297 replies to this topic

[rob963]

Wow this has really come on strong!
I think you have done a really excellent job on the front! not skimped on anything and carefully planned and taken you time
you should be proud of yourself and it should look brilliant when it has been done!
there will always be a few surprises along the way, but you have dealt with them really well

how hard was it to get the gaps right on the bonnet?
and I'm guessing you are glad you bought the genuine scuttle

[The Otter]

So then, almost there!

I drove it around for a few days like this



Then I decided to put it in the garage for a few more days to cut the arches and spray the front end (with rattle cans, it's all I can afford at the moment). Here's the drivers side wheel turned to it's closest point, not much to spare!







Then I began the cutting/bending/welding process of it all









Then tonight I finally got the primer on, after trying my best all day to fix any issues in the bodywork. It's still not perfect but I always end up getting to a point where I just want to crack on, so I'll just touch up the little bad bits some other day.





Hopefully I'll get some red on it tomorrow! I'm also planning to paint the arches gloss black and maybe do something to neaten up the wiring for the spot lamps, depends if I have enough time/inclination to do so really...

[Noah]

Why not just re-paint the whole car in rattle cans, you can get a great finish with a rattle can using good prep and technique

[The Otter]

Why not just re-paint the whole car in rattle cans, you can get a great finish with a rattle can using good prep and technique

To be honest, half of it will be in rattle cans when I'm done with the front end, the bootlid and rear panel are already rattle canned, but I don't really see the point in doing the whole car right now, it's never going to look as good as a proper paint job and would take a lot more work to go over perfectly good paintwork. Although it would be nice to have the same shade of red all over, the rattle can colour and the proper colour are somewhat different... The door skins have gone at the bottom too so they need doing sometime, and no doubt the doors will then be rattle canned too. It's going to be many years yet before I can justify spending £1k plus for a proper paint job.

Meh, a lot of people will slate me for "not doing it properly" but it's my car and I can do what I want with it!

[rob963]

Looking good Sven!

Hopefully I'll see the finished product on Sunday?
Keep up the good work!

[Noah]

Why not just re-paint the whole car in rattle cans, you can get a great finish with a rattle can using good prep and technique

To be honest, half of it will be in rattle cans when I'm done with the front end, the bootlid and rear panel are already rattle canned, but I don't really see the point in doing the whole car right now, it's never going to look as good as a proper paint job and would take a lot more work to go over perfectly good paintwork. Although it would be nice to have the same shade of red all over, the rattle can colour and the proper colour are somewhat different... The door skins have gone at the bottom too so they need doing sometime, and no doubt the doors will then be rattle canned too. It's going to be many years yet before I can justify spending £1k plus for a proper paint job.

Meh, a lot of people will slate me for "not doing it properly" but it's my car and I can do what I want with it!

I'm not slating! I spent alot of time getting perfect finish's on my tech products with spray can's that what im saying. You dont have to spend a thousand pounds.

[The Otter]

Why not just re-paint the whole car in rattle cans, you can get a great finish with a rattle can using good prep and technique

To be honest, half of it will be in rattle cans when I'm done with the front end, the bootlid and rear panel are already rattle canned, but I don't really see the point in doing the whole car right now, it's never going to look as good as a proper paint job and would take a lot more work to go over perfectly good paintwork. Although it would be nice to have the same shade of red all over, the rattle can colour and the proper colour are somewhat different... The door skins have gone at the bottom too so they need doing sometime, and no doubt the doors will then be rattle canned too. It's going to be many years yet before I can justify spending £1k plus for a proper paint job.

Meh, a lot of people will slate me for "not doing it properly" but it's my car and I can do what I want with it!

I'm not slating! I spent alot of time getting perfect finish's on my tech products with spray can's that what im saying. You dont have to spend a thousand pounds.

Sorry, I didn't take your words to be against me, I just added that bit on at the end as I'm sure plenty of purist "Gods" on here would have a go at me for rattle canning it (just a vibe I've got from some on here lately) Reading it back it does seem like I'm ranting at you a bit, I apologise as I didn't mean to I was planning on leaving the paint a couple of weeks to cure properly and then flatting it back and cutting and polishing it to some degree, just see what sort of a shine I can get from it.

[Noah]

Why not just re-paint the whole car in rattle cans, you can get a great finish with a rattle can using good prep and technique

To be honest, half of it will be in rattle cans when I'm done with the front end, the bootlid and rear panel are already rattle canned, but I don't really see the point in doing the whole car right now, it's never going to look as good as a proper paint job and would take a lot more work to go over perfectly good paintwork. Although it would be nice to have the same shade of red all over, the rattle can colour and the proper colour are somewhat different... The door skins have gone at the bottom too so they need doing sometime, and no doubt the doors will then be rattle canned too. It's going to be many years yet before I can justify spending £1k plus for a proper paint job.

Meh, a lot of people will slate me for "not doing it properly" but it's my car and I can do what I want with it!

I'm not slating! I spent alot of time getting perfect finish's on my tech products with spray can's that what im saying. You dont have to spend a thousand pounds.

Sorry, I didn't take your words to be against me, I just added that bit on at the end as I'm sure plenty of purist "Gods" on here would have a go at me for rattle canning it (just a vibe I've got from some on here lately) Reading it back it does seem like I'm ranting at you a bit, I apologise as I didn't mean to I was planning on leaving the paint a couple of weeks to cure properly and then flatting it back and cutting and polishing it to some degree, just see what sort of a shine I can get from it.

Thats alright :). I rattle everything. Even did a repair to my dads Metallic mercedes using a rattle just masked off a section then polished up the rest of the car as well blends right in. :) Purists my arse. I'm going to get slated by the LE committee for not restoring my 35 but actually making a car I want lol .

[jaydee]

Rattle cans are not that cheap..i've done mine with cans too but got silicone reaction oh lucky man!

[Noah]

Rattle cans are not that cheap..i've done mine with cans too but got silicone reaction oh lucky man!

Cheaper than a full spray job

[The Otter]

Cheap is a relative term of course, if we're talking £50s worth of cans and wet+dry paper as opposed to £1000 for a professional respray, I'd say the cans are cheap! Obviously you then get a cheap finish, but as long it looks good from the other side of the car park then I'm satisfied

[jaydee]

I'm not saying dont rattle it, i'm just warning you.
A properly done professional respray lasts years with just washing and polishing every then and now., with rattles you have to fix/repaint parts several times. Or you have to afford top quality cans (not cheap..)
I said, painting mine with rattles was just more practical to me, but in the end i've saved very little money and spent a lot of time in prepping..its worth it only as long as you like rattling.
Where rattle cans is a win-win is when you have a rolling project and you plan to put your hands on bodywork again, then you must rattle it or you're just throwing money in the bin with professional sprayers.

[The Otter]

I started off today by having a look at my Italian Job spot lamp bar and working out if I could tidy up the spot light wiring using the fact that it is just a bent piece of tube. I realised on close inspection that I'd need to respray it, as in only a year and a half it had started to rust quite significantly on the bottom mounting brackets.





The finish before seemed somewhere between satin and gloss, so I just went with spraying it satin (after a rub down and treating the rust of course).



I'm going to run the wiring for the lamps through the bar via these holes you can see in the bar below, and have all the connectors in one place behind the bottom right corner of the grill.



I also sprayed my arches gloss black, as they had the inevitable transit and fitment scuffs and scratches on them, and I don't like seeing unpainted fibreglass/resin on the underside when they're on the car.





Oh yeah, I got a bit of paint on something else as well...





It honestly looks pretty darn terrible, and the camera has made it look a lot more orange than it actually is, but it definitely is still red! I'll see what I can do to make it look a bit less orange peely in a couple of weeks. At least it'll look good from a distance!

Just re-assembly to do over the next couple of days now, so I'll throw up a couple more pictures when it's all back together.

Thanks very much for reading if you've followed me this far!

Sven.

[Daviewonder]

Nice project so far.

I bet when you flat and polish it it'll look awesome.

[Steely]

When you come to replace any other panels, just remember to spray them orange and there ya go lol. But seriously it looks good mate