[mct]

Quote: Originally Posted by Skatemom

mct:

You've obviously done your homework, read all the posts and know the drill. Good job posting your specs, prod # and such.

So you didn't want to change colors huh? I understand, CR/W is awesome. If we were replacing instead of adding, I would have gotten CR/B...a little change but not entirely different. My daughter didn't want us to have 2 Chili Reds in the garage, so I agreed. It was a tough decision which color to get since Red was off the table. I think I'll like my PH and I'll especially like the HK! Hey, I'm gonna love it all, what am I saying????

Skatemom:

I guess once you've been through it once, it all comes back (like riding a bike) .

I *almost* went with Hyper Blue, but just couldn't part with the CR/W Italian Job combo LOL. If I already had a CR/W MINI and was keeping it I probably would have gotten the HB/W color combo.

As for the H/K - I agree - that is definately the best factory-installed stereo I have every owned in a car. Used in conjunction with an ipod and watch out !

As far as inaccurate data through the website and ASKMINI, I remember on my '05 Cooper that the site and ASKMINI still said awaiting transport the day I picked the car up from the dealer. So who knows... Still fun to try and figure out where the car is

[MGB Boy]

Status updated today, out of the paint shop, "at port awaiting a shipping vessel" according to ASK-MINI. Nothing on the WW site yet...

-Ricardo

[fjpatriot]

Geez, they had me nervous - less than an hour ago billing number GBSOU414553 had no cars loaded from it. Well, there are 106 cars in the group and only about 29 of them are shown as "loaded on vessel" - and Baby is one of them! Awesome The ship should get to NY on Apr 20th, and hopefully they find some way, some how to get me the car on or before April 27th - my Bday Anyone have an estimated time of arrival from the distribution center once it gets delivered there?

The last car I see was loaded at 22:58; which is 5:58pm East Coast time. The Elektra is scheduled to leave at midnight, which was 27 minutes ago. You can track this on
http://www.southamptonvts.co.uk/shipping_movments.asp

Boy, given the amount of cars they have at Southampton ( I don't know if the above billing number just contains Mini's, or contains all types of cars ), they could use a couple more ships. The group I was in for the Manon only took about 20 or so cars ( out of 88 ), and if this holds only 29 out of 106 will be loaded on the Elektra.

Severe happy feet though Now the wait for the distribution center dropoff!

[fjpatriot]

One update - the Elektra seems like its being held til lunchtime tomorrow ( 12:00 ), but is moving from pier 43 to pier 34/35. No idea if Mini's are just loaded from pier 43 or not - hopefully not, so they can get some more of the 106 waiting Mini's on board. Baby wants some more company!

[Skatemom]

As of noon today the Liberty has travelled 1158 miles with our MINIs safely (I hope) secured aboard it's decks. New date of arrival at NEAT is April 15. 1 whole day earlier, Woo Hoo!

[Skatemom]

Congrats fjpatriot! Finally on a ship. The Electra better hurry up if she's gonna draft off of the Liberty...we're making good time on Sunday we had a 23 knot tail wind, but today we're facing a 30 knot headwind off our starboard The Bristol Channel and Celtic Sea have 15-20 knot winds out of the NW for you. Temps at sea are 50-60 degrees F, so not too chilly. Enjoy your voyage!

[fjpatriot]

Skatemom - thanks for the good wishes. Yah, if I made the Manon, drafting would have been a possibility - but yes, VERY HAPPY to be on any ship! Wow, April 15th, do you think you'll get her around the 20th? You're taking delivery in Ohio(?) - any idea how long it takes to get to your dealer? I'm hoping, since I'm not getting any distribution facility installed options ( I heard they would do an alarm install maybe there ), that they will only keep her a couple of days. Wishful thinking on my part, but one can hope!

Wow, there should be a whole lot of deliveries of Liberty based cars April 20-27, can't wait to see the pictures!

[mct]

Quote: Originally Posted by Skatemom

Hi all,

My baby is in the paint shop now! Next is assemby and final assembly. ASKMINI human said final completion will be tomorrow as scheduled. Yeh, they are all going down the line together

fjpatriot, if you call ASKMINI and request "customer relations" the rep will give you your VIN. I got mine off the Owners Lounge track your baby thing. Go to Review Order Detail. If the screen appears empty you can go up to View, then Source. I screen will appear with a lot of code, but if you sift through it you can read your specs, including your VIN. It's about 3/4 down the page.

The next ships to leave are Courage April 2, LIberty April 7, Manon April 9 and Electra April 11. Fingers are crossed

SkateMom

Why does the "Review Order Details" screen always come up blank but if you view the source all the info is there? Is that just a bug on their site?

[ayde_bury]

Not sure if anyone has mentioned it, but there is LIVE port radar with the ships names here http://www.southamptonvts.co.uk/radcap.asp - so you can watch you MINIs' vessle leave port live.

[sfgrunge]

Wow. Lots of updates this week. My MINI was updated as well. I'm scheduled for production with an estimated completion date of 4/21. When I click on the order details, I also see a blank box, but the html source has the correct options. The other interesting thing is that the main image when I login is broken. It is supposed to be of a Hyper Blue MINI (2006CooperSHyperBlueMetallic.jpg), but I get the little broken image box.


Congrats to all the MINIs that have started their little ocean cruise. I know that is going to be a tough wait for me since I am in SF.

[mct]

Quote: Originally Posted by fjpatriot

Anyone have an estimated time of arrival from the distribution center once it gets delivered there?

Here are my dates from back in 2004 from the day my Cooper was finished to when I picked it up:

Oct 27 - Car finished
Oct 28 - Car arrived at the docks
Nov 5 - Car left Southhampton
Nov 15 - Car arrived at SC
Nov 19 - Picked up car at dealer

[Skatemom]

Quote: Originally Posted by mct

Why does the "Review Order Details" screen always come up blank but if you view the source all the info is there? Is that just a bug on their site?

Yep, I read somewhere that it's a bug. Doesn't seem that MINIUSA is in any hurry to fix it. It's been that way for a while. Since most of us know the work-around, it's no biggie.

Looking at your stats back to 2004, you got great turnaround! Especially from the VDC in NC to your dealer!

I'm looking for the stats on Audrey, but for Bagheera, he spent 4 days at the VDC in NJ and then 4 days over land to Ohio. The dealer had him ready the next day.

I don't know what options the VDC installs, other than "American Only" type parts. Dealer options would be installed at the dealer of course. I'm hoping that the VDC isn't overly busy when my ship docks and they can get the MINIs through FAST! When I did a Google Earth for the VDC in NJ, I could see there were about 7 transports in the parking lots. Obviously they were either full and ready to leave or empty just waiting to be loaded

My MA said early to mid May for my delivery, but my calculations have it more like April 25th/26th if the same scenario holds for this car as it did for Bagheera. Since Audrey went the long way (through the Panama Canal to Port Hueneme) the timeline would be different.

fj patriot: I see you have the same timeline in your estimations, that is April 20-27th. I probably won't fly back to Ohio until the following week though. So either way it looks like I'll collect my baby the first week of May.

[staceybassoon]

I'm having a hard time actually getting ahold of my MA. We're playing phone tag, and I haven't heard back from her. Sad..... I don't know where my little car is

[MGB Boy]

Woo hoo, my car arrived at the port yesterday and was promptly loaded on the Elektra! It looks like I've avoided the 2.5 week Southampton limbo that my last car was sucked into (where it was booked on one ship then rebooked four times before finally being loaded). Total time from arrival in port to loading: 14 hours and 16 minutes. The Elektra isn't a straight shot from Southampton to NY, it has a stop in Halifax, so I'll lose a couple days there, but it ought to be on U.S. soil by the 20th...

-Ricardo

[staceybassoon]

Did you find out this information from your MA before tracking it online? I feel like I'm missing a step....

[MGB Boy]

Quote: Originally Posted by staceybassoon

Did you find out this information from your MA before tracking it online? I feel like I'm missing a step....

Got my VIN online off the Owners Lounge (via the "view source" method, because my detail screen appears to be blank even though it isn't), gotten most of my status info from the automated dude at ASK-MINI, got the shipping data by repeatedly plugging my VIN into the Wallenius tracking site about five times a day over the past couple days until my car finally showed up in their system...

-Ricardo

[staceybassoon]

Oh, ok, that's what I'm doing! I guess I just felt kind of obsessive. hehehehehe But I guess that's the whole point!

[mct]

Quote: Originally Posted by Skatemom

When I did a Google Earth for the VDC in NJ, I could see there were about 7 transports in the parking lots. Obviously they were either full and ready to leave or empty just waiting to be loaded

Man - I wish Google Earth was realtime - that *would* be a great tool to use to peak at the VDC (not to mention seeing the ship carry our little cars over). Not sure how old the satelite pics are that they use.

On another note - I talked to my MA this morning and he told me my car was scheduled to begin production April 17th (even though the website and ASKMINI does not show that yet). Since my car's status was still a 112 (last chance to change anything before it becomes status 150) I decided to add the Limited Slip Differential option .

[fjpatriot]

BTW, you can find your VIN early on by going to the MyMini portion of the Owners site, and looking at Maintenance logs. They posted mine their sooner than anything else.

MGB Boy - congrats, we're ship mates! Wow, that was a fast turnaround, lucky you. I waited 3 days at port, which wasn't too bad, about 3 times less than the average - but 14 hours, yahoo! I've been following Elektra's progress, and BTW almost all the ships first stop at Halifax before going to NY/NJ. Its standard a 9 day trip from Southampton to NY, including Halifax as a midpoint.

[staceybassoon]

I've decided that the auto tracking site needs to have an application for cell phones so I can act on my obsession all day long.......