Stripping methods?

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Mattwood440

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Location
Kodak, TN
I am finishing disassembly soon and will be approaching the 2nd step in my first restoration: dropping it off at a body shop. I have the skills, time, and most of the tools to do everything myself, except the body.

Vehicle: all numbers matching 72 Duster 340, fender tag, no broadcast sheet, TX9 black, auto, ridiculously loaded originally. It has been caked with an amateur primer coat and undercoat and was left outside for years. Rotted bottoms of rear 1/4s and both areas between trunk hinges/rear window are the worst looking. Possibly the bottom corners of the front windshield need work, maybe. Floors look decent.

Goal: all oe looking inside and out, but with modern paint/tires, not concours, very good/fine quality. I hope it would be worth $40k+ depending on the market, of course, when finished. I am more than willing to spend the necessary $ to fully restore it, and fully expect to dish out more than it's worth lol. This car is for me. Having said that, I'm not going to spend 6 figures. Again, I'm doing 99% of the mechanical work myself, unless I decide to have a component farmed out.

I have 2 body shops options before me and I'm struggling with the choice. I can take it to a place that does high dollar restorations, where it will be blasted down to bare metal, fixed, then painted. Or I can take it to a local guy who does just body work on muscle cars and custom hot rods, out of his own shop and spray booth, where it will be mechanically stripped, fixed, painted.

I was dead set on blasting down to bare metal but after doing research I'm not so sure. I realize that the original prep work ma Mopar did at the factory does make a good base to build upon, and mechanical stripping was how body shops did it for decades. Obviously, the local guy would be cheaper by the hour. Neither place specializes in Mopars, but both have done expensive looking Mopars within the past year.

Experienced people's opinions needed!

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Take it to the one man shop. Then besides, you won't have 5 different guys working on it and everyone passing the buck as the price goes up.

The media blast process, you will have media shaking out of it for the next 50 years, that stuff goes everywhere... even when protected areas are covered.



☆☆☆☆☆
 
Have it dipped in caustic solution electrolysis tank purpose built for cars. They are out there, do your research. Removes paint, body filler and all rust.
 
WHAT EVER YOU DO.....

DO NOT pay in advance.

Small up front is fine, like a few thousand.

Then make progress payments.

Or put the funds into an escrow account so he knows he will get paid but only after he completes the work.

Check on it often, like weekly, at least till you are satisfied it will get done.
 
Have it dipped in caustic solution electrolysis tank purpose built for cars. They are out there, do your research. Removes paint, body filler and all rust.
I looked at that as well but I read that the car should be e coated afterwards. That sounds expensive.
 
I looked at that as well but I read that the car should be e coated afterwards. That sounds expensive.
Talk to people and price it out.

There is a guy that is Florida that goes after seam sealer with tools he made out of forks and knives after its done in the electrolysis tank. He isn’t cheap but he is thorough.
 
I like when they start with gloves, shoes and and stockings and then work their way to the important stuff.
 
Let's talk media blasting.

Is soda the way to go? Something else? What about the leftover media that I keep hearing is a mess?

What about dustless blasting? If I'm not mistaken the water contains the media so it still leaves residue.

Since I'm not doing the bodywork, I assume the bare metal is going to need to be treated or worked on within a couple weeks, no?
 
Dry ice blasting, only the paint and sealer flakes are left.

I like the idea of dipping, many 6 figure cars have been dipped.

I have been looking into it for a 67 dart convert I'm working on. It's not that expensive, and auto shipping from CO to Oregon, SoCal, or Midwest is about 1000 one way all in its about 4 to 5 grand.

I would also like to see cars submerged in the tank and rotated like a pig on a spit. I'm sure there are areas that don't get touched due to trapped air.

I may be over thinking it!

I would love to see someone setup an E coat company. Or better yet the OEMs could setup a line for auto restoration.
 
Dry ice blasting, only the paint and sealer flakes are left.

I like the idea of dipping, many 6 figure cars have been dipped.

I have been looking into it for a 67 dart convert I'm working on. It's not that expensive, and auto shipping from CO to Oregon, SoCal, or Midwest is about 1000 one way all in its about 4 to 5 grand.

I would also like to see cars submerged in the tank and rotated like a pig on a spit. I'm sure there are areas that don't get touched due to trapped air.

I may be over thinking it!

I would love to see someone setup an E coat company. Or better yet the OEMs could setup a line for auto restoration.
I'm actually looking into a dry ice blaster in Knoxville. I will report when I hear back.

I think dipping is out of the question. 4-5 grand to strip a 72 Duster is a bit rich for me and there is no one local. If it had the broadcast sheet, was more original, or had sentimental value I would consider it.
 
I like soda blasting myself, and you can generally blow out the the leftovers easily.
Will the soda remove body filler or is it too soft? I know it has filler in the 1/4s but who knows what's under the rest of that primer.
 
Will the soda remove body filler or is it too soft? I know it has filler in the 1/4s but who knows what's under the rest of that primer.
I'm not really sure, I haven't had issues with whatever the factory used back in the day.. haven't dealt with newer fillers, or thicker layers, I just dropped the stuff off and picked it up nice and clean.
 
I have done cars both ways.
The blasted car.
Before blast I scraped the underside under coating off, cleaned engine bay with heated pressure washer, prior to blast. Then blasted those areas, plus inner fenders, trunk, inside cabin
Blasted cleaned and epoxy coated with PPG DP PRIMERS.
Then used a finer grit media on rest of car.

I used to have a Redi-Strip franchise by my shop.
Cost was more But!
It was way less painless and used same PPG DP primers.
But shot inside frame rails with a long tube as everything was now bare.

Dipping is my Favorite.
Sadly I no longer had it available close enough and I can blast as I go section at a time as needed myself
 
WHAT EVER YOU DO.....

DO NOT pay in advance.

Small up front is fine, like a few thousand.

Then make progress payments.

Or put the funds into an escrow account so he knows he will get paid but only after he completes the work.

Check on it often, like weekly, at least till you are satisfied it will get done.
100 % agree with this as someone who just got his car back after 6 years in two different body shop jails.

Visit both shops you are considering and take a good look around. If either are disorganized, messy, ect. then DO NOT leave your car there.

If you see cars there that are pretty dusty it means they haven’t been worked in a while. Ask why?

I recommend taking home any/all parts that are removed while the car is being stripped unless your shop shows that it has a system for keeping all your stuff together.

I removed my car from its first shop not long before it closed its doors overnight and left dozens of unfinished cars and dozens of deposits high and dry. Do your homework before trusting anyone with your car.

Most of the time you get what you pay for. Sure, highly organized, higher priced shops are expensive, but good, timely, bodywork isn’t cheap.

End of rant.
 
I'm definitely not blasting that whole car. I'm sanding down until I get a good base, hitting it with epoxy and then building on top of that. Yeah it's not the 'right' way to do it but spending 100k on a Duster is not really a good idea either.

It looks like you may already need a floor, lower quarters, trunk extensions and some custom pieces under the rear window made. This is just the rust you know about. Think of all the issues that are going to pop up after blasting that you don't know about? If you can't do rust repair yourself, you're looking at spending a lot of money unless that guy working out of his garage is giving you a sweet deal.
 
Quick update: I'm leaning towards media blasting. I'm supposed to talk to the business owner this week.

@ESP47 I didn't even know what trunk extensions were until just now, lol. Thanks!
 
Dustless blasting does a good job, best to have the car on a rotisserie if possible.
 
Will the soda remove body filler or is it too soft? I know it has filler in the 1/4s but who knows what's under the rest of that primer.
If the soda blasting or Dustless blasting doesn't remove old filler, you can heat the filler with a propane torch and pop it right out with a putty knife. You aren't going to hurt anything if there's an old dent under that filler....lol. If those trunk gutter pieces aren't available from AMD, you may be able to get some from @Lee Robinson on here. He sells nice sheet metal that he meticulously cuts from parts cars. It sounds like the one man shop you mentioned is a good place to get it done. If you'd like 2nd opinions, go to the Mopar show in Knoxville this coming Saturday (22nd) at Chilhowie Park over by Knoxville Zoo. There will be lots of pretty local to you Mopar people there. Myself included! :)
 
You can do a combo of paint stripper on bulk, machincal strip, and blast rust areas (go over the areas paint stripper was used with #80 where stripper was used).
BTW The 1st thing Redi-Strip did was 2 guys one with magnet to find fillers and 2nd man used a large torch like used on rolled roofs.
They also used it on under coating, and seam sealer.
This was 1st step before paint stripper tank.
Was washed with heated pressure washer, then derusred in another tank. Heated pressure washed,
Phosphate coated and epoxy coated with primer
Was not a 1 step dip

So what I am saying is just becuase you blast does not keen it has to all be blasted. You can do a combination of what certain area's require
 
TL;DR blasting is half the cost of dipping.

I spoke with PJ, the owner of Strip Technologies in Knoxville at length. His business does all kinds of stripping, including classic cars. His dad, Larry Burchett, owns B Rod or Custom restorations which specializes in Corvettes and hot rods and has been featured in Motortrend. They do not have a problem with media contaminating everything during the restorations.

Dry ice blasting is amazing but ridiculously expensive. $2 per pound!

Plastic media is what they use on more delicate surfaces. A coarser material is used to remove filler. He didn't mention anything about soda.

He made an interesting point. Besides materials, they charge by the hour and there are certain things I can do to save money. First, he said it would go faster on a rotisserie, which they no longer provide. I'd have to purchase it, which wouldn't save me money at first, but it might eventually. Without the rotisserie, I could bring the car to them as a roller with wheels and suspension still installed, they would disassemble for a fee, put the shell on a "table," which would be put on a 2 post lift, and blasted from below (it would be reassembled afterwards). The rotisserie would eliminate the set up cost, shave time off the blasting, I'd have the benefits of having a rotisserie myself, and I could resell it afterwards if I choose not to keep it. I kinda like that idea...

Second, he said undercoating takes the longest to blast off and that's something I can do myself to save time and material. In my case, a previous owner went nuts with undercoating on the underside AND inside the trunk. It's bad. I could remove that myself with a scraper and heat gun, or just have them do it.

That's the direction I'm heading in.
 
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