Up Close: 2009 Mini Cooper Convertible
Two years after the Mini Cooper hardtop got there, the convertible is in the second generation of its rebirth. For a completely different car, it doesn’t look completely different. The casual observer wouldn’t know the difference between the two generations. The same was true with the hardtop, and it’s mostly a positive in both cases.
Along with the larger headlights and taillights, the convertible exclusively gets really cool graphite-colored alloy wheels. The main drawback is that the ragtop gets the larger, less-legible center-mounted speedometer.
The interior is upgraded and gets a combination cloth/leather “Interchange Yellow” pattern — basically some yellow stripes in the center panel that emulate the leather stitching. It looks pretty good, but of course stuff like this tends to work in Minis. People would probably think it gaudy or ugly in another kind of car, but Mini gets away with it.
In terms of space, it’s still plenty roomy in the front seat. It gets fractions of an inch larger in some dimensions both there and in the backseat, but the backseat still isn’t for grown-ups. At least it now has side pockets, and the scooped-out front-seat backrests are softer and easier on the knees. The rear backrests still fold down, and the trunk and its opening are a bit larger.
The top works the same, with a front section that slides back first like a moonroof, but Mini says it opens faster now, and will even open when moving at speeds just over 20 mph. The big new idea is the Openometer, which tells you how long you’ve driven with the top down over the life of the car. It shows minutes and hours in its own gauge. You can reset this to zero, or just let it keep counting. The center gauge’s LCD holds on to the total miles and doesn’t reset.
Mini says this generation should be as much as 20% more efficient than the current one, just like the hardtop, and a good deal cleaner in terms of pollutants, too.
