Mini Cooper S - phenomenal??

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Kompete

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I have not driven one, but they seem terribly fast. I "observed" ;) a race between a Cooper S and a Z4 M coupe (252kW), and was astonished by how well the mini held on; probably only a 0.5 sec diff on a 0-100km sprint ??

And this for a car with a 1.6 litre engine (128kW)...even if chipped can it really be that close?? (assuming the //M driver knew what he was doing)
 
Yip they very very quick!
I think it would have done well against the M.
FWD will be quicker of the line, with a turbo... yip till 140 it will stick with the M, after that the M will pull away easy.
 
So then the Cooper S is a normal 1.6l Cooper, but with a turbo in? lifting the power output from 88kW to 128kW. I see the spec sheet states a 0-100km in 7.1 secs for the Cooper S, that is over 2 secs slower than the 5sec sprint of the //M...no, I think that Cooper must have been on steriods :p
 
Kompete said:
So then the Cooper S is a normal 1.6l Cooper, but with a turbo in? lifting the power output from 88kW to 128kW. I see the spec sheet states a 0-100km in 7.1 secs for the Cooper S, that is over 2 secs slower than the 5sec sprint of the //M...no, I think that Cooper must have been on steriods :p
Click to expand...

lol, a cooper IS a mini on steriods!
 
Whenever a NA car takes on a Turbo car up here this kind of results are not that surprising.
Even though its a 6 cylinder, a turbo is sometimes better.
You can also customise a Mini with the JCW conversion with small badges and thats about another second faster.
 
JK8 said:
Whenever a NA car takes on a Turbo car up here this kind of results are not that surprising.
Even though its a 6 cylinder, a turbo is sometimes better.
You can also customise a Mini with the JCW conversion with small badges and thats about another second faster.
Click to expand...

True that. My next car will definitely have a turbo in. Its such a waste to sit (at altitude) with this huge amount of 'potential' power and never able to unleash it:o
 
I thought the S had a supercharger and not a turbo?

I thought it was a 1.6 Supercharger.

:confused:

Still, had a nice go in one and then a Brabus 1.5 Smart.

These small bullet cars are awesome !!!!!!

Those Minis are quite safe as well.

:)
 
iDenTiTy said:
I thought the S had a supercharger and not a turbo?

I thought it was a 1.6 Supercharger.

:confused:

Still, had a nice go in one and then a Brabus 1.5 Smart.

These small bullet cars are awesome !!!!!!

Those Minis are quite safe as well.

:)
Click to expand...

The old spec pre 2006 (I think) were supercharged, new spec are turbo'ed. the new spec and the Peugeot 207 GTi have the exact same engine.
 
I never thought they'd be that potent.

Although i drove an OPC corsa the other day (i think 141kw and 6 kw overboost or somethn like that) i got into the car thinking agg just a 1.6 how bad can it be.
WELL, must admit it's "too much of fun" can only see myself getting into trouble with a car like that.
 
The JCW Mini Cooper S is barely 0.5 seconds faster than the normal Cooper S but you could boost it to around +-152kw without anything too fancy. A Cooper S will never even nearly keep up with a Z4 M Coupe driven by a decent driver. If you drive the newer Cooper S model the car is turbocharged whereas the pre2007 Cooper S was supercharged. A Cooper S could only do under a 6 second 0-100 I reckon with a huge turbo & intercooler squeezed into the supercharged S plus some extra intake/exhaust mods. That would cost a @#*ing ****load but you'd be a legend on track days!
 
Sensorei said:
The JCW Mini Cooper S is barely 0.5 seconds faster than the normal Cooper S
Click to expand...

I think I remember reading somewhere that the reason that the JCW MINI is not that much faster is because they change the gear ratios, so it needs to change to third before it reaches 100kph while the standard Cooper S can do it in second.
 
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iDenTiTy said:
I thought the S had a supercharger and not a turbo?

I thought it was a 1.6 Supercharger.

:confused:
Click to expand...
Depends on the year of the Mini Cooper S in question.
They used to be a 1.6 supercharged. Since the facelift they are now 1.6 turbocharged.
 
Some points to take into consideration :

1. The BMW Z4 M is normally aspirated which means it will only make about 214kW at Highveld altitude.

2. The BMW Z4 M has a kerb mass of 1420kg vs the Mini's 1205kg.
This mean that the power to mass ratio for the Z4 M is 150 W/kg vs the Cooper S's ratio of 103 W/kg at Highveld altitude.

3. The Mini Cooper S makes it's maximum torque of 240Nm at 1600 rpm.
The Z4 M makes it's max torque at 4900 rpm.
That means the Z4 driver is going to have to do a hard launch at 4000+ rpm in order to get into his power band quickly whereas the Mini driver has max torque from low down.
Max power on Mini is at 5500 rpm vs 7900 rpm for the Z4.

Now if you take the JCW Cooper S the power to mass ratio is 127W/kg which isn't that far off from the Z4 M's ratio of 150W/kg.
Certainly not bad for a car that costs half as much as the Z4 M and certainly looks better. :p
 
Er.

Obviously a heavily worked Cooper S.

I tried a friend in the previous supercharged Cooper S in my RunX RSI and although it hammered me, it wasn't quite the same distance as a Z4 M Coupe would do to me.

It is about 2-3 car lenghs ahead of a RunX RSI at reef at about 100km/h - whereas the BMW would be double that
 
Dolby said:
Er.

Obviously a heavily worked Cooper S.

I tried a friend in the previous supercharged Cooper S in my RunX RSI and although it hammered me, it wasn't quite the same distance as a Z4 M Coupe would do to me.

It is about 2-3 car lenghs ahead of a RunX RSI at reef at about 100km/h - whereas the BMW would be double that
Click to expand...

Give the Cooper a couple of bends and it'll be far more than a few car lengths ahead of a RunX. Straight line the mini isn't sooo fast, but it sticks to the road far better than most hot hatches.
 
Reminds me of my old UNO Turbo MKII, she stuck to the road like **** to a nappy and ran like a dream. Then the missus said, "You need a family car!" (she meant something with 4 doors) So I sold the UNO and bought a Palio 1.6EL 16v (and slapped a charger in her as soon as warrenty was up :) ) that ran rings around my old UNO, until some young lovely lady decided that she had the urge to jump a robot doing 120km and t-bone me :(
 
All I can say is don't underestimate Turbo charged engines, I'm gonna get knocked by VW fans but in SA especially not Opel Turbo cars. There are a lot of people adding Turbo's to Opel engines here these things produce insane amounts of power. Not the fastest around a course tho, Mini is better at that, Opel's tend to suffer from err, Turbo "Power Steering" you turn slightly left, boost kicks in and you're heading for a wall, needs a strong arm :P
 
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