 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
The MiniHowever you look at it, the Mini is an alltime great. Not only does it provide cheap transport for everyone, it's a technical triumph, a dominant rally car, a packaging masterpiece and, as britain's best-selling car ever, a runaway sales success.
Packaging was perhaps the Mini's greatest strength. For then, it was quite staggering how much interior space there was. Every square inch was used: there were big door storage bins, tiny 10in wheels that didn't intrude on passenger space, and a boot lid you could fold down to double up as a luggage platform. Amazingly, it took just two years to develop the Mini for production. Launch was set for 26 August 1959 and there were four versions initially: the Austin Mini Seven and Morris Mini Minor, each available in basic or De Luxe trim. Prices started at £496 - making it pretty much the cheapest car on sale. Costs were pared to the bone by fitting sliding windows, cable-pull door releases and external welded body seams.
What really sealed the Mini's reputation was the legendary Mini Cooper, launched in 1961. Issigonis was no fan of the idea of a go-faster Mini, but grand prix-winning constructor John Cooper persuaded BMC to extract the most out of the Mini's innate handling prowess. The Mini's use of subframes allowed a huge variety of Mini derivatives: van, pick-up, estate, long-boot Riley Elf and Wolseley Hornet, the Mini Moke workhorse turned leasure vehicle and, recently, the ultimate Mini Cabriolet. The Mini has seen many changes through the years: Hydrolastic Liquid suspension from 1964, winding windows from 1969, the option of square-nosed Clubman and 1275 GT versions from 1969, bigger 12in wheels from 1984 and standard 1275cc engines from 1992. But essentially the Mini's face has remained unchanged and today it has as passionate a following as ever. Indeed, it wholeheartedly justifies its election by numerous motoring pundits as the "Car of the Century". ADO 15 was the code name for the Mini. Alec Issigonis sketched his ideas - literally - on the back of envelopes, envisaging the most compact possible "cube" in which four passengers would sit, headed by a space-saving front wheel drive system. Other cars had used front-wheel drive and transverse engines before, but none had done so in such a small space. A typical Issigonis leap of imagination led to mounting the gearbox under the engine instead of behind it, saving inches. Another innovation was Dr Alex Moulton's rubber cone suspension system.
BUILT: 1959-TODAY IN LONGBRIDGE, BIRMINGHAM.
|
||
The
story of the Mini is all the more remarkable because it was designed
virtually singlehandedly by Alec Issigonis. This brilliant engineer
of Greek descent was hired by Leonard Lord, head of the British
Motor Corporation, in 1956 to design a medium-sized saloon - just
as the Suez crisis erupted. British drivers were rationed to just
10 gallons of petrol a month and the need for an economy car became
urgent.
The
buying public was suspicious of this curious little car at first.
But it soon dawned what a remarkable car the Mini was. It handled
better than any rival (and most sports cars), it could also boast
"penny-a-mile" running costs, it was nippy, delightfully
easy to park and looked chic too. It quickly became fashionable
to own one and the word Mini passed into the everyday english language.
The
car's reputation was sealed when John Cooper stroked the 848cc Mini
engine up to 997cc (later 998cc), increasing power from 34bhp to
55bhp. Now it was a real hotrod: over 87mph was possible. An S model
was launched in 1963 with 70bhp on tap and Coopers were capable
of almost 100mph. BMC fielded works Mini Coopers with incredible
success. "Normal" Coopers won the Tulip Rally in 1962-63,
while the "S" was all-conquering in British saloon car
racing and the Monte Carlo Rally, which it won three times in 1964,
1965 and 1967. The Cooper was dropped in 1971 as part of british
leyland's rationalization plans. but the legend was revived in 1990
when Rover launched a new-generation 1275cc Mini-Cooper.
The
British army put proto- type Mokes on trial in 1960 but found its
low ground clear- ance hindered progress across anything more arduous
than wet grass, and decided to stick to Land-Rovers. But having
spent money developing the Moke, it seemed a shame to waste it.
So it went on sale in 1964. Mokes featured large in The Prisoner,
and in the underground scenes in Bond's The Man With The Golden
Gun.A beefed-up version was made in Australia until 1982. Then it
moved to Portugal and, finally, to Italy, where it is, theoretically,
still available.