Steve welcome from the US side of the water. 4/4 is a great choice. You will love it.
Re Aircon and American Roadsters, I haven't seen one without it, but nobody claims it works well. There are only 82 3.0L (Series 1?) Roadsters in the US. They all came in legally in 2005, something about only that many US certified Air Bags.
There are are some ongoing attempts to get the 3.7L in the US, through dealer efforts rather than factory imports. But I don't know of any cars as yet.
Cheers and again, Welcome!
