The Mini Library Reviews...
The Big Mini Book.
by J Hübner
It is that - couldn't fit it onto a flatbed scanner for the cover image!
Large format, >250 illustrations (mostly black & white with a few double
page colour inserts), this is the quintessential coffee table Mini book,
with a brief history of the development, and overview of the subsequent
evolution of the car of the century. The chapters are as follows (production
dates are for the UK):
- Mr Mini - Sir Alex Issigonis:
- Provides five pp. of details and photographs of some of the projects in
which Issigonis was involved, from open-wheelers through to the Morris Minor,
Mini, Maxi, and Morris/Austin 1100/1300;
- Mini beginnings - from prototype to production cars:
- The famous restaurant sketches are here... the humble beginnings of the
monocoque body with a transverse engine, the development of the subframes
and hydrolastic suspension... the smallest Lockheed disc brakes on the early
Cooper. Prototype and early production cars are shown;
- Mini grows up:
- Badge-engineering produced many variants of the basic Mini... most of
these are shown, with the details of cosmetic changes given in the text...
from the Morris 850, through the de Luxe and Super ranges, to the Elf and
Hornet 'booted' versions... including the South African Mini Mk III with
the Elf / Hornet bodyshell and a normal Mini nose;
- Many Mini aspirations:
- Some made it, some didn't... projects which were abandoned are
described... some even made it to prototypes - a 4-door Mini,
others were a success - no-door beach Minis, plastic Minis in Chile, the
various rebadged versions in different countries, fastbacks, and of course
the custom Minis by Wood & Pickett, Crayford, Era, Minisprint and others - a
good varity of photographs, mostly b&w;
- Mini acquires a family:
- Text describes the chronology of the Mk1 - Mk2 - Mk3, the arrival of the
workhorse Minivan, Pickup, Traveller, Estate, 1275GT, and more recent
models... Mini City, to the 1991 Lamm cabrio;
- Mini but not Cooper: the 1275 GT:
- A double page spread describes production of the GT, concurrently with
the Cooper S, which it was supposed to replace, although the model never
received the support that the Cooper model did, even though it became the
top-of-the-line Mini after Cooper production stopped in July 1971.
Production of the GT ceased in August 1980;
- Mini Cooper - giant killer:
- Nine pages and 17 pics are devoted to the Cooper variants, from the 1961
997 cc model through to the resurrection of the Cooper by Rover in
collaboration wih John Cooper Garages in 1990. CKD kit export to Australia
is mentioned, as is the production of Italian Cooper variants by Innocenti.
Downton Engineering gets a mention as one of the inventive tuners of Minis;
- Twinny Mini - there's no Moke without a fire:
- A couple of pages and pics. of twin-engined Mokes and Minis
(236 bhp?!)... described as 'treacherous' and 'potentially dangerous', one
was crashed by John Cooper. Initially developed for use in a Moke by the
army, the concept never took off;
- Mini-Moke, for beach or boulevard:
- Variants of the Moke are described, as is their unsuccessful marketing
in the UK, but voluminous production in Australia and Portugal, from where
some were imported back into the UK;
- Mini goes rallying:
- 20 pp., the largest chapter, devoted to the Mini's success in rallying,
from the first 850's, the Coopers, to more modern entries. Considerable
detail is provided on the 1966 Monte Carlo rally, where the first 3 cars,
all Coopers, were disqualified by clever bending of the rules. 1968 is seen
as the last year for Minis in main-line rallies;
- Mini on the circuit:
- A brief review of the racing Mins, particularly at Brands Hatch;
- Mini Specials:
- An 18 pp. alphabetical treatment of the cars built using Mini components,
from the 3-wheeler AB1, Biota, Buckle, among others, to the Midas, Mini-Jem,
Ogle, Unipower and Yak... not a lot of real successes in there, although
some can still be found. A couple of nice full-colour spreads;
- Innocenti Minis - The Italian jobs:
- A 2-page summary, with pics, of Innocenti models and production figures:
some 400,000 Minis were produced in Italy, mostly sold there;
- Minis in miniature:
- Not often included in Mini books is this listing of models of the Mini,
by company, country, model type, scale, model number, material... over 200
models are listed to 1991;
- Mini specifications:
- An 8 page table provides specifications and production totals of most of
the Mini/Moke models of the UK and Italy. Models from elsewhere (e.g.
Australia, Spain, South Africa) are not mentioned;
Verdict: Another worthwhile addition to the Mini bookshelf (assuming you've
got a high shelf!), this book achieves what it sets out to do... provide
a historical background, and a summary of the evolution of the Mini in it's
various guises. As with many other review type treatments, the bias is to
UK production, with only Innocenti production in Italy covered briefly.
Production elsewhere rates only a few paragraphs, with the odd error...
Moke Californians, for example, were produced in Australia. The large
format illustrations are profuse, although I would have preferred to see
more of the detailed illustrations in colour. Nevertheless, a good number
of the photographs are not found in other Mini reviews, hence are a bonus
for the photo file.
Review by Russ Shiel, Albury, NSW
Russ Shiel
Return to Coffee-table books or view book details
http://www.comp.glam.ac.uk/~minis/minilib/review21.htm
Copyright © 1997, Russ Shiel - validated (3.2s)