Gerahead's 71 Dart
Okay, so I have been away for a while, but I have been busy during this time. I got the underside of all but the engine compartment cleaned up. Wire wheeled the bejeezus out of it and then hit it with some spray bomb black to protect it since it is sitting out side.
I got some tips from swinger340canuck on how he media blasted the bottom of his car (thanks, Danny!). I got a stockpile of media and developed a plan. I built some easy 2x4 corner posts and built myself a "bathtub" to catch as much of the flying media as possible.
Once I had that done, I loaded up the playpen and went to work. It went really smoothly until I was about 1/2 done and then the blaster started to act up. The nozzle was plugging and when that wasn't the problem, the siphoning manifold plugged. It may be due to me recycling the media. It breaks down as you use it and the finer grain might have been the issue. Anyway, you would not have wanted your little kids to hear the language that was clearly audible Friday afternoon!
I eventually got it all done. The underside of the car is in really great shape, so the areas that were pretty clean didn't get the full treatment. I decided that if I ever have to do this again, I will pay someone to do it. I was absolutely exhausted by the time I was done.
I tried to plug the holes in the floor pan with aluminum tape, but it didn't hold up to the devastation of the blaster. With the recycling, I ended up using 3- 50 pound bags of ground glass media to complete the job.
Tonight the car got a couple of coats of PPG Omni black epoxy primer.
The epoxy was followed with a couple of coats of satin black paint over the epoxy primer. I wasn't sure at first if I would like the satin black, thinking it might be too flat, but it turned out to look pretty good. It is probably hard to see in the photos, but the paint has a little more gloss than the epoxy primer.
I am stoked that I am finally on the road to RE-construction rather than continued disassembly! It is amazing how nice it looks with clean metal and fresh paint. Whoohoo! I am declaring the official start to the reassembly!
Okay, so I have been away for a while, but I have been busy during this time. I got the underside of all but the engine compartment cleaned up. Wire wheeled the bejeezus out of it and then hit it with some spray bomb black to protect it since it is sitting out side.
I got some tips from swinger340canuck on how he media blasted the bottom of his car (thanks, Danny!). I got a stockpile of media and developed a plan. I built some easy 2x4 corner posts and built myself a "bathtub" to catch as much of the flying media as possible.
Once I had that done, I loaded up the playpen and went to work. It went really smoothly until I was about 1/2 done and then the blaster started to act up. The nozzle was plugging and when that wasn't the problem, the siphoning manifold plugged. It may be due to me recycling the media. It breaks down as you use it and the finer grain might have been the issue. Anyway, you would not have wanted your little kids to hear the language that was clearly audible Friday afternoon!
I eventually got it all done. The underside of the car is in really great shape, so the areas that were pretty clean didn't get the full treatment. I decided that if I ever have to do this again, I will pay someone to do it. I was absolutely exhausted by the time I was done.
I tried to plug the holes in the floor pan with aluminum tape, but it didn't hold up to the devastation of the blaster. With the recycling, I ended up using 3- 50 pound bags of ground glass media to complete the job.
Tonight the car got a couple of coats of PPG Omni black epoxy primer.
The epoxy was followed with a couple of coats of satin black paint over the epoxy primer. I wasn't sure at first if I would like the satin black, thinking it might be too flat, but it turned out to look pretty good. It is probably hard to see in the photos, but the paint has a little more gloss than the epoxy primer.
I am stoked that I am finally on the road to RE-construction rather than continued disassembly! It is amazing how nice it looks with clean metal and fresh paint. Whoohoo! I am declaring the official start to the reassembly!
