Just checked with the Dealership, I wanted to put the Aero on my new MCS that I am picking up next week. the dealer book price is $1200, but then the told me what it would cost after paint and install $2780. OMG. it cost more to put it on than the parts. Can some one please help me understand if this is right, if so is their anyway someone who know very little about cars could order this and put it on. I really like it, but I dont want to spend that much. Thanks for any help/ advice or general assistance I can get.

 

You can defintely order this and source the painting locally. Give Classic Auto Campus a call as they can get any OEM MINI part you want (including the aero kit). You can then find someone to prep and paint it locally at a greatly reduced cost. Happy hunting!

Also, be sure to keep your stock bumper covers and pieces as you should be able to sell these (if you wish) to other MINI owners. This is important if you have the dealer do the kit install for you as they will keep them...and you already paid for them. Wrap the peices up in old sheets or blankets and store them in your basement/attic until you see someone needing a replacement bumper cover in the color you have. You'll recoup some of the cost of the aero kit and they will get a bumper cover at a fraction of the cost of what a dealer would charge to paint and install a new one.

Mark

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Ditto, got a bunch of OEM parts from them cheap and quick

 

Aero is an add-on. You can buy any or all the parts from the kit through the dealer. Why the dealer will charge so much is a very good question, but is the standard price from all the dealers, not so with other add-ons like rally lights. Dealers have a huge swing in the price they want for installation of them.

If you think the cost is too high, buy the parts you wish and go to your body shops around town and get competitive prices for the work.

 

Classic Auto Campus is THE BEST! I bought almost all of my accesories from them and saved hundreds of dollars. I too want an Aero Kit, and never thought of doing it that way. Thanks Mark.

 

i'd love to get the Aero Kit... guess i'll have to start buying Lottery tickets!

 

Thanks for the Info guys, I'm in Atlanta, GA are these parts easy to install? I dont know any one around the area except the dealership that has authorized mini workers, and my skill level at doing something that seems this major might be more than I want to bite off. Thanks for the Info, My MCS is all black, and the parts come primed, wonder what it would look like if I left it grey? Hmmm. Thanks again, if anyone else reads this post and has any more suggestions please feel free to respond.

 

Classic Auto campus is great! I asked Brian about the aero kit and he told me $960, but he does not ship it because of the size. Oh well.

 

He told me he would ship it but the cost would eat up most if not all of the savings.

 

First of all ask yourself what do you like abou the aero kit?
The whole look? The sides, the front and back, the black aero grille?
Some dealers will paint all of the wheel arches to match the color of the car- this is another benifit of the kit upgrade.
The cost is high because in addition to the materials you get the paint job and installation. For my dealer this is all done outside with a body shop- therefore the dealer has a markup and the bodyshop has a markup so if you can buy the parts and get your own bodyshop to do the installation and painting then that would be less.
The cheapest way to get the parts and not have to pay for shipping would be to join the BMW car club of america for $33 a year and that would qualify you for discounts at your dealership's parts dept. Maybe as much as 15% off retail so that would be great. check with the dealer's parts dept first to see if they participate and the discounts vary from dealer to dealer. If you have an active BMW club chapter in your area they know which dealers will work with them.

The cheapest aero like look is whether you have a cooper or cooper S, is to add only the two black grille pieces to the front bonnet and bumper. The parts are not bad about $38 and $58 or so and you can remove and install the bonnet grille yourself without much trouble- maybe 20-30 minutes. The front bumper grille is much harder and requires taking the front bumper off the car. There are many how to articles posted on this but the bottom line is that it is difficult.

Why?-because the grille was meant for the aerokit bumper and the cooper and cooper S bumpers are different and have different slots for the stock grilles. So lots of reworking and cutting of plastic and tabs needs to be done on the bumper and the grille to make it work nicely. I had a body shop do mine and they took a long time but only charged me about $180 in labor to install the front bumper grille only. I did the bonnet myself. Parts were all less than $90 so for a few hundred I have the aerogrille look. My sides and rear bumper are stock. Wheelarches still black plastic.

Other people are doing this. Buy the side skirts, leave the front and rear bumpers on. paint the wheel arches and sides the color of the car. No black grille but it looks really nice too. You don't have to do the full kit, you can buy bits and pieces of it as you like.

Good luck

 

>>He told me he would ship it but the cost would eat up most if not all of the savings.

Good point...also consider though that even with the added cost of shipping that buying a kit (or part of it) locally will entail sales tax. Given this you may still save some $$$ over buying it locally.

Mark

 

how expensive are the side skirts only?
i've always liked em'!

 

totally forgot about this but http://www.newminisport.com sells an aerokit that looks very much like the OEM kit (I think that there are cutouts near the fog lights but thats the only difference that I see). But the big news is that it comes painted. It is an english company and they sell it for something like 800 pounds. I havent ordered from them but it might be worth looking at.

 

thanks will look into it :smile:

 

MINI dealer 2003 Aero retail prices:
Full aerokit parts for cooper or cooper S: $1200
Front apron $360
Rear apron (different parts for cooper and cooper S) $326
Side skirt $233 each for right and left
Black aero grille bonnet $51.25
Front top black aero grille bumper $37.25

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You guys are lucky you got competitive suppliers other than BMW dealers. Here in Hong Kong we got stuck with the one and only BMW dealer and it would cost me no less than US$2,000 to get the full areo kit installed. :evil: :evil: :???:

Should I import the kit?

 

Don't really need to remove the bumper to put on the black aero grille. I did it and it took me about 45 minutes for everything. You just carefully pop out the old grille from the front with a screwdriver, and then Dremel the new black one so that it fits flush. Not bad really.

Others have done it this way too and it looks really good.

And $2700-$3000 is what I've seen for the whole aero kit installed in California. The part I liked about it was the grille anyway, so doing it myself I save around $2600-$2900 !!

 

Removing the front bumper helps to make it easier to work on getting the right fit. You could pop out the grille on the bumper with a screwdriver but on my Cooper S it was not so easy-maybe with a cooper it is better. Then the slots left behind in the bumper and the pegs on the grille do not line up so you have to make a decision on doing some surgery to the grille or the bumper or both to get the pegs and slots to match up- this means lots of grinding down of the grille to make it fit flush with the surface of the bumper. In my MCS the bumper did not fit well with the grille so much of the original grille support on the bumper had to be grinded away. I could be done fast but you have to be careful grinding and cutting things away. A professional body shop did mine. Overall it came out OK but the internet instructions I got were not very helpful to my installers.