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MINI Air Duct Fenders - Japan |
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CORNERS 
PSMINI Expert Advisor 
PSMINI Member Joined: July/29/10 Location: Bothell, WA Status: Offline Points: 3733 |
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 Topic: MINI Air Duct Fenders - JapanPosted: January/27/11 at 9:00pm |
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OK, so I'm going to be in Japan on business week after next and seriously considering getting a couple of these and having them shipped to the office... Good thing about MINI fenders- they are practically small enough to take home on the plane with you!!
I've never seen these in the US?
 They show a painted wheel flare in the picture, but the actual product reuses your existing wheel flares. A little bit pricey... Unpainted is about $450. Painted is $680!! (They sound a lot cheaper in Japanese yen...) I have some money still in my Japanese bank account. If it's not in my US bank account it's not real money, right? Edited by CORNERS - January/27/11 at 9:25pm |
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SuperCoop
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Posted: January/27/11 at 9:28pm |
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Wow, those are pretty sweet. You could actually do a conversion to those to act like side wheel vents like the other member (brain is mush right now, can't recall his name) did on here.
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Jason - '05 PS/B Cooper S, most packages, 17%, Brisk silver plugs, IE fixed camber plates & Craven STD's, Powerflex trans/dogbone mount poly inserts, 20mm Whiteline rear sway bar, SprintBooster.
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CORNERS
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PSMINI Member Joined: July/29/10 Location: Bothell, WA Status: Offline Points: 3733 |
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Posted: January/27/11 at 9:40pm |
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I'd be a little scared to cut up my stock fenders. I am OK at taking stuff apart and putting it back together but I am terrible at body work.
The advantage of these ones is that the duct isn't real. You get to keep your windshield/headlight washer bottles. Oh, they are made from fiberglass reinforced plastic. Lighter than the stock for better performance :-) -EDIT- Oh, you meant convert these to functioning vents... That's a possibility but might end up with dirt all over the fender/door. Edited by CORNERS - January/27/11 at 9:41pm |
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SuperCoop
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Posted: January/27/11 at 9:42pm |
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Hmm...if they're not functional, I dunno...seems kinda gimmicky to me. But they do look cool =)
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Jason - '05 PS/B Cooper S, most packages, 17%, Brisk silver plugs, IE fixed camber plates & Craven STD's, Powerflex trans/dogbone mount poly inserts, 20mm Whiteline rear sway bar, SprintBooster.
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CORNERS
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PSMINI Member Joined: July/29/10 Location: Bothell, WA Status: Offline Points: 3733 |
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Posted: January/27/11 at 9:58pm |
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I don't think there is any need to have venting into the wheel well. Maybe they could be made to vent into the engine compartment.
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SuperCoop
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Posted: January/28/11 at 7:43am |
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The one guy on here who completely modified his side fender was to keep the air from cavitating around the wheel and causing turbulence which overall affects performance (think of a Dodge viper).
In the grand scheme, it's probably not that big of a deal for our cars as we don't really go THAT fast most of the time. They do look good though..
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Jason - '05 PS/B Cooper S, most packages, 17%, Brisk silver plugs, IE fixed camber plates & Craven STD's, Powerflex trans/dogbone mount poly inserts, 20mm Whiteline rear sway bar, SprintBooster.
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Sanderskog
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Joined: October/08/04 Location: Sammamish Status: Offline Points: 1960 |
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Posted: January/28/11 at 8:39am |
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I like them, they're unique. A lot of money for what you get though.
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2012 VW Golf Pirate Edition... Aarrr! - JACK
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SuperCoop
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Posted: January/28/11 at 8:44am |
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I agree with the cost/benefit, that's some serious coin!
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Jason - '05 PS/B Cooper S, most packages, 17%, Brisk silver plugs, IE fixed camber plates & Craven STD's, Powerflex trans/dogbone mount poly inserts, 20mm Whiteline rear sway bar, SprintBooster.
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CORNERS
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Posted: January/28/11 at 9:45am |
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Yeah they want a lot for them but they look nice. The shop emailed me back saying they are out of stock until after my trip is over. This might not happen.
Mod parts in Japan tend to be very expensive. I had a look at the other parts available on the site. Most everything was double or more the US price points. Catback: $1800 Header: $1800 Sway bar: $600 Cool air intake: $400 But the most ridiculous was: 15% pulley (including belt): $750! (For a MINI Mania pulley) |
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SuperCoop
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Posted: January/28/11 at 9:57am |
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Wow...talk about mark-up!
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Jason - '05 PS/B Cooper S, most packages, 17%, Brisk silver plugs, IE fixed camber plates & Craven STD's, Powerflex trans/dogbone mount poly inserts, 20mm Whiteline rear sway bar, SprintBooster.
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CORNERS
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Posted: April/14/11 at 6:20pm |
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Update time -
I ordered those airduct fenders, but there was a big delay due to the Japan earthquake, my visit getting postponed, and Japan supply chain/power disruptions. They finally finished procuring and painting the fenders, so I had them ship here to the US (shipping cost was about $70 by global express post/EMS). It took about 3 hours to install these things. First it was hard to access all of the fasteners, some of which were very inaccessible. I also had to carefully adjust for body panel gap, etc. So here's the final pictures. If anyone else wants some of these, let me know and I can help you pay for them and communicate with the retailer in Japan! |
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SuperCoop
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Posted: April/14/11 at 6:52pm |
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Nice! Are they metal? Plastic? They matched the paint beautifully!
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Jason - '05 PS/B Cooper S, most packages, 17%, Brisk silver plugs, IE fixed camber plates & Craven STD's, Powerflex trans/dogbone mount poly inserts, 20mm Whiteline rear sway bar, SprintBooster.
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CORNERS
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Posted: April/14/11 at 7:17pm |
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They are FRP (fiberglass reinforced plastic) - the same stuff they make bathtubs out of these days.
It is a testament to Japanese engineering and quality that the paint matches, even though nobody in the supply chain has ever seen my car! (I'll withhold final judgment until I get the car out in the sun. It's possible they won't look so hot then.) Edited by CORNERS - April/14/11 at 7:19pm |
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Sanderskog
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Posted: April/14/11 at 7:27pm |
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Love the look Kurt. Brilliant!
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2012 VW Golf Pirate Edition... Aarrr! - JACK
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italianjob
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Posted: April/14/11 at 9:17pm |
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they look great Kurt!
Stefano |
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(Italian Job) '03 MCS Indie Blue SOLD :'(
(Polpetta) 2008 MClubman S Sitting on Sparco Assetto Gara Wheels 2013 GP "I killed the clown and took his car" |
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shasti212
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Posted: April/14/11 at 9:28pm |
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Wow looks great! Wish I could get some but I would lose a chunk of my wing graphics....plus it would be kind of ghetto on a base model anyway :)
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R.I.P.: "Zippy"-Hyper Blue Metallic/White 2005 R50."MINI-ME" plates. Side wing decals.
"Luna" - White Silver 2014 Roadster S. "RDSTER" plates. "Aura" - Space Blue/Silver 2006 Cooper S. |
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bobbydanger
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PSMINI Member Joined: January/31/11 Location: Portland Status: Offline Points: 260 |
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Posted: April/14/11 at 11:53pm |
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nothing is ghetto on a mini. well maybe duct tape. unless you are at the race track then its just "the way"
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johnf36
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Posted: April/15/11 at 1:39am |
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Looks Great Kurt, hey you known there is a GP rear spoiler that you can only get out of Japan.
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If everything seems under control, you're just not going fast enough.
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CORNERS
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Posted: April/15/11 at 10:43am |
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Hmm that would be cool but probably too big for the plane and expensive to ship.
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bobbydanger
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Posted: April/15/11 at 9:45pm |
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This will sound off topic at first but its sorta on topic ...
so I have Apple TV at my house and if anyone has this they will know what Im talking about but for those that dont I will explain something. you can stream music, photos and videos from your computer to your TV via the apple tv unit but when you dont have anything on the screen after 2 minutes it goes into screen saver mode. well one of the options for screen saver mode is to slide show photos from your computer or from FLICKR. so I use the flickr option and I did a search for MINI. so what comes up is a 100 random pictures from flickr that are labled MINI. the 100 photos seem to change every day or so so I dont see the same ones all the time.
by now you are thinking "Get to the point bobby"
ha ok so the point is I im sitting on my couch talking to my roomate about how he tried to fix TWIGGLES instrument cluster today and I look at the TV and the pictures coming up are the very pictures that are posted above. yeah those and other pictures of Corners car. haha so anyway it just goes to show, its a very small internet.
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CORNERS
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Posted: April/15/11 at 10:19pm |
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Haha, that's funny. But statistically not entirely unlikely :-)
Here's the math: Determine subset of population who own MINIs Extract subset who are MINIacs Extract subset of those who are Flickr users Extract subset of those who are heavy Flickr users Flickr may also not skew their randomness algorithm toward newer photos, photos taken at higher resolutions, and photos with higher "interestingness" (a term they use to refer to artistic value of the photo - greater clarity, better color saturation, deeper blacks, etc.) Throw all those together and, by my estimate, you end up with probably about 100-200 MINIacs worldwide who are also heavy Flickr users and who have recently uploaded photos with high "interestingness"! |
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Genie B
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Posted: April/16/11 at 7:48am |
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I'm coming late to this thread, but have to say how GREAT (and unique) those panels look on your MINI, Kurt. It's no surprise that CORNERS is being featured on the Internet!
Cheers!
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SMOG
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Posted: April/16/11 at 8:51am |
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Sure looks good Kurt!
S. |
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I wish there was a local MINI Dealership, like our Honda, Subaru, Mazada and VW.
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Hot Shot
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Posted: May/02/11 at 11:40am |
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Looks pretty good! Not really my thing for that price, but more power to ya!
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firehawk618
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Posted: May/13/11 at 10:15pm |
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Hey just saw this thread Kurt, those are cool!
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*SOLD* 05MCS, added too much to list. 193k miles
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CORNERS
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Posted: May/13/11 at 10:30pm |
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Thanks. Are you coming to the Redmond car show Saturday? You can see'em in person.
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firehawk618
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Posted: May/13/11 at 10:41pm |
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No I work on Saturdays, that's my Friday. :(
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*SOLD* 05MCS, added too much to list. 193k miles
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