The Mini Aceman Revealed: Big Name, Smallish Package, and a Whole Lot of Questions
Boy, oh boy, have I got news for you? You know MINI, the BMW-owned company that makes the updated (oversized) copies of the classic Mini from yesteryear? Well, they’ve been trying to keep its latest model, the Mini Aceman, under wraps for a while. Unfortunately, the car will be made in China - and the rules are a wee bit different in the Old Kingdom.
Courtesy of China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, or MIIT for short, we get to see the Aceman for the very first time without any camouflage. This government agency keeps a watchful eye on the auto industry in China, and filing details with them is practically a rite of passage for any new car hitting the market. Think of them as the guardians of car info in the world's biggest auto market. So, while we haven't seen an official press release from Mini yet, the MIIT filing gives us a pretty darn good idea of what this new electric Mini will be all about.
So, the Mini Aceman is a real thing, made in Beijing because… globalized automotive industry, I guess? That Spotlight Automotive joint venture between the BMW and the Chinese still feels like some fever dream after too many pints, but here we are.
Let's dissect this Frankenstein's monster of a Mini. It's a size mashup – wedged between the Cooper and Countryman like a confused teenager. Dimensions are 160 or 161 inches long (4076 mm or 4,094 mm – your pick!), 69 inches (1754 mm) wide, and 60 inches (1515 mm) tall. Seriously, who cares about that extra inch? It turns out the difference is due to some fancy optional bumpers.
Styling-wise, they kept the core Mini vibe but went for edgy over endearing. Those angry headlights are a far cry from the classic, friendly face, and the whole thing has more SUV-chunk than the cheeky go-kart spirit we know and love. The Union Jack taillights remain, because even with all this change, some things are sacred.
Let's get nerdy. The base Aceman's 135-kilowatt electric motor (that's about 181 horsepower) and 40 kWh battery get you from 0 to 62 mph (100 km/h) in 7.3 seconds. Range probably won't break the 186-mile (300 km) barrier – this thing won't replace your road trip warrior.
The Aceman S ups the ante with 160 kilowatts (215 horsepower), a slightly better 6.7-second sprint, and a 54 kWh battery promising 250 miles (400 km) of worry-free driving … assuming you stick to city streets. Both versions drive those front wheels only – no fancy all-wheel-drive shenanigans here. But please remember - these range numbers come from the Chinese CLTC test cycle - let’s just say it is as optimistic as me looking at bicycles. Yeah, never happens.
Now, the part that makes you do a double-take: the price. Whispers put it around €36,800, which is somehow under $40,000 in actual currency. For a Mini, that's shockingly... affordable? Don't get me wrong, Elon Musk isn't losing sleep, but it undercuts similar-sized electric crossovers from Jeep and Volvo by a decent margin. Makes this whole China-built Mini experiment seem, dare I say, less awful.
But hold your horses. Can the Aceman actually capture old-school Mini magic with this mish-mash of parts? It's got all the latest electric buzzwords, but can it out-fun some of its excellent predecessors? Frankly, I need to slide behind the wheel myself before forming a solid opinion. The Aceman might surprise us, or it might be the final nail in the coffin for purists who already think the brand lost its way long ago. Time (and some serious test drives) will have the answer.
Yours truly,
Captain Electro
