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Someone is going to get a beautiful car. Even today when I made my first post I looked at your car again and felt a twang of doubt about my decision to proceed, lol!
Glad to hear this! Remember.... anybody can "restore" a car... but it takes REAL stones to cut one up!
Extra work is right! We started with a single stage paint. A buddy of mine layed 3 heavy coats. We got orange peel. We wet sanded, layed 3 more thick, heavy coats, and it peeled up again. Wet sanded again, went to the paint shop. Got good advice, and some clear "just in case".... went and put 3 more thick coats of paint, then 3 coats of clear over that. Wet sanded & buffed. Wife said she was sick of wet sanding! But it looks great out in the sun (not so much in the garage under the lights though...at least to me)
make-shift paint booth
Gotta love a gal who wet sands with a smile! Good enough for a driver!
Now if I can do it, so can you Priya! Just keep thoes pictures coming so we can follow along with your progress!
Awesome color. I went back and forth between resale red and the grey. I will do one in grey before its all over.
Someone is going to get a beautiful car. Even today when I made my first post I looked at your car again and felt a twang of doubt about my decision to proceed, lol!
Thanks!
Buy it and I'll meet you half way, that's near Thunder Bay or so.
Priya... you need to visit doorgunner`s thread, and browse through his pictures again to get yourself back on track!!
Many years ago my wife gave me some very good advice... I wanted a 69 Grand Prix, but a co-worker had a 72 and 73, said he`d give me a great deal on either.
Wife said don`t EVEN go look at them, `cuase you`ll buy one, and it won`t be what you want, and in the end you still won`t be happy with it.
So I`m telling you.... as MUCH as you`ve talked about doing this chrome bumper conversion... it sounds like that is what you truly want. Don` go and buy something else that will not satisfy your desire for a unique custom built by you.
Remember Kenny Chesney song lyrics....
I can go out every night of the week
Can go home with anybody I meet
But it's just a temporary high 'cause when I close my eyes
I'm somewhere with you, somewhere with you
So when I picked up my second rear clip I damaged it stuffing it into my Eagle. There are some very fine stress cracks as you can see in the pictures below if you look carefully. The first picture shows the cracks much more clearly than they appear in real life. The second picture is closer to what the cracks look like in real life - they are very hard to see and one must be at the right angle to see them. Can I just sand these down a bit and put Vette panel adhesive and filler over them, or do I need to lay down fiberglass matt?
I do not know where these cracks are located. I need a photo taken further back...and if you want to put masking tape on where they are located so I have a reference point.
Is this clip handlaid???.... or factory with what appears to be white paint?
And if you look on the backside of the damaged area...and it being a handlaid part....can you see distressed fiberglass that can have a white look to it????
Using VPA or matt and resin/gelcoating is still up in the air. Which is why I personally need to know where the damage is located on the panel.
I do not know where these cracks are located. I need a photo taken further back...and if you want to put masking tape on where they are located so I have a reference point.
Is this clip handlaid???.... or factory with what appears to be white paint?
And if you look on the backside of the damaged area...and it being a handlaid part....can you see distressed fiberglass that can have a white look to it????
Using VPA or matt and resin/gelcoating is still up in the air. Which is why I personally need to know where the damage is located on the panel.
DUB
The clip is new hand laid fiberglass with a white gel coat. Looking at the backside I don't see any fiberglass that looks distressed/white or damaged.
I hope it's only a minor problem with your new clip.
Yes, I'm kicking myself over that. I spend an extra $1000 to get a clip that's not so beat up as the one I have and then when I'm picking it up I get in a rush and damage it putting it in my car.
Honestly....And I know I am not there to see it due to photos sometimes can not show clearly what an eye can see.
The area of concern is where the parting lines of the mold come together. And what you might think is damage that you did to it...actually can be cracks in the mold that show up in the gelcoat of the part when it is made.
In your series of photos...where you can see the crack BELOW the parting line...I do not see any above the line...which tells me there may be an issue in that section of the mold....and not a problem in your part.
Because I can not see any issues from the backside. If you still feel you have a concern...either take a magnifying glass and look at the crack really good...OR...take the part outside in the sun..and look at the 'damaged area' from the backside with the sun on the outside and chances are...you will have enough light shining though to let you see if you see cracks that are actually wider than what is seen from the outside.
Dub, I sanded the parting line where the cracks are with 120 grit to even the level between the two parts of the panel. I hope you can understand my diagram below. I've exagerated the shape to hopefully make it clearer what I'm talking about. This is viewing the rear clip as it would sit on the car but from the passenger side. The black line is the original outline of the rear clip. I sanded the mold parting line down to where the red line is. Now there isn't a smooth curve from the ducktail to the tail lights. Should I continue sanding the tail light panel at point "A" to regain the smooth curve or should I fill the tail light panel out to the blue line in order to get the smooth curve?
OK...from what I gather from your drawing....the parting lines were OFF a lot...and NOT flush. So you sanded on the parting line to get this area flat. Am I correct???
And in doing so....the contour of the body is off a bit and not to your liking. Am I correct???
AS long as this sanding you are doing is not going into the fiberglass a lot....then applying VPA to build it back out to where you want it.....OR...as much as I hate to write it....depending on how much you have sanded it...you could block this issue out and not need any VPA.
This is where your sense of feel and being able to close you eyes and picture what you are feeling and then apply what you are feeling to the panel and decide if adding VPA will get you to what you want is the way to go...or carefully blocking the panel out and then taking into consideration applying gelcoat back on this area to build it back out and then possibly a polyester primer.
IF you feel that the amount of gelcoat and/or polyester primer is going to be quite a lot to get this area filled in and right...then you might want to apply VPA.
MANY times when I am working on a Corvette ...where I feel a body defect. I can picture it in my mind after feeling it and decide IF me blocking it out will do it OR it is better to STOP and fill it in with VPA. Over the years I have learned and know what I am feeling and how it equates to how much of the body I would have to block down and off to get that distortion out of the panel.
I am more concerned about sanding down the thickness of the body to get the repair flat....and WEAKENING the panel at the same time.
Hopefully what I wrote made sense and helped you...If not...let me know.
OK...from what I gather from your drawing....the parting lines were OFF a lot...and NOT flush. So you sanded on the parting line to get this area flat. Am I correct???
DUB
Correct.
Originally Posted by DUB
And in doing so....the contour of the body is off a bit and not to your liking. Am I correct???
Correct.
Originally Posted by DUB
AS long as this sanding you are doing is not going into the fiberglass a lot....then applying VPA to build it back out to where you want it.....OR...as much as I hate to write it....depending on how much you have sanded it...you could block this issue out and not need any VPA.
This is where your sense of feel and being able to close you eyes and picture what you are feeling and then apply what you are feeling to the panel and decide if adding VPA will get you to what you want is the way to go...or carefully blocking the panel out and then taking into consideration applying gelcoat back on this area to build it back out and then possibly a polyester primer.
IF you feel that the amount of gelcoat and/or polyester primer is going to be quite a lot to get this area filled in and right...then you might want to apply VPA.
MANY times when I am working on a Corvette ...where I feel a body defect. I can picture it in my mind after feeling it and decide IF me blocking it out will do it OR it is better to STOP and fill it in with VPA. Over the years I have learned and know what I am feeling and how it equates to how much of the body I would have to block down and off to get that distortion out of the panel.
I am more concerned about sanding down the thickness of the body to get the repair flat....and WEAKENING the panel at the same time.
Hopefully what I wrote made sense and helped you...If not...let me know.
DUB
Makes sense. I thought about this a lot last night and I'm going to fill the area on either side of the mold parting line with VPA as well as blocking a little farther down on the fiberglass where I now feel quite a bit of a bump where there should be a smoothly transitioning curve (or at least I assume that's the case as I didn't think to feel the tail light panel area before sanding down the part line).
