Then I broke down (74 mini mild refurb)

[94touring]

Bullet mirrors came in.  Look super cool and feather light, not that stock mirrors weigh anything.  Probably have little function but that's ok.

[MiniDave]

What's behind me, is not important!   ;D

[94touring]

Ha, pretty much! Luckily minis are easy enough to peak over your shoulder.

[94touring]

Have an aerodynamic read!

http://www.carbonweezel.co.uk/testing/testing_mini.html

[MiniDave]

Looks like I was on the right track, a front splitter, a sealed flat floor and the addition of a diffuser in the back showed great increases, then attention to airflow into the radiator and grill will be the final steps.....I don't see me adding an above the roof rear spoiler.

Dan is this something like what you're headed for (absent the color of course)

[94touring]

Mmm well not really.  Though now I'm contemplating that under floor sheet to smooth and speed up air and blocking off most of the grill.  No wonder vikrams car was a rocket ship with the front and rear screen removed.  We're driving around with thrust reversers deployed!

[MiniDave]

Yeah, you could really save some weight by removing ALL the glass!  Just wear a helmet or goggles...   77.gif

I learned a hard lesson about weight reduction racing go karts - I came in third behind two Asian guys that together didn't weigh as much as I did!

[94touring]

.38lbs lighter between both mirrors, but more aerodynamic!

Edit: add 2.5lbs removed in sound deadening.

[94touring]

Cills upon cills. This should be worth a few pounds taking out the multiple layers.  :-[

[BruceK]

Re: that pink-ish Mini from Japan.  Seems a lot of Japanese Mini enthusiasts love to do that modification to the wipers. 

I get that it looks cool from the outside, but what driver wants to have to look past two vertical and stationary wiper blades right in the field of vision when it's not raining?

[MiniDave]

Yeah, I don't get that either - John McGee put a set on his customer's car that he did a Vtec on, the guy waited a year and a half for John to finish the car, and put it up for sale a month after it was done.

[94touring]

Lots of dirt, rust flakes, an unnecessary metal.  Few areas to tidy up before putting the new cill on.

[MiniDave]

Doesn't it feel good to remove nasty, rusty bits and weld in solid new metal?  77.gif

[94touring]

Well that and the other thing I discovered was rather than trim the flares to fit over the body seams, they cut the seams!  So I have 6 points with no seam.  That's no bueno for body rigidity.

[94touring]

One side done.  Saw where they had put new inner cills in spots but then other spots were a bit rotten still.  Did a little rear subframe mount reconstruction as well.  I didn't have a pair of mk3 cills, well had one but not the other. So it got mk1 style on both sides.  The floors are pretty ugly at this point with the overcill, their removal, and everything else going on down there.  But at least it's solid metal now looks aside.     

[MiniDave]

Solid metal is what's important........looking better!

[94touring]

Yeah where the cross member meets the inner cill there wasn't any metal period. It did make it easy to vacuum out tons of sand that was under the cross member before welding it shut.  They have some heavy duty welds under the floor that are staying put from where I cut, air chiseled, and ripped out. I'll need to apply some adhesive to fill in some of the jagged voids.

One door is stripped down to basic frame.  It weighs in at 11lbs with the hinges, so at this point I'm guessing 20lbs fully built.  We shall see. 

[94touring]

Got home to a box of minispares.  Alloy skins were part of the order and weigh in just under 3lbs.  The heater box is TINY and didn't bother to weigh it, but way lighter than stock as advertised.

[94touring]

My box of kad parts were signed for by our front office yesterday. Unfortunately they left early for the ice storm and didn't bother to put them in the mail room to be checked out by security.  Well since Jen is president of the HOA she has a key to the main office.  Lucky me!  But then the key she has didn't work. Unlucky me.  At 415am I was up and off to fly for 4 days so no touching my kad parts.  Sad times.  I did however order some protech adjustable shocks to ease the pain.  Everything I read about them on the internets shows positive reviews.  Also apparantly very rebuildable.  Though shipping on them was stupid and they almost lost a sale. If I get hit with customs fees I'll be kind of pissed.  The adjustable gaz I have been running will go to the truck.   Got these protech in the lower version which was the main reason and they offer them in aluminum.  Lighter maybe?  Hopefully the dsn trunions arrive this week so I can slap these subframes together and be ready to bolt on soon.

[MiniDave]

I love getting boxes of new parts, it's like I'm a kid on Xmas morning!

My DHL guy and I are on a first name basis..... ;D

[94touring]

Best part of being an adult right? The security guys at our condo are always going..oh hey you got more car parts back there to grab

[94touring]

More on aerodynamics:

[BruceK]

Cool.  I was thinking that the area all around the rear subframe probably created a lot of drag.

[94touring]

I will be interesting to do a before and after on the same day to see if any differences are felt at speed.  I'd probably need some kind of acceleration reader though.

[MiniDave]

I'll bet there's an ap for that!   ;D