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Mini Cooper crushed in the name of the law

16 December, 2014

In a bid to crush the illegal trade of vehicles between the UK and the US, the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has been doing some crushing of their own.

The images doing the rounds online are of a Mini Cooper — illegally imported and unsafe — being crushed after it was seized by CBP.

The seizure was for what appears to be a fraudulent vehicle identification number (VIN), where the vehicle was manufactured in the 2000s, but sold as a 1988 model, which would have met the 25-year rule. In the US, vehicles over 25 years of age are exempt from EPA emissions standards and DOT safety ratings, but newer vehicles that do not comply must be brought to compliance, exported, or destroyed. Check out the destruction of the Mini Cooper below.

A fraudulent VIN is a pretty common occurrence, where the vehicle is represented on import entry documentation as being 25 years or older, but may be newer, illegally reconfigured, or even reconstructed from the parts of older vehicles.

Over the past year CBP has increased targeting and inspections of suspect imported vehicles, primarily Minis and Land Rover Defenders, as part of Operation Atlantic — a new trans-Atlantic partnership between US and UK regulatory and law enforcement officials. Following inspections of more than 500 vehicles, the operation has led to several criminal investigations in both countries.

We’re pretty fond of complaining about how difficult the import and VIN process is over in our corner of the globe, but somebody somewhere has always got it worse!

Coaching from the bench: Casting plastic knobs and rubber parts

16 July, 2026

Casting rubber items is simple if you have a good original to work with. The item doesn’t have to be perfect. You can use plasticine to smooth out cracks, and you can even make whole prototypes out of low-fire modelling clay available from craft stores if you need to. Prototypes can also be made of wood or metal.
You will need mould dams to contain the liquid urethane moulding solution until it cures. You can build boxes out of strips of wood, but I have found that small plastic boxes and bowls such as those you would use for leftovers in your fridge work well if you spray them with a mould release agent.
Temperature is important to the chemical processes involved, so work in an area that can be maintained at around 20 degrees. You will also need adequate ventilation because the fumes can be dangerous to breathe. And you will want to wear latex gloves to protect your hands.

Fraser Cars – low flying into the fourth decade

10 July, 2026

With almost three and a half decades under its belt, Fraser Cars is one of New Zealand’s longest-surviving car manufacturers. The company first opened its doors for business in 1988, during the boom time for kit manufacturers. During the ’80s, around 40 different companies were building kits and turnkey cars for this niche market. Of those, only Fraser and Almac Cars (established 1981) are still in business today.
Most of the new kit car companies were killed off in the cradle by the threat of new legislation that never eventuated and definitively by the sudden availability of high-performance Japanese cars when the floodgates to second-hand imports were opened. The now long-retired founder of the company, Neil Fraser, first came across Lotus Seven replicas while racing Lotus Cortinas in the early ’80s. He regularly found himself racing against a little Caterham, a Lotus Seven–styled car built in England. He was very impressed by its simplicity and handling. In 1986 Fraser built his own Lotus Seven–type car, using the knowledge he had gained from several close looks at the Caterham.