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May 28, 2021 20:13:11 GMT
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First part of this update is some good news, I've booked my first track day of the year woohoo! I'll be heading to Snetterton in July with a small group of friends so its gonna be a fun day. When the Gizfab manifold was fitted it made the exhaust quite loud and raspy, which isn't ideal for a track day. So I purchased a stainless centre section with 2 resonators from Gizfab to help sort it. It still has a low end grunt but what it's certainly alot quieter than before  One of the jobs that needed doing before the rest of the car got sprayed, was to have the bootlid welded up. I removed the rear wiper shortly after purchasing the car and had used an ebay blank. The wiper hole along with the holes for the original boot handle were welded by a friend and I done the filler work.  The corners need some more sanding but overall its come out pretty well IMO   The other job I've recently carried out is the removal of the sound deadening and painting the floor. I used a freeze spray and hammer to remove the majority of it, followed by a Makita multi tool to remove the pieces stuck by the factory seam sealer. Unfortunately I didn't weigh what I removed, but reading on the forum its approx 9-10kg  The holes were abit scabby around the edges so I cleaned them up with a drill wire brush attachment and gave it a coating of rust treatment.  Once that was dry I applied seam sealer to cover the holes to prevent water getting in  Next was to paint the floor. I used smooth red Hammerite so it matched the rear half of the interior (although that was aerosol and this was brush on)      This weekend the rear arch should hopefully be sorted,removal of the graphics and door boards and any dings/dents filled |
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May 28, 2021 21:06:16 GMT
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To be honest, I haven't really noticed a huge difference in the couple of miles I've driven since. I'll let you know  |
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Love what you have done so far.
All of it suits my taste.
Niiiice.
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Awesome stance, just the right height. Looks squat and aggro, lovely! Caught myself looking a k11s on ebay, in large part because of your thread 😂
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merryck
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 480
Club RR Member Number: 9
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hoodedreeper's K11 MIcra v3merryck
@merryck
Club Retro Rides Member 9
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I just picked up a K11 yesterday, 5 door 1.3 with only 21,000 miles on it. I bought it to take the engine out for a Mini conversion, but it's so much fun to drive I'm not sure I want to! Probably the closest thing to a Mini I've driven.
Not sure my wife will be happy with the idea of there being another car around, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
I was going to ask where you're buying your performance parts? Is Gizfab the only place selling the exhausts etc.? I'm hoping to be able to keep it looking pretty much stock but get some better handling and power out of it, but most of the Micra forums I've found seem to be pretty dead, and a lot of the links to parts no longer work.
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Jun 23, 2021 10:17:23 GMT
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Gizfab and Matt Humphries Oxford www.humphrisrallysport.co.uk/ are your only options really. You may find other parts like springs, anti roll bars etc on the net but the above 2 are the go-to places |
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Jun 25, 2021 23:36:10 GMT
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Not sure my wife will be happy with the idea of there being another car around, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Ha ha- wait till you end up with 3 of them! They breed I can tell ya. But as you have found out- such small car fun and like you with your mini I have found them to be very similar to my Imp in little car fun. |
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Time was quickly passing and I was running out of time to get the car sorted ready for my track day. I spoke to a couple of people who work with bodywork (to get a price on cutting out and replacing the N/S/R arch) and they said it was solid metal and replacing the panel could distort the quarter panel. So I attacked the arches with a flap disc on a grinder to see what I was dealing with. Turns out it IS good metal underneath, winning!   Driver side wasn't as bad but had started to bubble so that received the same treatment  The areas were cleaned, rust treated and then filled. I envy those who can do body work especially filler. These areas are pretty straight forward, but it certainly tested my patience lol. Unfortunately I don't have any final photos of the repair. Fast forward to last sunday (27th June). A friend had kindly allowed me to use a space in his unit to prep and paint the car. The paint booth he has is currently being re-done otherwise this whole process would have been alot better and easier. With the car prepped with 400 grade sand paper, wiped down and masked it was ready for painting. The rear bumper was left on, a replacement was purchased and was being prepped off the car (I needed to cut the bottom for the diffuser and exhaust)  We then used 8 cans of Montana Black Code Red with pink dot caps to paint the car. Someone recommended these caps as they give a wider spray pattern. We also repainted the bonnet because it was streaky from when I had painted it at home.  But we didn't stop there... I thought it would be a great idea to PAINT a livery on. I didn't know how vinyl would stick to the graffiti paint so went this way instead. We started off by applying 6mm 3M fine line tape  Masked off the rest of the car  We then sprayed the areas with Montana Black Snow White   A band approx 25mm was masked down the sides along with the tops of the bumpers ready for the next colour      Very happy with how crisp the lines have turned out  Next was to fine line the bonnet and spray that white    It was time for the clear coat. I applied the first coat of Satin lacquer (Montana call it Varnish). By the time I had done the whole car, I noticed it had started to go cloudy in places.   Perhaps it was too cold in the unit? So we pulled out the little heaters and see if there were any improvements  Much better!  But the bonnet was proving to be a real struggle. I tried spraying far away and up close, tried the wider nozzle and normal nozzle, tried holding a heater above and then spraying. Nothing was seeming to work....ARHH!!  In the end my friend mixed up 500ml of 2k lacquer and used his spray gun. Not ideal conditions but its the only option we had  He did a single coat/pass over the whole car, left it about 20mins and we unmasked. This was now the end of the 2nd full day and we would return the following morning. |
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joeytalent
Part of things
ITB Everything.
Posts: 440
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That looks magnificent. Well done!
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Jul 13, 2021 13:20:54 GMT
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knocked it out the park with the repaint
great work !!
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Jul 16, 2021 21:18:08 GMT
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Wednesday this week I had my first track day at Snetterton accompanied by some friends (Supra Mk4, Fiesta ST and Mini One)  It had been awhile since I had done a track day (Snetterton 2015 and Lotus Test Track 2016, both in the purple MX5) The day started out overcast with a drizzle of rain on the sighting laps. Spent the morning avoiding getting in the way of everyone else   I think the majority of the time was figuring out which gears to use for each corner,cornering speeds, braking distance, when to accelerate out of the corner etc Theres so much to think about without realising.   After lunch things started to improve as the track become quieter. I was very surprised the brakes hadn't boiled up, it was a good decision to get the fluid flushed through with Dot 5.1 a couple of weeks prior. I was still on the Pagid discs and ADL Blueprint brake pad, they survived the day and got me home. Probably because I eased onto them rather than braking late, which obviously effected 'times' and flow   The Avon ZV7 tyres held up pretty good too. After a couple of outings I dropped the pressures to 29-30psi and left them at that. Whether I should have increased/decreased them more I'm unsure?   As expected the car struggled on the straights,purley because of the 1.0L gearbox. Quickest I got down the back straight was 95mph backing off at the first brake marker (again, didn't want to kill the brakes)   Confidence was much higher towards the end of the day so switched on the GoPro for the last couple of outings. Still lots to learn but that will come with more seat time |
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