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oops, wrong color..









My surfacing primer, I guess when it says "dark gray, they really mean damn near black.

Well, there's a lot of surfacing primer on there so it's going to have to dry until tomorrow.

Look at it in the morning.
Atta boy.

and some red wheels and you could ratrod it.

Looking good Dave!

keep it going. this is going to be spectacular.

That was what I was thinking.

sanding day today (again)

Well I started with the drivers side fender top because I knew it would be an easy panel and I wanted to get a feel for the poly primer with the block before I moved on to something more challenging.



Then onto the passenger (hammer rash) fender.

Here's one of my tricks to keep my paper fresh, as it loads I give a light swipe with a scuff pad across the paper to clean it off.



For those that haven't done it, this is the sort of thing we are straightening out with surfacing primer and sanding blocks. See I have a low area here.



I will work the entire panel (the entire viewed surface) evenly down until I have leveled everything to low spots like this. If it's a more drastic low spot I will just hit it with a light glaze coat of very light 2K body filler. If you try to level an entire panel to too low of a low spot you will expose patches of bare metal, which is actually kind of normal on some panels but you kind of get a feel for what's going to straighten out and what might need a little skim coat of filler.

Here's the same low spot almost gone..



and now it's gone.



Here's a little ding that I didn't catch before priming, this is an example of "too deep" I'll need to hit this with a little bit of glazing filler.



I'll be damned, a nice straight fender top.

[img]http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e..._2013-04-21_11-01-05_950_zpscdb78e09.jpg[/img]

Now for some ugliness, this is the most challenging body area on this whole car, my hammer rash fender, straightened the best I could and skim coated, block sanded (rough) with 80 grit and primed HEAVY with polyester primer. This is what te first few strokes with the board look like, UGLY!

[img]http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e..._2013-04-21_11-05-44_265_zps4932b691.jpg[/img]

Yeah, just like with body filler, this polyester primer can have a skin on it that clogs your paper fast. Once you get that skin off, it sands nice and clean.

I'll be damned, she's coming around. Maybe we can save this old fender after all.

[img]http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e...s/2013-04-21_13-28-16_15_zps70924ddd.jpg[/img]

The key to good blocking is (for me anyways) go slow. I mean your finishing strokes on a panel might be like careful and precise strokes of a file, slow and true, very controlled, just lightly shaving the surface.

[img]http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e..._2013-04-21_17-57-42_553_zps0c3a687f.jpg[/img]

That don't look like much for "a day's work" but my arms certainly think it was something.

I'm really happy with how it's going, she's blocking out really nice. I'm about half way around the car.

I sure wish I had more to report, it was a lot of work, 3 days straight and it doesn't look like much.

If I ever get a door ding.... I might behave like this guy.

Looks like a LOT of work to me Dave! I probably would have had the air file out in frustration.

Ah,..so the Poly primer sorta acts like a super thin body fill.?

Never done any body work, but it's making sense.

Looking good ND..

exactly

I didn't know cactus grew as far north as Detroit.

Keep up the great work Dave. That'll be one sweet bird when you're done.

As always, looking good Dave!

Looking good, ND. You have saimt-like patience and ambition. I've done a small amount of bodywork-enough to know that it isn't my calling.

Keep it up, Dave, lots of guys wishing they had your skills and could do the same.

Dave, I blow it off with that air gun. Does your method work better or save more paper? I like that trick.





for those of us that have done even a small amount of body work, such as myself...you did a hellova LOT! It looks great!

I keep a scuff pad within reach as I make my way around a car with the blocks.. What a lot of folks don't understand is that when I say "make my way around the car with the blocks" That doesn't mean you can time me with a stop watch as I make the lap, hour glass wouldn't be the right tool either, try a calendar. That's how much freaking time it takes lol!

But the scuff pad is within reach as is the box/roll of paper and various blocking tools. I wear a very good dust mask and even still I do everything I can to not stir up the dust. I use the air hose very little, it puts all that dust in the air and I don�t like doing that without the exhaust fan running because it gets all over the shop. Even when I�m all done blocking and it�s time to clean up the sanding dust I like to start with a shop vac, then tack rags/wiping cloth and finish with the air hose.

I find that most times what ends the usable life of a piece of sanding paper is if paint/primer balls up clogging the paper so you are riding on gummed up sanding dust rather than the abrasive surface of the paper. For that reason a gentle swipe of the scuff pad works well for cleaning the working face of the paper. I also wipe the sanding dust off the panel I�m working on quite frequently with the scuff pad, this too helps a lot because you are able to make better contact with the panel instead of riding on a bunch of sanding dust.

I�ll be back out there tonight and every night between now and the June show down in Farmington MN.

I sold some of my old shop equipment, thinking about buying a new spray gun I�ve had my eye on for several years. I think this job is important enough to use a really good spray gun on.

That makes sense. I've been doing the work in the "shop" and then all the spraying is done in a seperate, closed off, "booth" with the only way to get a car in there is from the outside, through a different garage door.

I like your idea of the dust control. It will make for a much nicer paint job.

I do clean off the truck whenever I clean off the paper or it gums it up too fast. I probably clean the truck 2-3 times between paper cleaning actually.

Do you guys ever use a recirculating air cleaner? Not something that you would probably use while actually sanding as it does increase air currents but it is great when cleaning up or doing things where a little bit if air movement is not a big problem.

Woodworkers often have these in their shops to improve air quality and I made mine out of an old furnace fan and motor with a series of filters - the last one being a micropore filter.

It makes a hell of a difference when sanding wood work.

Brent

If you're gonna be working this hard on this car until June, Dave, I predict a winner's tropy...

Thanks for keeping us updated!