My 2014 Mirage all DONE

Nice little car. If you are doing any kind of debadging at least the hampton badge. The others look ok. Much better wheel covers than the OEM covers. With these wheel wells I would go with a slightly larger wheel. Also are there OEM foglights that can be added into the existing areas? Some tinted windows would look good as well.

OEM fog lights I checked on, $380.00. Why?
The dealership sticker should be off tomorrow.

You know I was just looking on the net and saw a car as I have and they has 16's on it, looked awesome, but I worry if it would hurt my gas mileage?, you see the main reason I bought this car was for it's 44 MPG.
 
Well maybe you can find an OEM fog light set up on ebay for less down the road. What size wheels are on there now? 15's? With a light wheel you should not see much change in gas mileage. Something to consider in the future. I would probably go with a silver wheel as it looks better on this color. Also black wheels look smaller than they really are.
 
I'm thinking de-badging yes but today I changed out the factory wheel covers, not ready for wheels yet so this will do fine for now:)


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IMHO they look better than the sliver OEM covers.

if you decide to purchase some wheels, check out some rotas...
Wheel Collection - ROTA Wheels
 
Nice work on the paint correction of the Mirage. Last year, I bought a used Insight also for the specific reason of saving fuel for my commute. Not exciting by any means but perfect for my needs. The new Mirage looks to be a perfect fit for commuters who need a reliable,inexpensive, efficient car. I bet your is probably a lot of fun to wring out.
 
I don't care of its a Ferrari or a Mitsubishi, that paint looks great! Glad you're better.
 
Great Job Kevin...I'm glad that you are feeling good enough now to get out and do what you do! That paint really looks great and I like the color too.
 
Very nice work Kevin! That's the way to take care of a new car as soon as you get it!

Curious, as this is a DD that is used quite a bit why didn't you opt for a coating?
 
Very nice work Kevin! That's the way to take care of a new car as soon as you get it!

Curious, as this is a DD that is used quite a bit why didn't you opt for a coating?

This will be my DD.
I will travel a 100 miles each day , the traveling will take a toll on the finish, I know I'll have to Polish it 3-4 times per year, much easier to buff out defects with a sealant instead of a coating.
Who knows, I may coat it later but it would be after I wrap my roof.

Last night I remove my sealant and applied a black single pinstripe , IMO it shows off the lines of the car and my new graphics.

Below is how it looks as of now, doesn't look like the same car I only bought 12 days ago.


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I'm done , only thing I have left to do today is wipe the engine bay down, protect it, rinse-less wash and apply Collinite Aquawax where I remove the wax.
I did apply the Wolfgang Trim Sealant to the graphics to keep them looking new:dblthumb2:

What do you guys thing of my little one now a.
 
Paint looks awesome but from the picks the wheels look to be 14's, tires should be pretty cheap! Fwiw I added 17's to my old CR-Z which were 1" larger, the width was 1" wider and the tires were 30mm's wider and my mileage was still great, did mostly highway driving too, so never really took advantage of the hybrid system.

IMO the wheels really look too small for the car from the profile pics.

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Paint looks awesome but from the picks the wheels look to be 14's, tires should be pretty cheap! Fwiw I added 17's to my old CR-Z which were 1" larger, the width was 1" wider and the tires were 30mm's wider and my mileage was still great, did mostly highway driving too, so never really took advantage of the hybrid system.

IMO the wheels really look too small for the car from the profile pics.

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The tires are 14's.
Oh how I wish they would have at least had 15's.

I think I'll get my mileage out of these tires first which won't take long being I avg. about 600 miles per week including weekends , that way I can bargain shop, thinking 16's would look great, as I said before I saw someone who posted the same car with 17's and man totally different look but I think they'd be just a tad to large, rubbing.

I'd buy a used set if I found a bargain , they don't have to be perfect because I'll be painting them black anyway.

My 08' RAV4 came with 17's, I'd like to slap on some 20's but that's when the tire cost goes way up.
A while back I saw a Camero with looked like 22's, can't say enough times how bad it looked, crazy man.
As one said here, wheels is what makes a car look good, I totally agree.

Back to my little car.....

I was so surprised how well it road and drove on the test drive, going into the drive I told the salesperson that I didn't feel this was the car for me but I was wrong.
It rides very well, just don't hit a pot hole, the small springs can't handle it.
When I'm going down the road I feel like I'm in a much larger car, when I come out of it I smile and think, wth. Lol

The steering is extremely good, it's electric aid steering, no pump, weird but it does the job, even if it was to go out I could still steer the car with one hand, curb weight of the car is only 2750 pounds.

One feature I like is I can slow the car down using the engine, on the gear shift there's a "B" and thought , what is this for, I took off in "B", didn't shift, after reading it's a breaking aid.
It says to use it if going down steep hills and let it coast, that way you don't have to ride the break, pretty cool, another thing it's good for is let's say I'm going down the road and someone pulls out in front of me, I could break and also use the engine break to really stop the car.

There's more to this car than meets the eye. Lol

I was concerned about safety, what if I crashed it?
There's 7 air bags in the front, one in front if your knees, a rolled bar in case you roll it over and two beams of some kind that goes across the car on both sides in case of a side impact, like being in a cage of some type , it scored 37 out of 39 on crash testing.

Just those little wheels that kills me. Lol
 
Paint looks awesome but from the picks the wheels look to be 14's, tires should be pretty cheap! Fwiw I added 17's to my old CR-Z which were 1" larger, the width was 1" wider and the tires were 30mm's wider and my mileage was still great, did mostly highway driving too, so never really took advantage of the hybrid system.

IMO the wheels really look too small for the car from the profile pics.

Sent from my SPH-M930 using AG Online

That's some nice looking paint, very well done!

Thanks Mike, little surprised how good the paint is on this car being how cheap they sell them, I paid $12,950.00 for it, that after the $1000.00 rebate.
 
I detailed and protected the engine bay, all done with that part.

The engine wasn't really dirty, I was more concerned in protecting it.

I did the following.....

DP Rinse-Less Wash & Gloss
Small detail brush and a few cheap micro fiber towels

Once I was done cleaning it I did the most important step.
I protected all metal, plastics and rubber using Wolfgang Trim Sealant, I now feel better that even the engine bay is well protected, I'll detail it every 2-3 months to keep it clean and new looking.

Before pics .......

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After pics ....

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As Bobby G. said my little three banger is now bullet proof:dblthumb2:
 
Am I seeing what I'm seeing or is it a Mirage, LOL;)

Glad to see it came out so nice, looks better than 90% of the cars at just about any cruize night!

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