Lunch at Woodmans

Posted on by Ian C.

Even though “big snow” threatens, five MINIs and eight people headed down to Woodmans in Essex today to say “hi” and have lunch …

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Minolta DSC
Minolta DSC

Rick & Laurie, Harvey & Terry, Joe & Debbie, Jared & I enjoyed non-MINI chat, fried clams and scallops; Terry was disappointed that there was no dessert but I am sure she can find something when they get home!

Thanks to Jared for organizing the get-together on this MINI2 thread.

GBMINI is in pieces!

Posted on by Ian C.

For Christmas, Margaret bought me a custom jigsaw puzzle, of GBMINI & other MINIs during the Coopers For Caregivers run last year. Trying to piece it together is challenging because of the scale – GBMINI is close to the camera and a single piece does not represent much of the car – the license plate is six pieces! But further back, the MINIs are smaller and one piece is almost a whole car …

I am not good at jigsaws, and did only a few pieces, but Margaret is very good and has successfully rebuilt all the MINIs:

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Minolta DSC
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A great gift, although I noticed that the colors have been slightly offset during printing, so there is a red “ghosting” around the more distance parts of the picture.

Snow, Wind, Waves, and Snow Tires!

Posted on by Ian C.

Yesterday and overnight we had an impressive “nor’easter” – a storm sitting out over the Atlantic Ocean, spinning moisture off the water back over the land as falling snow. Coupled with high winds, we have perhaps 8″ or more of snow, sculpted into pretty patterns, drifts, etc:


After digging out GBMINI I decided to drive to the nearby coast at Bass Rocks – but Police had closed the road due to dangerous waves – so I headed round to Good Harbor Beach instead (normally a bit more sheltered); normally this footbridge crosses a stream and leads to the sandy beach – today all is inundated with ocean!

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Minolta DSC
Minolta DSC
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Minolta DSC

During my drive, I experimented as much as possible with the performance of GBMINIs new tires. Most of the roads were plowed but still had a layer of packed & slippery snow; in these conditions, GBMINI performed quite well and very predictably. DSC was kept busy but I found that unless I was very aggressive in braking, ABS did not cut in.
I was not able to drive GBMINI from a standing start up a steep driveway – for that I guess you need snow tires at a minimum.

Overall, I will be confident in these tires through the sort of weather we have here – if the roads are not plowed a MINI is no use anyway (I heard snow against the bottom of GBMINI regularly today), and the tires gave me a useful level of grip today.
This is a summary I sent to a friend a week or so back:
Overall I am happy with the tires.
Their dry performance is probably a little better than the runflats, but I can still trip DSC if I push GBMINI.
Their wet performance is definitely better than the runflats, which often hydro-planed in very wet conditions.
Yesterdays snow performance seemed good. On a test on black ice, I had to brake quite hard before the ABS kicked in, and they never surprised me by letting go unexpectedly on the snow.
They don’t improve the ride massively compared with the runflats, which is my only disappointment. I think they help to smooth out the normal small irregularities on the road, but they don’t do anything with bigger ruts and potholes. I guess in the end the MINIs suspension is just very stiff.
They are definitely quieter than my old runflats – but I don’t know how quiet brand new runflats would be (mine were awfully noisy at 20K+ miles).