around a track.

Just had the cat refitted as the exhaust was getting louder on long journeys. Now found out the centre box had cracked all around the pipe exit from the box, so I had the centre box replaced with a smaller one and the car sounds really good now. It'll easy pass the decibel limit trackside now! Looking to replace the wheels in the future with either a set of BBS RC's, CH's, or LM's.

Well I have just ordered a 20% reduced pulley and the water meth injection is on its way too. Should really improve mid range pull and I'll be able to run wide open throttle for far longer periods.

Tell me about it. Thing is, the mini is addictive. You can really chuck it about and it seems to handle the power really well.

Many thanks. Trouble is. The modifying won't stop here. Looking at more mods, bigger brakes, better coil overs, possibly KW Clubsports, and a bigger supercharger too.

Thank you. Obviously a bit out of the league you guys are in with your BMWs. However, I'd be up for popping along to a meet or two in the Kent area when they are going on, or maybe mix it up with you guys on the track when the next trackday is at Brands?

Another shot of the car.

I run a set of fully adjustable coil overs on it with camber adjustment up front, adjustable camber arms on the rear, and a set of the R56 Brembo brakes up front at the moment, to help keep the car stable on the roads.

I'm running it on a fully rebuilt engine after an after market cam disintergrated on a rolling road session and all the fillings went everywhere within the block along with the engine oil. It now runs a 1750cc conversion, lightened and balanced, forged ceramic coated pistons, billet conrods, the block is the thin walled block but sleeves have been fitted to make the cylinders stronger as the thin walled blocks tend to end up with ovalising of the bores through heat distortion when running big power. The whole engine is held together with ARP bolts and so good for 8000 RPM if we use a cam with the power at that end of the rev range. The head has been ported and polished, new valves and guides etc. And all is timed in on a race spec Schrick cam. The main bearings, big ends, and small ends are all uprated items. The inlet manifold has been ported and polished and matched to the throats of the head, as well as the janspeed manifold has been opened out to match the exhaust ports perfectly, too. I run a chargecooler to keep the IAT'S down, with all the mods I'm running, because the engine is now far far more efficient at getting the exhaust gases out of the block, I have seen nearly a four psi drop on the supercharger's back pressure with a higher output. I'm now looking to run an even smaller pulley to give me back the 18-19psi along with running yet bigger injectors to give me even more power. At the moment, until the cars fitted with the new VIPEC stand alone ecu, we are guessing a power figure in the region of 240-255BHP is more than possible at the moment. We could be looking at a figure in the region of around 285-295 once we have worked a little more on it. this car goes off of its 150mph speedo anytime.

Another one. It has changed a little since these photos were done. It now sports the JCW grilles up front now.

I hope this works

I'll dig some photos out from when I purchased the car, up to where I am with it now. Not quite sure how quick it actually is, but it's all coming together rather nicely. Maybe if there's any regional meets in the Kent area, I can come along in my mini. One thing is for sure......... you will certainly hear the car from afar! I run it with a janspeed manifold, a decat pipe, and a Miltek cat back system.