Kolumne von John Cooper in der MiniWorld, Ausgabe Dezember 2000. Ich finde sie sehr interessant, sie zeigt doch, wie John Cooper den neuen Mini sah.
Royal Heritage
I am writing this column just a couple of days after the world premiere of the new mini, and a couple of days before the old Mini line at Lonfbridge is shut down after 41 glorious years. As I am sure you can all imagine, these events arouse some very mixed emotions in me.
When I consider the new Mini, it all sarted for me when BMW first took over Rover and I met with the then top man fron Germany company, Bernd Pichetsrieder. I met him initially as he had become a good friend of Lord Hesketh; Hesketh was on the board of British Aerospace, Rover's previous owners, and they worked together over the sale of the company to BMW.
Pichetsrieder went to the British Grand Prix as guest of Hesketh who, as some of you will know, actually lives 'next door' to Silverstone.With Hesketh being such a prominent member of the BRDC (the club that owns Silverstone), our paths were bound to cross. What impressed me from our first meeting was Pichetsrieder's enthusiasm for motoring, motorsport and his understanding of the history of modern cars. He was not just a chairman of a big company; he loved and understood cars.
At the 35th birthday party for the Mini, he was again in Silverstone - ironically as guast of John Towers, MD for Rover that time - when he told me thet his ambition for the new Mini was, "to replace the Mini with a new car as near as the original as we can get."
Of course, the original Mini could have ended in 1996 because of the problems the engineers were having Type Approval over emission regulations.This was when Mike Theaker came up with the twin-point injection system to meet the emission targets and keep the car going until this year. Pichetsrieder was fully supportive of this. He could have easily refused, saying it was too expensive, but he wanted to keep the old car going while they worked on designing a new one.
I was pleased that Pichetsrieder wanted myself and my son Michael to be involved in the new Mini project right from the start. He made quite clear and told me that BMW would call the car a Mini Cooper because he said, a Mini in Germany is juat a small, mini car but, "a Mini Cooper means something. It means Monte Carlo Rally. It means success."
To achieve this he asked 15 designers to design a new Mini. We then had meetings in Gaydon looking at the designs and I can say now that Frank Stephenson's was by far the best design of the lot. Frank is an American who was working for BMW in the States before he came to England to design the Mini. And the result looks very good as everyone saw when it was unveiled to the world in Paris last month.
I have come to know Frank really well over the last five years. He has been to the garage at Ferring several times and I think he has done a wondeful Job on the car. I know it has to be bigger to meet the rules and regulations for Type Approval but, when I look at it , it does look Mini and that's the main thing. In my view, they couldn't have found a better designer.
As for the engine, Mike Theaker has worked with BMW right from the very beginning which is very important. Equally important, of course, is what the car feels like to drive. Myself, Michael and our engineer Tony Franks used to go to Gaydon and drive the prototypes. You can rest assured that it does have that direct Mini feel through the steering.
Unfortunately, as we all know, there has been a split between Rover and BMW wich really is a shame. At least BMW are continuing with the Mini and it will still be build at Cowley, which I am very pleased about.
Michael has done a huge amount of work on the tuning kits for the original Mini and we are hopeful that we will be able to do similar job for the New Mini: Michael is working closely with BMW on this. He has been to Munich on a number of occasions and was at the Paris Motor Show for the launch of the new car which he says was a great success. As I am writing this before the British Motor Show, the cars haven't yet seen by the British public but I think they will get a similar positive reception.
After 41 years, it is very sad to see the end of the line for the Mini at Longbridge, but that's life. That's just the way it goes. This fantastic little car will never be forgotten - all the enthusiasts in the clubs all over the world will see to that. at least there is now a new Mini to carry on, which means that Longbridge stops, Cowley gets started, which can't be bad.
I have some fabulous memories of this car that has been such an important part of my life, which will stay with me forever. And speaking personally, as the production of the old car greases, it is great that my son has become so involved with the new version. You could sa that i'm th old Mini and he's the new Mini!