restoring My 66 dart gt convertible

[keastab]

Thanks Len
I know it'll have to be sanded and re shot right before spraying top coat (would sanding @ 400-600 be ok to get the sealer able to re-activate by shooting another sealer coat? or will I have to go coarser? ie 220 or 320) , but it was the best way to lock down the painted surfaces from contamination until I could get back to the outside of the body. I still have to change a couple of things in the engine bay such as going from rod actuated carb to cable, adding A/C firewall and drilling all the different holes to go to electronic ignition and late model alternator. Then it's off to the interior to finish the 96 sebring power seat mounts in front and trim the rear section about 1/2 inch per side and a custom console and top well liner. then hopefully I'll have the money saved up for that nice nissan QX3 paint.

[keastab]

got a lot of high's and lows. I guide coated the epoxy and sanded it down just to make sure it was as bad as I thought it was , yup it was. now al I have to do is chase the highs and skim the lows that fixing the high spot don't take out.
DSCF2867.jpghighs n lows.jpgDSCF2865.jpgDSCF2866.jpg
in the edited pic red's are high spots and yellow are lows

or would it be better to shrink the highs and shoot featherfill or slick sand over the entire hood and block it down?
I don't have any oil canning so I'm luck there and it's stuck to the inner brace rather well for a 40+ year old hood

[Len]

got a lot of high's and lows. I guide coated the epoxy and sanded it down just to make sure it was as bad as I thought it was , yup it was. now al I have to do is chase the highs and skim the lows that fixing the high spot don't take out.
DSCF2867.jpghighs n lows.jpgDSCF2865.jpgDSCF2866.jpg
in the edited pic red's are high spots and yellow are lows

or would it be better to shrink the highs and shoot featherfill or slick sand over the entire hood and block it down?
I don't have any oil canning so I'm luck there and it's stuck to the inner brace rather well for a 40+ year old hood

I would probably tap down the high spots using a hammer and dolly, grind the entire hood and apply Rage Gold or Rage Extreme in the low spots and level it. Once it's as good as you can get it THEN use Slick Sand to finish the leveling process before applying 2K then block sand and paint. Guide coat is a must to get a good job.

[keastab]

I would probably tap down the high spots using a hammer and dolly, grind the entire hood and apply Rage Gold or Rage Extreme in the low spots and level it. Once it's as good as you can get it THEN use Slick Sand to finish the leveling process before applying 2K then block sand and paint. Guide coat is a must to get a good job.

ok thanks
I just found some rage gold left on the shelf, I'll use that to hit the lows after I hammer and dolly down the high's.
I was just testing the powder guide coat and it works even better than the spray that I was using. it gave me a lot more definition of the bad spots with a lot less work and faster too!
thanks again for your help

[keastab]

I just finished up on some much needed suspension work for the dart and moved on to the door jams, trunk gutters and the underside of the trunk. ohh yeah and did my dashboard painting.

door jams done
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dashboard 1 coat of main color and top to be painted tan with a flattening agent added to the clear
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bottom of the trunk lid
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trunk gutters done
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complete gutters
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[keastab]

all I have to do is get all the bezels redone and the pad recovered in brown and I can bag and tag it as a finished part.. woooohooooo!
man those bezels suck!
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it's all there though and no RUST yehaa! it was in bad shape from being out in the weather for 7 years with no top.
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I even was able to get the dash lines to line up again after the repairs.
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the glove box had been screwed to the dash to keep it from falling down. (got the right springs on it and now it stays up.)
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ashtray even opens and closes. (was tack welded shut)
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now to dis-assembly the bezels and send em off to mr. G's to get them redone

[keastab]

yup I did a little more work on the dart this week and decided that if I do everything right it comes out looking Fantastic. Buttttt there's always a but ain't there? I just shot the first 2 coats of color and was going out of the booth for some clear to mix up and forgot to close the door(duh) anyway when I got back in there and was shooting the clear I watched some darn mosquitos kamikazi into the clear. quite a few of then if fact, I guess they like light colored paint something fierce. I ended up tweezering out about 20 of them buggers.

got the dash done too, except for the pad being recovered. that I'll do when I find a vinyl that matches the dash top color
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more to come

[keastab]

here some of the body
I'm pretty pleases even though I had to stop after the first coat of clear to remove the bugs
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of course I had some trash in the paint from me stirring up dust outside
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didn't get a mosquito at all on the sides but they sure did like the hood!
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looks like polk a dots !@#$#@#$#@! but now it's been sanded with 600 and 1000 (dull but flat)
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sides came out a lot better than I thought they would. it will need very little work to finish up on the sides.
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I'm going to sand the clear flat on the surfaces that got bug and dirt in it and lightly sand the sides with 600 to take the gloss off and then clear out the bug's and wet down the booth again(forgot the first time) so I can get the (wife want's some pearl in the mix now that she's seen it) next couple of coats down


QUESTION ??
I have not broke through to the base while sanding the claercoat to get the bug tracks and remains out and have very little peel issues to deal with
Can I just treat it like a scuffed clear and shoot the intercoat clear with pearl over the first coat of clear (that has been sanded with 600 grit, then 1000) and then hit it with the regular clearcoat finish?

or
am I going to have re-sand/block flat rebase and then intercoat clear/pearl and then clearcoat?

[keastab]

I decided to fix my steering wheel. I used a product called p7 and it worked ok it was sort of gummy while working with it but it ended up curing nice and hard and sanded fairly easy considering I was working on a small area at a time

a couple of before and after pic's
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here's the wheel ready for clear coat after I sand out some jagged edges and fuzzy lines on the 2 tone (I tried 3 times to get the lines right but decided to stop here because I was just making it look worse each time) I have to admit that I suck as a 2 tone masker, but a solid brown wheel looked HUGE and Ugly. luckily it'll be hidden somewhat by the nice chrome horn ring that follows the design.

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[Len]

Nice job on the steering wheel, I've been using Fusor Plastic Repair Adhesive for about 5 years and it's worked great for that job.

[keastab]

Nice job on the steering wheel, I've been using Fusor Plastic Repair Adhesive for about 5 years and it's worked great for that job.

thanks Len
I'll have to try that , the p7 worked ok but it left a lot to be desired while working with it and shaping it. it was sort of gummy and hard to push into the v'd out cracks. Once I got it inside the carcks and started filling it things went ok.

I've got one more wheel to do for the wife's car and I'll try the fusor plastic repair. thankfully it's not going to be a 2 tone wheel like this one

[Len]

thanks Len
I'll have to try that , the p7 worked ok but it left a lot to be desired while working with it and shaping it. it was sort of gummy and hard to push into the v'd out cracks. Once I got it inside the carcks and started filling it things went ok.

I've got one more wheel to do for the wife's car and I'll try the fusor plastic repair. thankfully it's not going to be a 2 tone wheel like this one

The one downside to the Fusor is that it hardens quickly so you can only do small areas at one time. Since we repair and paint one or two steering wheels a year I built a stand out of allthread and ply-wood. The stand works well for repairing and painting.

[keastab]

The one downside to the Fusor is that it hardens quickly so you can only do small areas at one time. Since we repair and paint one or two steering wheels a year I built a stand out of allthread and ply-wood. The stand works well for repairing and painting.

that is a lot nicer than mine I just taped a 1/2 inch pvc pipe to a saw horse and threaded a bolt through the steering wheel into the pvc in worked but was a bugger to spray the backside without a lot of overspray. I'll have to mak me one of those up,since I'm going to do another one for the other dart. how high did you go on the allthread to be able to paint the bottom? bout a foot or so?

[Len]

that is a lot nicer than mine I just taped a 1/2 inch pvc pipe to a saw horse and threaded a bolt through the steering wheel into the pvc in worked but was a bugger to spray the backside without a lot of overspray. I'll have to mak me one of those up,since I'm going to do another one for the other dart. how high did you go on the allthread to be able to paint the bottom? bout a foot or so?

The allthread is about a foot long but only about 8" sticks up above the plywood. If necessary you can sit the stand on a pedestal, stool, milk carton etc. which will allow you to get under the wheel and spray upward.

[keastab]

Thanks Len I'll get me some allthread and get it going on the other one, it needs even more work on the rim but the inner hub is a lot better.

A question about clear coat if I could. I had to stop after the first full coat of clear and part of the second going on the car due to mosquitos dive bombing the darn hood and trunk when I went out of the booth to get another batch of clear mixed up and forgot to close the door up all the way.
I block sanded it with 600 to get rid of the bug tracks and some legs that I couldn't tweezer out. I didn't have any burn through's so it's still got decent clearcoat on it .

There's (wife want pearl on the car now that she's seen it, she thought the color would be like the 3 stage gm off-white color) not enough bling I guess.
1.Can I just shoot the pearl now using intercoat clear (I've already done a test panel to see how many coats I need to make it look ok (2)for the wife) and finish up with 2 coats more of regular clear?
or am I
2. best blocking all over again and going back to base and then intercoat clear back to back? then clear. I'm worried about getting to many mil's on that car and having it easy to chip.
I'm using nason paints if that makes a difference