Mini Memories. What are yours?

[NorfolkNWeigh]

I want to know what Chuck Berry was doing in your Mini, was he nicking it? Arf arf. I'll raise the bar, saw him in concert in that there London in the 70s and the mode of transport was a Consul Capri GT.

Nice choice of motah....I had to endure the firm's Renner 4 when I took my then bird to see Chuck in '79, my first experience of the great man live. Wherever that Zephyr 6 of mine lives now it should still have a CB ticket that fell from its perch on the dashtop airvents....
The photo of me with the Cowley was taken at a Marty Wilde and Charlie Gracie gig.....Charlie is sadly no longer with us but we have MW tickets for December.

It's all getting a bit off topic but it is not generally known that Gene Vincent bought and drove an A40 Farina whilst he was living and working over here. Not quite a Mini but no less surprising....

Here’s Marty’s lass in a mini

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Now that I would bounce on my balls.

[Split_Pin]

Great idea for a thread, everyone must have some Mini memories.

In the early 1980s, I would have been about 3 at the time and my mum.passed her test. She hated driving my dad's Cortina estate as it was too big so he bought her PST 525S, a bright green Clubman estate. She loved that car and its small size was a revelation for my mum. We went everywhere in that car and the van style doors meant it was easy for Gyp the dog to jump in and there was still room for my Scrambler trike.

As the years wore on it gradually became more grey primer patches than green and it needed a new sill as well. I think they got about £600 when they sold it. I'm not sure how reliable it was though as I recall my dad asking my mum 'how's the Mini' every evening when he came in from work.

[Broccoli]

A few more miles on it today.

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[Warren t claim]

Still would.

[xtriple]

My first car was a Mini Cooper 'S', 'G' reg and custom painted blue and black it looked great. I had to sell my bike and save the £4 a week I earned from my Saturday job (House of Fraser store in Leamington Spa) to pay for it - £359 it cost. Christ, those were the days.

I had the windows tinted black and put High back reclining seats in it, had a dashboard made for it and a centre console with a wicked stereo. I loved that car and had many great times in it: I had one friend with another Mini, absolutely tatty as fuck with a fibreglass flip front and the horniest engine known to man and no interior, big wheels on the front and standard rears.

Two other mates had MK1 Lotus Cortina's and the four of us would go out very early on Sunday morning and tear arse around the Charlcote bends, each week, at least one car went home on a tow rope...

Had a few more over the years but when my wife and I were not long married, even though we had just bought a brand new KIA, she fell in love with a Mini. Fair enough, I love them too so we went mad on the sod...

Engine and front discs from a Metro (1275 with a 1340 overbore) a decent (lumpy as fuck) camshaft, 13inch Minilites (which looked great but ruined it to be honest) all new panels, a new dash, seats from a Subaru Impreza and a white paintjob with glitter metalflake in it so it constantly looked like a frosty morning!

It did go very well but I hated driving it (wasn't my car, I 'inherited' the sodding KIA which I hated) but was a touch unreliable, clutch went, rear subframe snapped a week after it was MOT'd , all sorts.

I nearly bought another a couple of years ago even though I know they are cramped, slow, unreliable, noisy and rot for fun. They are GREAT fun!

[FhakeConcern]

When my GF (now Mrs Concern) went to college (LCF) in the early 80s she had the Blaze Mini 1000 & I had the 1275GT. On the same course was a lad who also had the hots for Mrs Concern and she went around with a group including him. He was also into Minis and had a Pickup with a 1275 engine and disks on the front. He had several other Minis including an old rusty Teal 1275GT that my mate bought off of him. Anyway I became good friends with him despite the strange relationship with my GF. Often I would be called to pick her up late in the evening after she’d had too much to drink, either I cycled in and put my bike in the back of her Mini or drove in and left hers where it was. However what this is leading up to is I would chat to him on these evenings and tell each other stories usually involving Minis and one of the best ones of his was he often saw a mate of his out in his own Mini and if heading towards him, one of them would go on the wrong side and only swap back at the last second. So he did this one time and only realised very late that it wasn’t his friend at all!
We are still all friends and he now has three Triumph bikes, two Defenders (actually ones a Series 3 I think), a Porsche 914, a Volvo Amazon a Razor Edge Karmann Ghia and some sort of Merc Estate.

[Asimo]

Back to mini Panda cars. This is the best image the internet has of a Clubman Panda car.

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My professional mini driving came to an end whilst persuing some toe-rags along an unmade track. It was very bumpy so I was going slowly but I was watching the crims, not looking where I was going. I had been down the same track not long before.
There was a crunch. I stopped, I couldn't see what had made the noise. I got out and then I noticed the pole-barrier that was pressed up against the blue light on the roof. It had been open last time!
I radio'd in with the bad news. Damage to Pandas was taken very, very seriously. Reception was shit, all they heard was "roof damage" so everyone turned out expecting that I had rolled it. They were very obviously disappointed the damage was so trivial.

I was fired shortly afterwards, for "not fitting in". Which I'll take as a complement.

One of my slotted-plod colleagues had one of these mini-coupés as her personal wheels.

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She spent quite a lot on fighting the rust, but wouldn't be parted from it. I've never seen another one.

[mercrocker]

They had a kind of DB6 look to them from the back (if you squinted and had the perspecacity of Father Dougal), I saw a couple back in the day in various Mini shows and race events. I think somebody was knocking out copies in the late 90s, too....

[Eddie Honda]

Was the roof part GRP? Only ever saw one in a book.

One of these, probably the paint one.

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[mercrocker]

Yeah, fibreglass....