My take on English rusting minis is that farmers are always on the "B" roads and leave their dirt which contains Nitrogen. It's rains a great deal in England. The mud sticks to the body and there you go.  Of course that's my take.

I agree...a few hundred dollars is all it took.....and lots of elbow grease.

Yes but any and all of that work is far better and a lot cheaper than welding up rusty shells

JDMs' like ours, will usually have faded paint, wood dash faded and likely cracked, dirty engine compartment as nobody seems to bother cleaning them??, lower KMs than expected, some possibly unusual mods, AC, minimal-if any-rust, windshield chrome filler sun faded. None of these things are overwhelming to tidy up and the generally good condition more than makes up for them. Have fun.

Yes they were built in the UK but Japan does not have the dismal wet weather the UK and European Mini owners have to contend with. The only place i have seen any rust on Japanese Mini's is in the bottoms of the doors and sometimes occasionally on the scuttle panel which is due to the "water holding" late model flat windscreen rubber.
The Northern Japanese Mini's do rust as they have snow there but at least they do not salt the roads.
Now the rubber parts on Jap spec Mini's are almost always shot and needing replacement.
Also a consideration is land is at a premium in the UK and a decent size garage is not the norm, just look at a lot of the Mini's for sale on ebay they are in driveways or streets in all the nasty weather or locked up in some dingy damp lock up garage somewhere.

Curious as to why the Japanese minis would be better? Weren't they built in the UK too?

Whee ---< most of my mini knowledge ends in the mid 70's.

malsal and big al.. dido on the Mini 30s..fyi the mini 30 from Germany ( I have only seen them in black for the UK market) in LHD even worse for Tin worm. than the RHD burgundy ones.. I have NOT imported any Jap Speck minis.. later bc

I am with Big Al the Mini 30's seem to be the rustiest 90's Mini's i have come across but non of the 90's Mini's are good when it comes to premature rust issues.
I know of someone in the UK who bought a new shell fully sealed and primed and ready for paint. It was stored for 3 years in his shop out of the elements and when he went to paint it there was rust starting to show through so you can imagine how bad they rust when outside in all weather.
The best 90's Mini's to buy with minimal or no rust are the Japanese ones.

from the site: I want to personally thank all of the BAT community for their valuable input regarding the car in this listing. As I said before our goal is to be transparent and forthright in all we do. Given that there are questions regarding the vehicle I asked the good people at BAT to withdraw the listing until a date and time that all questions and concerns can be addressed. BAT has graciously worked with us and have withdrawn the listing. We look forward to getting clarifications on all details pertaining to the car. If and only if they are all resolved will the vehicle be re-listed. Once again I thank all the BAT memebers for their commentary and guidance

After a back and forth with the seller, we have decided to withdraw this auction. Our knowledgable commenters have raised a number of issues that throw the authenticity of the car into doubt, and the seller needs to investigate and address these concerns. We hope to re-list the car once all of the details are cleared up and its history can be detailed in a more transparent fashion. Thanks for the thorough discussion, and we apologize for any inconvenience this has caused.

This listing has been withdrawn by BaT because something during this auction was not fair for the buyer and/or the seller. It might be re-listed in a future BaT Auction if this can be corrected and, if so, we will email all watchers of this listing. We apologize for the inconvenience.

30th Anniversary 1989 models were the worst for tin worm in burgundy 


Big AL

whee.. but it is rather nice British Open.. think the one for the German market came also in Black. I would like to see the import papers CBP 7501, EPA 3601 and DOT HS7 papers.. on it. Malsal.. have you noticed this British open seem to suffer badly from TIN ROT.. ?? even worse than normal minis in the 90s.. later bc

Something tells me that BAT haven't experienced a truly complicated legal situation with their auctions.....yet. 

It's only a matter of time until some deal goes south and something grey market or stolen or sketchy is sold on the site and BAT has to lawyer-up and deal with it. 

Considering BAT is already playing in the big auction house arena (selling more than a few $500K + cars), I'm surprised they're not already more cautious. 

BaT does not care about incorrect vin numbers.

A while back a Clubman Estate with a round nose conversion into a Woody came up for auction. According to the seller he was told the original vin was not used when it was imported and it ended up with something like a 5 digit vin number which was obviously from another vehicle as it had a different colour paint around the edge. That Estate ended up selling for over $27,000 USD even with the mention of the incorrect vin number.
It seems like the buyer and BaT and all the other bidders as well did not care, it is one thing having a re vin with a Mini vin number but to have one with a made up vin number is a whole different story some may say it's a bad vin number either way. That is not to say there is anything wrong with a State issued vin number but that would be on a State issued vin plate and this one was not. 
                               
Just my opinion.

Yeah, I saw that too. I bet Bring A Trailer ends that auction early after a little research.

Got to wonder how a dealer can be brave enough to post such an obvious revin.

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1973-mini-cooper-s/