[Nobbc] More than you want to know about Minis

Mon Jan 31 17:44:54 MST 2011

and cars you have to spend 2-4+ hours prepping for a monthly 2 hour
drive....

C.M. is back in Santa Rosa with his blue '65 Australian Mini.... 

Peter

-----Original Message-----
From: nobbc-bounces at autox.team.net [mailto:nobbc-bounces at autox.team.net] On
Behalf Of Liam O'Flaherty
Sent: Monday, January 31, 2011 4:01 PM
To: North Bay British Car Club
Subject: Re: [Nobbc] More than you want to know about Minis

I thought British cars were classified as the ones that leave oil spots in
your driveway.
Seems simple to me.
Liam
On Jan 31, 2011, at 3:29 PM, Clif & Deborah Williamson wrote:

> Works for me.  I will have to come up with a category for non British,
British cars.  Any ideas.  Sounds like a fun event.  Where is it?
> Clif
> 74 JH
>
>
> -----Original Message----- From: Peter Ziedrich
> Sent: Monday, January 31, 2011 2:51 PM
> To: 'North Bay British Car Club'
> Subject: Re: [Nobbc] More than you want to know about Minis
>
> UBSCC deals with it in a very simple manner at the Woodland Car Show 
> (which I attend yearly)... if you think it's British they will go along
with it.
At
> their shows you will see German Cars (MINIs, Bentleys, Daimlers- 
> licensed
by
> German Daimler), Irish or American cars (DeLoreans), Italian, Spanish, 
> New Zealand, Argentina Cars (Minis), American Cars (English Fords, 
> Jaguars,
Nash
> Healey's & Metro's, Aston Martins), etc. etc. etc....
>
> Btw, what is a Mazda? It's been partially owned by Ford for years and 
> Ford has been doing the primary designing for years?
> Looking at Wikipedia, Aston Martins are no longer predominantly owned 
> by Ford but also by Kuwaiti Investors and the cars are manufactured in
Austria.
> What would James Bond say?
>
> Peter
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: nobbc-bounces at autox.team.net 
> [mailto:nobbc-bounces at autox.team.net] On Behalf Of Clif & Deborah 
> Williamson
> Sent: Monday, January 31, 2011 1:49 PM
> To: North Bay British Car Club
> Subject: Re: [Nobbc] More than you want to know about Minis
>
> Peter,
> You couldn't have said it better.
> Perhaps it would be best to say, that if a car has British roots, it 
> is British.  I have a bit of a problem with that, but I can't think of 
> a
better
> way to deal with the issue.
> Clif
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Peter Ziedrich
> Sent: Monday, January 31, 2011 12:43 PM
> To: 'North Bay British Car Club'
> Subject: Re: [Nobbc] More than you want to know about Minis
>
> Where this logic might be sound, then I guess new Jaguars and Land 
> Rovers aren't British but Indian, and new Bentley Continentals are 
> German (owned
by
> BMW and looks like BMWs), and Aston Martins are American... hmmm...
> Okay. Does that make recent Jeeps German and later ones Italian?
>
> I guess what I am saying is that no cars manufactured today have a 
> clean pedigree. Almost all Japanese cars sold in the Western 
> hemisphere are manufactured in the US, and most American automobiles 
> are manufactured and/or assembled in Mexico, Canada, or China. In fact 
> one of the newer
Buick
> models is manufactured in Germany.  I guess most of us believe the 
> cars pedigree should be assigned to the country where the profits end 
> up.... but only sometimes.. only when it supports our personal biases.
>
> peter
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: nobbc-bounces at autox.team.net 
> [mailto:nobbc-bounces at autox.team.net] On Behalf Of Clif & Deborah 
> Williamson
> Sent: Monday, January 31, 2011 12:08 PM
> To: North Bay British Car Club
> Subject: Re: [Nobbc] More than you want to know about Minis
>
> Thanks Gerry.
> But what I get from this is that the BMW Mini is not British at all.
Except
> for a few part here and there and a similar exterior design, it is 
> pretty much "GERMAN".  I think almost all manufacturers of cars buy 
> parts made in other countries, but I don't think because a Toyota or 
> any of it's parts
are
> made in the USA, that it is an American car.  Nor a VW made in Mexico, 
> is a Mexican car.  In fact it would seem that the only thing that 
> truly has British heritage on the Mini is the name "Mini", as your 
> description below would attest.  I don't know if Cooper was the 
> designer of the BMW Mini, but even that would not change if it was 
> British or not, since Pininfarina was the designer of many non Italian 
> cars that are not considered Italian including the Jaguar, and
Rolls-Royce.
> Please, don't get me wrong.  I love the Mini, British, or German.  I 
> had an occasion back in 1970 to be hitch hiking in Sweden and was 
> picked up by a Swed driving a Dodge Charger.  After a few miles of 
> back country roads a Mini came up behind and past us.  Well this Swed 
> was not going to be
outdone
> by a little cracker box so off we went.  And after about 5 miles of
twisting
> Swedish roads he gave up.  I was so pumped up by the adrenaline rush 
> caused by the chase I was shaking when he dropped my off in the middle 
> of no
where.
>
> At that point I realized, that "might does not make right" and fell 
> crazy
in
> love with the Mini.
> Clif
> 74 JH
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: G. Mugele
> Sent: Monday, January 31, 2011 11:03 AM
> To: North Bay British Car Club
> Subject: [Nobbc] More than you want to know about Minis
>
> Ahem...  well Greg, you have the virtue of youth; you're not old
> enough to really have this down.   However, it was not as straight-
> forward as all that.
>
> BMC built the Austin Seven and Morris Mini-Minor at a couple plants in 
> England beginning in '59 or so.  The Morris quickly acquired the 
> sobriquet 'Mini" in popular UK vernacular.  Very soon afterward the 
> Austin also
became
> the 'Mini.'  I can only guess that the appellation was the result of 
> how people described them.  Anyway... as the popularity grew BMC did 
> some badge engineering and also marketed the Riley Elf and the 
> Wolseley Hornet, giving them some hideous fins and other awkward 
> cosmetics.  Those poor cousins
were
> also called Minis.
> Not long after the initial introduction, BMC upped the displacement to 
> a throbbing hunk of iron displacing 998cc and called it the Austin
> Mini Cooper or the Morris Mini Cooper.   Those soon  became simply
> "Mini Coopers."  Time and popularity soon brought us many variants as 
> well as more and more powerful versions.  Those sporty ones were 
> labeled with things like 'S' and '1275 S.'
>
> Around the time or shortly after BMC became British Leyland, the 
> company formally adopted the Mini name and the cars were sold under the
'Mini'
> label.  Of course by then there were variants all over the
> world: Italy, Spain, Chile, New Zealand, Belgium and a number of other 
> countries all had plants.  Some were factory and some were built under 
> license (Innocenti). I don't know who made the Mini Moke but I suspect 
> that it was an official BMC product.
>
> In the 90s BMW became the parent company by buying Land Rover (Rover
> Group) from British Aerospace.  At that time Rover Group was owner of 
> what was left of BMC.  I suspect BMW bought Rover to cover for the 
> lack of an
SUV
> in the market.  When BMW introduced the X5 they quickly dumped Land 
> Rover
on
> Ford and at the same time sold the rest of Rover Group (including MG) 
> to some British consortium.  But BMW decided to keep
> the Mini name and opted to build a new model.   The original Mini was
> out of production by 2000 or so.
>
> The BMW Mini is related only in layout and appearance.
>
> BTW mine was a '61 Mini Cooper.  It was grossly overpowered :) with 
> that 55 HP beast under the hood.  I am amazed that I survived owning 
> that
incredibly
> fun little car: it inspired spirited driving well
> beyond my skills at the time.   These days, with 400+ HP engines
> relatively commonplace, it's hard to imagine that 50 years ago 100 
> horsepower was a real handful, especially in our LBCs.
>
> This concludes todays lecture.
>
> Gerry
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Jan 31, 2011, at 8:22 AM, Greg Tatarian wrote:
>
>> I'll let John answer to tell you what he wants to call his MINI, but 
>> here's the deal on these cars (I know as we have a 2011 Mini John 
>> Cooper Works (JCW) Hardtop;
>>
>> The car company is "MINI", which as owned by BMW differentiates its 
>> name from the original "Mini", which, short version here, was made 
>> both by Austin and Morris in the UK, and other companies overseas 
>> under license during the day.
>
> G. Mugele
> mewgull at mugele.net
>
> *** "Life in Lubbock, Texas taught me two things. One is that God 
> loves you and you're going to burn in hell. The other is that sex is 
> the most awful, dirty thing on the face of the earth and you should
> save it for someone you love." --   Butch Hancock
> _______________________________________________
> Nobbc at autox.team.net
> Donate: http://www.team.net/donate.html Suggested annual donation  
> $11.47
> Archive: http://www.team.net/archive
> Forums: http://www.team.net/forums
> Unsubscribe/Manage:
> http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/nobbc/hawkview@sonic.net
> _______________________________________________
> Nobbc at autox.team.net
> Donate: http://www.team.net/donate.html Suggested annual donation  
> $11.47
> Archive: http://www.team.net/archive
> Forums: http://www.team.net/forums
> Unsubscribe/Manage:
> http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/nobbc/zied@redwoodempiremini.com
> _______________________________________________
> Nobbc at autox.team.net
> Donate: http://www.team.net/donate.html Suggested annual donation  
> $11.47
> Archive: http://www.team.net/archive
> Forums: http://www.team.net/forums
> Unsubscribe/Manage:
> http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/nobbc/hawkview@sonic.net
> _______________________________________________
> Nobbc at autox.team.net
> Donate: http://www.team.net/donate.html Suggested annual donation  
> $11.47
> Archive: http://www.team.net/archive
> Forums: http://www.team.net/forums
> Unsubscribe/Manage:
> http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/nobbc/zied@redwoodempiremini.com
> _______________________________________________
> Nobbc at autox.team.net
> Donate: http://www.team.net/donate.html Suggested annual donation  
> $11.47
> Archive: http://www.team.net/archive
> Forums: http://www.team.net/forums
> Unsubscribe/Manage:
http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/nobbc/hawkview@sonic.net
_______________________________________________
> Nobbc at autox.team.net
> Donate: http://www.team.net/donate.html Suggested annual donation  
> $11.47
> Archive: http://www.team.net/archive
> Forums: http://www.team.net/forums
> Unsubscribe/Manage:
http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/nobbc/liamof@earthlink.net
_______________________________________________
Nobbc at autox.team.net
Donate: http://www.team.net/donate.html
Suggested annual donation  $11.47
Archive: http://www.team.net/archive
Forums: http://www.team.net/forums
Unsubscribe/Manage:
http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/nobbc/zied@redwoodempiremini.com