Purchases

I recently decided to experiment with Cafepress to see what fun could be had with their products & GBMINI; I spent a few very frustrating hours using their web sites last weekend to set up various items for order with a combination of a picture of GBMINI or a close-up of the “S” logo.
Their website was shockingly slow, and timed out more than once – forcing me to repeat some steps.
I was also disappointed by the fact that you can’t set up more than one of the same item, with different designs (unless you pay $$$/month for the premium services).

Anyway, I did eventually get some things set up and ordered – they came quite quickly and mostly look like nice quality items:

I also ordered a few Tshirts and other things. The customisation process is quite good, allowing you to upload your images and size & position them on the items.

I guess not everyone wants a shirt or teddy bear that has their MINIs logo on it, but for those that do, Cafepress offers a useful solution, with good quality items at reasonable prices.

One of the still-not-right parts of the interior of GBMINI#3 is the screws holding the door panels to the door – they really show up with the red matched paint of the trim, and they shouldn’t.

Recently Gabe reviewed the MyMINI knee pad and I wandered over to MyMINIparts to have a closer look … I did actually order a knee pad but unlike Gabe, now it has arrived I don’t think I will fit it; it does not give a perfect fit to the down tube, and it makes the downtube even thicker so increasing the chance of my leg leaning on it. I should have realized that before, but I didn’t.
Also, it fits to the down tube high up and my knee rests below the bottom of the part!

Anyway, while I was at MyMINIparts I looked around at what else they offer and found some “chrome” caps to cover the door trim screw holes! Ordered, received and fitted:

I would disagree with the “chrome” description; they are more like polished metal and have a somewhat rough look rather than the pure smooth chrome look of the factory “real chrome” elsewhere in the car; but for $8 for the set of four, there’s not much to complain about – and they do look better than the bare holes.

Previously I have used Klasse, Zymol and P21S products to keep GBMINI(#1, #2) clean – but last year I saw what Zaino could do, on Josh Wardells Black MINI.
So for GBMINI#3 I followed Josh advice and bought a Zaino kit. Finally with todays improved weather I was able to tackle poor dirty GBMINI … and here is the result of more than 3 hours work – the painted hood stripes & “S” on the roof look much better when cleaned & polished!

Following instructions in the Zaino Kit, I first “Dawn” washed GBMINI#3, then used the included claybars – disappointingly these steps did not totally remove bird-dropping damage.
After that I used the Zaino Z7 to properly wash the car, followed by an application of Z5 then Z2 polish – I used the ZFX accelerator with both, but you still have to wait half an hour after application. I followed both polishes with the Z6, as instructed.

I probably need to apply more coats of polish but already one coat of each looks good – and I was running out of day!