Recently received a link to Joshua’s write-up of his tour of the MINI factory in Oxford:
While I was in Luxembourg I knew I had to head back to the Reading office, so I gave a mail over to the folks at MINI. A flurry of E-mail later it was determined that on February 14th, valentines night, I would tour the MINI factory …
I stood by the “Tyre” fitting station for a good amount of time and I counted at least 25 different style rims being fitted onto the MINIs …
We were in a group that marked over 25,000 plant tour visitors. Quite a bit for introducing the tour just over 2 years ago …
The tour guide at first denied the production rumors about the Clubman or Traveler, but when I pressed him for details he said that they would not be produced this year, and that they were putting together a new Vehicle Assembly Building for them, and they WOULD NOT be made this year …
They flatly denied any rumor or possibility that a 2 door Triumph model would be produced in the near future …
You can see my 2003 factory tour write-up here, and another one from Pat here.
The factory tour is fascinating and absolutely recommended to any MINI fanatic – but take care that with the ’07 redesign this year, there are likely to be restrictions on tour availability.
If you can’t make it to England, check out the MINI manufacturing info on the MINI international website.
M&I / GBMINI 