Recent Activity On My Mini

 Busy busy busy! I have been working hard on my Mini. I finished putting together the chassis and wheels. Not a lot to say about these. The chassis and wheels are often the easiest part of the model. Be that as it may, here is a picture of the Chassis and wheels for my Mini Mayfair. 

Next I painted the main bodywork. This was going to be a new thing for me as I wanted to paint a Union Jack on the roof. The mini was well known for being user modified and many owners had a Union Flag painted on the roof, seeing as the old mini was a British Icon. So sure, this isnt what my Mayfair looked like but it was how I would of liked it to look. 

So once the primer was painted I laid down a base coat of white paint on the roof. To paint multiple colours, always start with the lightest colour as the base, so white it is. Once that was painted, I masked up the roof again to allow for the red to be painted on top. Once dry, masked up the red and opened up ready for the blue. The red was Tartan Red and the Blue, Racing Blue. 

Once it was painted I had to gloss it. Trouble is, paint has a thickness. Running my finger over the painted roof, I could feel the edges of the paint. If I glossed this as a finisher coat, the edges would be easily seen when hit by light. So the roof had to be exceptionally smooth. So firstly I applied a 'levelling' coat of gloss. I sprayed mostly over the white areas of the roof as these were the lowest point and would fill the gap, then, after painting over the entire roof and leaving to dry for 24 hours, it was time to sand. 

I sanded down the roof so the ridges were smoothed out and the gaps were filled in. Although there was still a slight ridge to the white areas. I then masked up the roof and painted the rest of the car with the Tartan red. After applying the decals, I then applied a full finishing gloss coat over the whole car. Once sanded and polished, the roof was perfectly smooth, as was the rest of the car body. The diagram below will help visualize the problem I had with the roof. 

 So now the body work was painted, decaled and glossed. 

There are a few areas that need touching up after polishing but those will be handled later. Over all, I am pleased with the result. 

The Mini had metal work visible on the inside as well, so I had to paint and gloss those with body colour. The seats painted with textured charcoal paint and the floor and parcel shelf  coated with black carpet flock. Once put together, the result was very pleasing. 

I also used my new Chrome / Mirror paint I got from Culture Hustle This was fairly expensive but I have been looking for a good chrome paint for a while and thought it was worth a try and so far, I am pretty Impressed but I will wait and see how the main chromed parts turn out before giving a better review but so far, it looks amazing. 

Once my main body was sanded, polished and dry, I masked it up ready to receive the black paint for window rubbers and the chrome trim. It takes so long to mask up the details but in the end, this is the result. 

Next up, painting the rubbers and chroming the trim. The work is going well so far. Look out for the next update.