19 replies to this topic

[silverboarder]

Hi ya I'm looking at a X reg rover Mini Cooper and i am concerned about the amount of rust around the windscreen, what is this section of the body work called, can you get a replacement and is it worth doing! The rust is at its worst between the wipers and the window and the is some bad patches around the top too. Help!!!! Any thoughts? Thanks all. (unfortunately this part of the car was the only part that came out really blurry in the photos so no pic!Doh)

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[robtheplod]

I think this is the part ....

http://www.minispare.....ROUND LOWER...

[ANON]

the top on the passengers side looks quite bad. chances are you're goung to need a full scuttle/screen panel on it.
plus any other nasty bits that come to light when you take the scuttle off

[Git]

It was that part that bumped up the price of Boo's resto.....

[Guess-Works.com]

Holy sh*t...

what's up with the door !!!

It's called a scuttle ( well the lower part ), but does look like the whole windscreen surround needs urgent attention... the only way to get round it, is to do it properly... which means, removing the wings ( A panels look like they need renewing anyway ) and replacing the whole surround for a new one..

Cost of doing the above, probably means the mini is worth nowhere near what the seller is asking....

I'm fairly sure many 'in the trade' would look at that as a lost cause and use it as a donor for spares.. for it to be worth it, it'd have to be seriously low mileage with comprehensive service history.

Edited by GuessWorks.co.uk, 09 April 2009 - 09:05 AM.

[mike.]

Doors are also expencive to refurb unless you can do it yourself.

[mini-obsessive]

ive never seen an X Reg in that bad condition!! Its worse than mine and mine is a C Reg!
It will be expensive to replace the scuttle and doors!
How much are they asking for the car?

[Guess-Works.com]

well if it's four figures, it's one figure too many...

[mini-obsessive]

well if it's four figures, it's one figure too many...

Agree with you on that one mate!!

[Juju]

I've seen several MPis in that state.
Don't go near it unless you want to reshell the thing.
It's likely that the sills and boot floor have gone too.
Find yourself another.

[Pencils]

£10.01 is four figures!

[mike.]

In terms of cost of repairs. A pair of refurbed doors (i guess the passenger door is just as bad if its been looked after like the drivers) will set you back about £300 maybe more if the frames really bad. Then the scuttle/winscreen panel, A panels and maybe wings will be another few hundred.

Unless you are a good welder already, i'd forget about this car. A body shop would charge hundreds, maybe over a thousand to do the welding and spraying.

And if the cars been neglected, chances are you'll find alot more rust is even more critical places.

I'd stay well clear unless its only a couple of hundred quid and you can weld.

[Goopster]

I'm also surprised by what I see in the picture. I am surprised by the amount of visible corrosion in a car that is only around ten years old - I would never have imaged a door could have holed out like that in such a short period of time. Maybe there was something wrong with the glass seal as there is some really strange rusting below it at the bottom of the window, i've never seem Mini's rust to that extent in that area. Maybe there was a bad repair done there in the past? As Guessworks & others have noted, the windscreen scuttle area can be a bit tricky to repair, it's normally a wings off job if you want to do it properly, and you also find that that what you see on the outside is ten times worse underneath. It's definately rusted all the way along the lower edge of the windscreen and is bulging the rubber seal out so I reckon there will be a lot of crispy brown stuff under there which could lead to a costly repair. Also as others have stated, there is likely to be rust in other areas too. Check the rear corners of the boot floor, all of the sills, inner and outer, particularly at the rear, where the subframe mounts, and the floorpans.

I know they've never gone overboard with it from the word go in 1959, but were the late 1995+ Mini's not treated to the same level rustproofing from the factory that we saw on earlier models? Or is it down to quality of paint / steel that was used? In particular, do MPI's always seem to rust more around the windscreen, or is it me?

Regards

Edited by Goopster, 09 April 2009 - 10:49 AM.

[Guess-Works.com]

The 'wide' window seal doesn't help matters... if water is trapped behind then it has a bigger area to go at before it's noticed, and by that time... it's game over as not only has the joint gone, but most of the metal around it...

I've seen MPi's with the inner dash rail completely shot too...

[dougie1142]

I have a 1994 Mini, which has rust around the windscreen (look at my project thread) but not nearly as bad i dont think, and that door looks reeeeally bad! seems weird if you ask me! Luckily my mini was free!