I invested $12 on two 48 x 24 sheet metal rems. cut them in half to get four 24x24 plates to practice on. After learning how to adjust the paint gun, I painted all 8 sides without runs. I will now re-sand the parts with runs and try again.
Now that I am more comfortable with painting, I'm ready to take on some of the bigger pieces. I removed the hood and right fender. Since the hood looks more challenging i will save that for later. For now, I will start stripping and priming the right fender.
Greetings from the steep side of the learning curve. When I started working on the fender, I started using a stripper disk on an angle grinder. It worked very well at stripping the paint but I was afraid it would be too aggressive for the bare metal. So I used the angle grinder for the first 3 to 5 coats of paint and then switched to 80 grit sand paper to get down to bare metal. When I started this project, I purchased a reasonably good air powered DAS sander. I worked well when I sanded the headlights and small brackets. Unfortunately when I used it in the outside of the front fender, my compressor could nit keep up. It would work fine for a minute or two then the air pressure would drop and the sander would slow down. After 5 minutes the air pressure was so low the sander wouldn’t work at all. I then had to wait for the compressor to build up enough pressure to start sanding again. Since I think i removed about 180 pounds of paint from this fender alone, I decided to give up on the air sander. This weekend I purchased an electric 6 inch DA sander. It worked really well on the outside of the fender.
In general, once I got the paint off, the fender looks pretty good. There are numerous small indentations from 88 years of stones and other debris. I think body filler will take care of them. The one real problem is a crack at one bolt hole where the fender attaches to the frame. A friend has given me a suggestion on how to fix it. I will lay a small piece of 1/8 inch music wire on the inside radius and carefully weld the outside ( one short shot at a time). For the bolt hole crack I will back that up with a 3/8 washer and fix that crack. In order to get comfortable with the technique, I bent a small 18 gauge sample. I then added a crack on the radius and across the bolt hole with a dremel. The results came out pretty good.
Unfortunately, because of the shape of the fender I can only use the DA sander ob about 1/3 of the inside of the fender. The radius is too tight for the 6 inch wheel to fit. At this point it looks like I will be hand sanding two thirds of the inside of the fenders. On the inside of the fenders there are many deep dents. They appear to be from old body work. The outside of the fender is smooth because it was apparently tined after the body work, Many of these dents are quite deep. I am not sure I can completely remove all of the old paint and body filler. Is it Ok to just spray epoxy primer over the ones I can't get completely clean?
If that was mine, I would melt out all the old lead. You can then work out those dents with a hammer and dolly. On our '38, there was rust forming under the factory lead just waiting to cause problems after the new paint was applied. Also, it may be worth passing over some of those dents and pits with a quick dusting of a sandblaster to clear them out. You might be surprised that some of the deep pits quickly turn into holes...which you will want to address before moving forward.
When I sand or paint I wear a respirator, safety glasses and noise reduction ear muffs. My wife thinks I look comical.
Nice work Gene, keep up the good work. I second wicking the lead out. I've seen once the top layer of lead sanded disturbed it starts to cause problems with the first layer of primer or filler.
I really appreciate the feedback guys. I have to admit though that I find the idea of removing the tin intimidating. I am not experienced in body work and with the paint removed, the surface looks very good. There are more than 9 different layers of paint over the tin. I had 2 layers added in 2003 or 2004 ( primer and top coat). I know it was painted black in the mid 80's. Below that black and its primer there are layers of red, blue, grey and black. The tined areas appear solid and I can see no corrosion in the transition area between the base metal and the tin. I know the car has been in California at least since the 80's and I see no corrosion anywhere. How great do you think the risk is?
In addition to lots of sanding, I've spent the last two weeks getting different opinions and researching painting over old lead. Since I'm getting the primer from Eastwood, I contacted their tech department to get their opinion. They confirmed what 49ply said about disturbed lead causing problems. They said that the when sanded the newly exposed lead will have flux which if not neutralized will cause problems. They said that they used to use baking powder and water to do this. However, the water caused flash rusting. They say the best way to prepare the surface is with their paint prep cleaner. They recommend cleaning the surface 5 or 6 times with the cleaner changing to a new towel every time. Based on this and the opinions I've gotten, I plan to leave the lead on the outside. The inside of the fender is very rough so I've been trying to clean out every one of the dozens of small holes. To do this I've been scraping out the old paint with a dental pick and then wire brushing till all the old paint is gone. With all of the small holes this is taking forever. I showed the fender to several friends and they think I may be overdoing it. One friend has a small sand blaster he has offered to lend me. That should significantly speed up the process.
If the lead looks good, I'd leave it. Try stripping with a razor blade...... you will be surprised how quick you can get it to metal (or the first layer of primer, which comes off quickly then, with 80 grit). I find it to be way faster and much less mess.
I will try the razor blade. The sand blaster idea didn't work. My friend either gave away or threw away his old blaster. I tried a cheap one from harbor freight but with 100psi air it very slowly removed some paint. That was if the blaster was pointed up. When it was pointed down all the beads poured out before I could pull the trigger. Plan B worked much better. I used a rotary file on a die grinder that quickly cleaned out the larger dents. The dental pick followed by a wire brush on a drill cleaned up the rest. I welded up the two holes that had cracked where the fender bolts to the frame. That was before. This is after. There are two small holes towards the bottom of the fender where someone had added turn signals. I have decided to weld these closed and get headlights with the turn signals built in. Other than welding these holes, I think this fender is ready for primer. However, every morning I find something else I missed. So we'll see. Just for the heck of it I took a picture of all the tools I used to remove the paint from this fender. It was one air powered with one bit. Four electric powered with 9 attachments. Nine hand powered, a lot of sand paper and a vacuum cleaner to clean up the mess.
It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything. So I will try to catch up. I have stripped and painted two fenders so far. Once stripped, I found the right rear fender has had extensive bondo repair sometime in its past. When I cleaned out all the old body filler, I found several areas at the bottom of the fender with significant holes. Even though there wasn’t any sign of them before removal, I decided to reinforce the area before I painted and added new body filler. On the advice of a friend, I tack welded a 5/16 inch rod to each area with a large gap. The idea is to give a more stable base for the body filler to prevent future cracking. We have entered into our savage southern California winter. Even though the temperatures get over 60 for a couple of hours every day, I’m afraid that it’s not long enough for the primer to fully dry. So I have decided not to strip or paint any more parts untill the weather warms up. I still have plenty to do disassembling everything. There is not much to talk about or show. So far I have removed the starter, alternator, compressor, carburetor, radiator, grill and pulled the engine and transmission. I have also removed the seats, steering wheel, fuse box wires and gauges from inside the car. Next will be the shifter, the carpeting and upholstery.
In my last post I said there wouldn’t be anything interesting about disassembling the car. However, on Christmas day, my grandson ( who turned 6 on Dec 20), said he wanted to help work on the car. I got an electric drill with a screwdriver bit and had him remove the screws holding the side panels and window frames. After about 15 minutes, his father suggested we go open Christmas presents. He didn’t want to stop working on the car. After finishing the side panels, he moved on to removing the ash tray and dome light. At this point he was finally convinced to quit with the offer of snacks. I have appeared to have created another hot rodder.
I see yellow metal (brazing brass) in your fender lip with the cracking. It has had some issues for a while. Truly the best would be to cut it out, make new pieces and weld those in. But I get that shaping the pieces is beyond what many folks have the skills and tools to do. Those sticks of metal you welded in will not help all that much being they are straight and not curved to match the fender opening. Thin wall tubing, think electrical conduit with the zinc ground off or similar that fits inside your rolled over fender lip, can be split in half with a saw or grinder. Then it can be given a curve to fit inside the rolled over metal of the lip using hand pressure and something to bend it around. They should be welded all around on the inside as they are moisture traps. Then weld through the cracks from the outside into the half tubes to make it all strong and water tight.
Crusty Chevy, I agree that the methods you pointed out are the best way to go. However, although it doesn’t look like it in the photo, the rods I tack welded are a pretty good fit at the root of the fender lip. Also, since I’ve had the car for 25 years and until I removed all the old paint and body filler there was no sign of the old damage. For that reason I’m pretty confident that after filling the area with new body filler it will last another 25 years. Thank you for the suggestion. I really appreciate the input I get from you guys with a lot more experience than I have.
While removing the windows I broke the rear window behind the left door. I took it to Street Rod Glass to get it replaced. When I went to pick it up, the owner mentioned that he had a spare tire cover from a 36 ford sedan and asked if I wanted it. I’ve always wanted one and now I have one. It’s rough but I think I can fix it. He also said he had the mounting hardware but so far he hasn't been able to find it. I'm a long way from needing it, so I'll give it some time to see if he finds it. My windshield frame has been in bad shape since I bought the car 25 years ago. I showed it to a friend to get advice on how to repair it. He said he wouldn’t try. The extruded material was too thin to be able to repair. Fortunately, many years ago I purchased a frame at a swap meet. It is in rough shape but I am sure I can repair it and get it plated.
To get ready to remove the body, I welded in some bracing to help keep the it straight when I remove it. The body seems pretty stiff now. However, I plan to cut out the firewall and recess it by 3 inches. I think the bracing will be necessary then.
My latest challenge is removing the door hinges. Each door hinge is held on with three 5/16 flat blade screws. The front hinges have nuts holding them and are round head. The rear hinge screws are flat head and screw into threads attached to the door frame. I welded 7/16 jam nuts onto the front screws. I was able to either unscrew them or break them and remove the two halves. Front Hinge Screws The rear hinges are next. Since they are flat head and they don’t have nuts, I will go very slowly and see what happens.
Or...One of these on an air impact wrench. I removed my hinge bolts form my 40 PU with very little effort.
I found a hinge removal tool from Bob Drake. It worked great on all but one hinge. That hinge broke the tool. I tried drilling out the pin with a carbide tip drill. unfortunately the drill slopped off center and I still couldn't get the pin out.
I finally got all most everything off the body. I jacked up the body and separated it from the frame. I then built some wood supports and placed them on hardwood dolly's to support the body and frame. I got word from Fatman that my new frame is ready. I sent a check and am now waiting for delivery.
I like the improvised body mount/dolly. Where there's a will, there's way! Some folks jest at Home Depot or Harbor Freight for car projects but in many cases their components get the job done. Always a pleasure to see nuts and bolts progress. Keep on keeping on!
Looking good Gene! You got lucky with those hinge pins on a ford panel I was working on I had to drill them all out.
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