AMVILV Banquet

Here at the basically the end of the weekend's events. Lots of people
here. What's really amazing is the reach of this event. One person
drove from Charlotte, NC - 2,604 miles. He was deemed to have driven
the furthest narowly beating the MINI Club of Calgary.

Day Two @ AMVIV VI

The day has started beautifully. It's around in the low 70s with a
mild breeze. A lot of cars here, buy not a ton of people yet. There
are some morning runs going on so I suppose things will pick-up after
noon.

Here is a picture across the valley and as you can see, beutiful
weather so far.

Large Variety of MINIs

A lot of MINIs are starting to arrive here at Palace Station. The
variety and uniqueness of MINI is quite evident. Like MINI likes to
tell people, with all the options and aftermarket choices out
there...there probably are no two MINIs that are identical.

More to come.

At Spring Mountain

Sorry about the update lag. Unfortunately I had some technical
difficulties at the track event. Consequently, I will post more
details about it some time next week.

In the meantime, I am now at the Palace Station where many MINIs have
gathered. I will post some pics and more information shortly.

Check back soon.

Early Start

Waiting on the valet to get on the road. Will be reporting from the
track shortly with updates and pictures.

Las Vegas

Just before 1:00 AM and checked-in. Time to get some sleep to leave
for the track early. Check back for updates at the track, as well as
events at the MINI Vacation in Vegas car show throughout the weekend.

State Line

Just before midnight and I've made it to State Line. I saw a few
MINI's on the highway and look forward to meeting people in the
community over the weekend.

Next stop, Las Vegas...

Liquid Energy...

Tack-on another 90 minutes of driving and I've arrived in Barstow. Not
really tired, but could use the energy boost. A Venti Iced Caramel
Macchiato should hit the spot.

Before leaving NM headquarters, we put some new shoes on the NM R56 so
I was looking forward getting aquainted with the BFG KDWs. So far the
grip is incredible and response is very crisp. As many of you already
know, switching out of run-flat tires makes a world of difference. The
ride has improved vastly.

I will have a more detailed blog about the new wheels and tires next
week.

BTW, big shout out to our friends at BF Goodrich for helping with our
project R56!

Pitstop Antelope Valley

Left Camarillo at about 6:30 and decided to stop at the sis-in-law's
house to stretch my legs and have a quick dinner - in these trying
economic times, trying to keep the company expenses down!

Driving up to the Antelope Valley was pretty drama free with only a
little bit of traffic. Driving uphill, the NM R56 still made pretty
good mileage, about 32 mpg - is there any other car out there that is
fun to drive and this frugal with fuel consumption? It's no wonder
people live their MINIs.

More updates to come.

The Road Trip Begins...

NM Engineering Product Catalog

Our first catalog is at the printers now and will be ready for mailing in the next few days. All of us here are really proud of it and want to share it with all of you MINI enthusiasts. To receive one, simply email your name and complete mailing address to catalog@nm-eng.com. We will mail you one as soon as possible.

A MINI Vacation in Vegas / North American MINI Cooper Challenge Time Trials

In conjunction with our dealer Kappasphere, I will be attending the upcoming event, "a MINI Vegas Vacation". Festivities for this event begin Thursday in Sin City and I will be there late Friday and most of Saturday. Look for Kappasphere as we will be handing out our new catalog with pretty pictures of our parts.

For more details regarding a MINI Vacation in Vegas, go here:
http://amviv.com/

Also, early Friday morning I will be at Spring Mountain Motorsports Ranch for the North American MINI Cooper Challenge Time Trials. So look for me there as well...will be there with the Kappasphere guys as well.

For more information about the track, go here:
http://www.springmountainmotorsports.com/

For more information about the MINI Cooper Challenge event, go here:
http://www.minidriving.com/raceseries.asp

While you're at it, visit Kappasphere's MINI Cooper sub-site here:
http://www.kappasphere.com/mini/

Looks like a lot of MINIs and Minis will be converging on Vegas, so stay tuned to this blog as I will be updating it often from both venues with lots of pictures.

Koni Sport Shocks

Koni recently released their Sport dampers for the late model MINIs. Obviously, Koni is well known by MINI enthusiast as their Sport and FSD dampers seem to be the popular choice for the R50, R52, and R53 enthusiast.

The damper install took place February 17th and I wanted to put some significant miles on them before posting an evaluation. Since then, I have driven about 1,200 miles with them installed, which includes a long excursion to Las Vegas and a Southern California sales call loop which found me motoring on several freeways, the 101, 210, 15, 91, 57, 110 and 405. If you are from Southern California, you know that those different freeways provide unique challenges for any suspension system.

PARTS AND INSTALLATION

Let's start with the dampers themselves - Koni has been around for ages now and their engineers did a fantastic job with these. Both front and rear units are twin-tube low pressure gas units that provide externally adjustable rebound damping. This is a plus as the front units can be adjusted while they remain installed on the vehicle. We drilled a small hole in the rubber upper bearing cap to facilitate adjustment. Unfortunately, the rear dampers need to be removed from the vehicle for adjustment as there is no way to reach the top of the piston rod while they are installed. There may be a way to drill through the floor of the trunk to provide access, however, I do not recommend this.

As is the norm, installation was very straightforward. The front units are complete strut assemblies and simply replace the OE units without much fanfare. The rear units require some minor mods for installation - the upper spring hat and washer needed to drilled out so to accommodate the slightly larger Koni shock rod. Also, the OE rubber stone chip guard needs to be transferred to the new units.

MOTORING IMPRESSION

Just to recap, I have been driving our company MINI daily using our RS-a lowering springs. With the OE dampers, the car, to me, actually rode better than stock...however they did lack a little rebound control when driven over rough or uneven road surface. After having significant seat time with the Koni Sports, my opinion is that any lowered MINI owner that wants to improve the ride and handling should purchase these right away. The chassis is significantly more controlled now and handling is razor sharp. With the OE units, any significant road irregularity during cornering would unsettle the chassis, whereas now they are soaked up very nicely increasing confidence when motoring at near the limit of physical adhesion.

In terms of ride quality, one of the chief complaints is the choppy ride nature of the MINI synonymous with almost any other short wheelbase car on the road. With the Koni Sports installed, the car can still feel rather choppy, especially along certain swaths of uneven concrete sections of the 101 freeway...however the "choppyness" seems a quite a bit more subdued now because of the increased rebound damping - Good job Koni!

On the several long drives I have had since installation, I found the car to be very comfortable on the wide varieties of highways here in Socal. On the drive to Lost Wages, I mean Las Vegas, most people do not drive at or near the speed limit. Cruising along at a constant 110 mph was a breeze, the car was very stable, almost unflappable. There are some nice, high-speed, long sweeping turns as you drive through the Halloran Pass before entering Nevada and again, the car performed beautifully holding its line when the occasional "whoop-dee-do" was encountered. Overall, the Koni Sport dampers are well engineered and definitely provide an upgrade over their OE counterparts.

Quick update, here we just received some Koni FSD kits for the 2nd generation MINIs. We will be installing very soon on our R55 and I will report back with some feedback. In the meantime, let me know if you have any questions by emailing me.

Last but not least, I would like to send a special shout out to Koni for generously donating shocks for our project car!