Mongol Rally Micra
Discussion
Here's something a little bit different!
You may have heard of the Mongol Rally; I know that a few PHers have done it over the years. It's a charity rally that runs from London, across Europe and Asia, through Mongolia and now finishes in Ulan-Ude, Siberia. We're aiming to do the ~10,000 miles in a little under six weeks. The rules about what car you can take? 1.0 litre and crap. Excellent
For many years (since way before I could drive!), me and a few friends have been enamoured with the idea of doing the rally. Over the years the various restrictions that came in made it less and less viable (cars under ten years being the biggest issue) but a year or two ago it devolved and they removed the age clause – result! I can't honestly remember how we ended up discussing the feasibility of doing it this year, but it was decided within minutes that we'd give it a go. After going in to our respective bosses' offices, mumbling a lot and staring at our shoes whilst making promises of love and overtime, we found ourselves slightly alarmed to be in the position of taking part in the Mongol Rally 2016 as team '101 Damn-Nations'...
You may have heard of the Mongol Rally; I know that a few PHers have done it over the years. It's a charity rally that runs from London, across Europe and Asia, through Mongolia and now finishes in Ulan-Ude, Siberia. We're aiming to do the ~10,000 miles in a little under six weeks. The rules about what car you can take? 1.0 litre and crap. Excellent
For many years (since way before I could drive!), me and a few friends have been enamoured with the idea of doing the rally. Over the years the various restrictions that came in made it less and less viable (cars under ten years being the biggest issue) but a year or two ago it devolved and they removed the age clause – result!
I can't honestly remember how we ended up discussing the feasibility of doing it this year, but it was decided within minutes that we'd give it a go. After going in to our respective bosses' offices, mumbling a lot and staring at our shoes whilst making promises of love and overtime, we found ourselves slightly alarmed to be in the position of taking part in the Mongol Rally 2016 as team '101 Damn-Nations'... 
This is the beasty that we'll be spending our summer in. There was only ever one car choice, really; it had to be a Micra. We've all known each other since school (we're 22/23 now) and so spent a fair bit of time being turned pale in each other's first cars; team member Charlie's was an N-reg 1.0 litre Micra that survived an almost comical level of abuse without faltering. It held up surprisingly well when he crashed it, too. Finding this particular example was probably the most dodgy car-buying experience of my driving career so far - I managed to break pretty much every one of the rules that I generally follow, so I'll post about that next! Against the odds though, W472LCU seems to be alright! If a little cosy compared to what I'm used to:
I'll be keeping this thread focussed on the car – we've got a few bits that we're going to be doing to it. It's in reasonable condition; we did a basic service on it under the guidance of a friend who actually knew what he was doing. We've been advised to change the lower wishbones/track rod ends as they are corroded – still solid, but this will potentially be a ballache if we bugger up the tracking or bend it in some arse end of nowhere. Have the ballache now to potentially save having it in SomewhereStan, is the thinking behind this. We'll be doing a few decent road trips in it in the meantime though, which will hopefully flag up any issues!
The really fun part though, is how the car will look. In a move that we probably shouldn't have done, we have said that we will style the car like a dalmatian. It was originally more of a floating idea than anything else, but after the local paper ran with the headling “Team to travel to Siberia in a dalmatian” we've managed to somewhat box ourselves into a corner! We're still working on how exactly we are going to go about it whilst having it look half decent. The best thing to do is to start with a white car, but considering that this is our base there is a fairly obvious problem with that! All hints, tips, tricks very gratefully received on how to make the car white as cheaply as possible...
It would be awesome to hear from anyone who has done the rally before. Any advice at all really will be gratefully received as none of us have done anything like this before!
Looking forward to watching this one.
I have a big soft spot since I owned a blue Micra, same age roughly (S reg), it was a limited edition called an Ally. Bought it in a panic to replace a Ford KA I blew up and I loved that little Micra, one of the few cars I regret selling because there was nothing wrong with it. In fact, it never had anything wrong with it for 3 years I thrashed the life out of it, couldn't be killed but could go anywhere in any weather.
Can't think of a better car for the challenge, until you get to a hill. I've never known a car so badly impacted by the number of passengers or the wind direction, 1 up with a tail wind it felt like a bullet!
I have a big soft spot since I owned a blue Micra, same age roughly (S reg), it was a limited edition called an Ally. Bought it in a panic to replace a Ford KA I blew up and I loved that little Micra, one of the few cars I regret selling because there was nothing wrong with it. In fact, it never had anything wrong with it for 3 years I thrashed the life out of it, couldn't be killed but could go anywhere in any weather.
Can't think of a better car for the challenge, until you get to a hill. I've never known a car so badly impacted by the number of passengers or the wind direction, 1 up with a tail wind it felt like a bullet!
. I tried very hard to kill it no luck. It's still going somewhere...TooMany2cvs said:
camhasnoname said:
All hints, tips, tricks very gratefully received on how to make the car white as cheaply as possible...
If it was a metal gate or a metal garage door, you'd get some sandpaper, a brush and a tin of exterior gloss, right...?I did the rally (well, most of it - we rolled in Kyrgyzstan) last year in a Pug 205 called Daisy dressed up like a cow, not too far off a dalmatian colour scheme wise! We cheated and used a car that was already white and used some cheap black vinyl to give the spots. Worked really well and didn't peel off.
Advice wise, get your visas done ASAP - they are a gigantic pain in the behind and take way longer than websites say they will. What route are you taking? If you are taking a Southern Route, do the Pamir Highway - it's a lot of graft but very much worth it.
There is a wealth of Micra's that do the rally so get in a convoy and share spares etc.
You will have an awesome time, I'd do it again in a heartbeat if I could get the time off work
Advice wise, get your visas done ASAP - they are a gigantic pain in the behind and take way longer than websites say they will. What route are you taking? If you are taking a Southern Route, do the Pamir Highway - it's a lot of graft but very much worth it.
There is a wealth of Micra's that do the rally so get in a convoy and share spares etc.
You will have an awesome time, I'd do it again in a heartbeat if I could get the time off work
C70R said:
Indeed. Cans of enamel spray paint (Hammerite by a different name) can be had for a couple of quid on EBay. A quick rough up with some sandpaper (and a wash), and you can just blow straight over without priming.
Even easier than that, though.Less than a tenner for a litre of exterior gloss. Big brush. Job jobbed. Far less masking needed.
TooMany2cvs said:
C70R said:
Indeed. Cans of enamel spray paint (Hammerite by a different name) can be had for a couple of quid on EBay. A quick rough up with some sandpaper (and a wash), and you can just blow straight over without priming.
Even easier than that, though.Less than a tenner for a litre of exterior gloss. Big brush. Job jobbed. Far less masking needed.
TooMany2cvs said:
Even easier than that, though.
Less than a tenner for a litre of exterior gloss. Big brush. Job jobbed. Far less masking needed.
nooooooooooo!Less than a tenner for a litre of exterior gloss. Big brush. Job jobbed. Far less masking needed.
get on ebay and buy a load of 99p delivered black gloss vinyl (or a 1.5m x 0.5m is only £7.99) and cut out a load of shapes and stick them on
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Gloss-Black-Vinyl-Wrap-C...
then you can return to stock easily if you want to
JJ
Cheers for the responses - it's nice to see the love for the little Micras - and comforting that most of the stories seem to involve them being abused and taking it without fuss! 
Less than a tenner for a litre of exterior gloss. Big brush. Job jobbed. Far less masking needed.It's the sanding aspect that we're a bit apprehensive about; none of us have done anything like it before. Obviously it's not exactly got to be concours standard, but it would be nice if it at least lasted the duration of the rally! Is it worth getting an electric sander?
All okay I presume? Any pictures of Daisy?
We are doing the Southern route (albeit using the Caspian Sea ferry rather than going through Iran) and fully intend on doing the Pamir Highway! I must admit it's one of the elements of the journey that I'm both very nervous and very excited about. How long did that stretch take you guys?
TooMany2cvs said:
C70R said:
Indeed. Cans of enamel spray paint (Hammerite by a different name) can be had for a couple of quid on EBay. A quick rough up with some sandpaper (and a wash), and you can just blow straight over without priming.
Even easier than that, though.Less than a tenner for a litre of exterior gloss. Big brush. Job jobbed. Far less masking needed.
mattydoh said:
I did the rally (well, most of it - we rolled in Kyrgyzstan) last year in a Pug 205 called Daisy dressed up like a cow, not too far off a dalmatian colour scheme wise! We cheated and used a car that was already white and used some cheap black vinyl to give the spots. Worked really well and didn't peel off.
Advice wise, get your visas done ASAP - they are a gigantic pain in the behind and take way longer than websites say they will. What route are you taking? If you are taking a Southern Route, do the Pamir Highway - it's a lot of graft but very much worth it.
That sounds awesome - I can imagine the 205 would be a pretty solid choice for it. Don't know if I'd fancy rolling one though Advice wise, get your visas done ASAP - they are a gigantic pain in the behind and take way longer than websites say they will. What route are you taking? If you are taking a Southern Route, do the Pamir Highway - it's a lot of graft but very much worth it.
All okay I presume? Any pictures of Daisy? We are doing the Southern route (albeit using the Caspian Sea ferry rather than going through Iran) and fully intend on doing the Pamir Highway! I must admit it's one of the elements of the journey that I'm both very nervous and very excited about. How long did that stretch take you guys?
t and they will beg for more. camhasnoname said:
It's the sanding aspect that we're a bit apprehensive about; none of us have done anything like it before. Obviously it's not exactly got to be concours standard, but it would be nice if it at least lasted the duration of the rally! Is it worth getting an electric sander?
No, just go over it with a few sheets of glasspaper, just to take any polish off and give you a nice smooth flat keyed surface.We did a much smaller rally for charity. In return for a logo on the car, a local sign writer did ours up in our chosen scheme. We also got him a mention in the paper. Our car was also free, donated by the local audi garage (was a trade in corsa heading to the block), we bagged them a name drop in the paper too. 
Tour your local spray shops and see if one of them will spray it white and black spots since its for charity. You never know.
Tour your local spray shops and see if one of them will spray it white and black spots since its for charity. You never know.
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