MINI One D Review

MINI One D

When the engine is cold there is no getting away from the fact that it is a diesel powered car and as you start the MINI it chatters away, but as it warms up this soon settles down and the noise isn't particularly intrusive when on the move. As with most diesels you have to keep the revs up but the six-speed manual gearbox with its short throw is a delight to use. If you keep the turbo on boost progress can be quite rapid and the MINI One D never feels lacking in power. The best thing about the MINI One D is that you can have all the fun of a petrol MINI and achieve quite remarkable fuel consumption. On a light footed 30 mile tour of Devon 'A' and 'B' roads we achieved 62.3 mpg and this averaged out to a little over 50 mpg over the course of the week we spent with the MINI One D.

How It Drove - Ride/Handling

The increased weight of the diesel engine does not seem to have affected the handling of the MINI One D, which was every bit as fun as the Cooper model we last drove. There would seem little improvement that you could make to the MINI's handling; it is so chuckable, yet little seems to upset it. Body roll is minimal and the handling is precise, this is about as good as it gets for a practical hatchback. Even the all round disc brakes are spot on. You certainly feel poor road surfaces and perhaps road noise is a little bit more than we would like but overall we were very impressed. Although we did not find torque steer a problem the MINI One D is fitted with ASC+T (Automatic Stability Control with Traction), which helps prevents wheel spin if you pull off too fast on poor surfaces.