chevypower
Jul 26th, 08, 02:38 AM
My car is closing in on it's completion. The restoration started in April of 2007. It is finally painted and just needs to be wet sanded and buffed. It has been a frustrating and expensive experience but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel! You can read about the saga in my post titled "Boy did I get hosed".
Here is a list of the work done from what I can remember...
1. All of the sheetmetal was cut out of the rear of the car. The only things that were not replaced were the trunk lid, trunk lid gutter which holds the trunk weather strip, frame rails, and the back panel between the trunk lid and the rear glass. The tail pan and full quarters were GM NOS parts but the rest were reproduction parts.
2. Up front the driver side outer rocker was replaced and the rotted area directly in front of the rockers underneath the car on both sides were cut out and replaced with parts from a diner Camaro.
3. The old doorskins were removed and replaced with GM NOS ones.
4. The inner quarter area was cut out and replaced with the new parts that became available recently.
5. The original fenders were in pretty rough shape so they were replaced with Goodmark ones.
6. The original header panel and cowl panel were in very good shape so they were able to be reused but the dash was rotted underneath the windshield so it was cut out and a new one was welded in.
7. A new Goodmark 2 inch cowl was installed.
8. The floor was patched in a couple spots.
9. The old radiator support was a little ripe along the bottom so it was replaced as were the inner fenders.
10. The entire car was sanded down to bare metal before being primed. Even the parts that were EDP coated (unfortunately nobody thought to take a picture of it until after it was primed) I'm not sure how many coats of primer were put on in between sandings after the original build up primer was applied but it was two or three. I told them I wanted it really straight and boy is it! The car has very, very, little body filler on it. Basically only where there were little imperfections in the sheet metal and in the sail panel area.
11. I think they applied three coats of the blue to the entire car and then two or three coats of clear. They then sanded down the clear on the panels which were to be striped. Then they taped up the stripes with a stencil kit and shot the white stripes (two coats I think). Then they flow coated the whole car with clear. It looks great as it is now except for an occasional piece of junk in the clear which they said will all be gone after they wet sand and buff it. I'm happy with all of the gaps except for on the passenger side where the top of the fender meets the top of the door and on the front driver side where the hood meets the header panel. The top of the gap where the door meets the fender is the worst, it's pretty big compared to the others and the hood one is a little larger than I'd like, I think they're lined up as good as can be seeing how I used reproduction fenders and didn't have them add any extra metal to the areas I've mentioned. Looking back now I probably would have asked them to but they said they would be able to get them pretty good even though they were reproduction fenders. I'm not going to dwell on it though, the car still looks great and considering how bad it looked when I got it looks like a million bucks!
12. I got all new tinted glass for it (except the windshield) from the GP Superstore which now needs to go in. I've got all new weatherstripping to go in as well as a new interior, new seats, grill, and the list goes on.
I can finally see the end of the tunnel and I'm hoping to have the car ready for the road by mid August but who knows.... I brought the wife to see it the other day and she actually said it looked really nice and believe me that says a lot! (she's not a car kind of girl and was not too thrilled when I got it and then had to dump even more money into it :sad:).Thanks to everyone who has helped me out, this is a great site. I have added the most recent pictures of the car to my photobucket site which is in my sig. Please check it out when you get a chance and let me know what you think.
Here is a list of the work done from what I can remember...
1. All of the sheetmetal was cut out of the rear of the car. The only things that were not replaced were the trunk lid, trunk lid gutter which holds the trunk weather strip, frame rails, and the back panel between the trunk lid and the rear glass. The tail pan and full quarters were GM NOS parts but the rest were reproduction parts.
2. Up front the driver side outer rocker was replaced and the rotted area directly in front of the rockers underneath the car on both sides were cut out and replaced with parts from a diner Camaro.
3. The old doorskins were removed and replaced with GM NOS ones.
4. The inner quarter area was cut out and replaced with the new parts that became available recently.
5. The original fenders were in pretty rough shape so they were replaced with Goodmark ones.
6. The original header panel and cowl panel were in very good shape so they were able to be reused but the dash was rotted underneath the windshield so it was cut out and a new one was welded in.
7. A new Goodmark 2 inch cowl was installed.
8. The floor was patched in a couple spots.
9. The old radiator support was a little ripe along the bottom so it was replaced as were the inner fenders.
10. The entire car was sanded down to bare metal before being primed. Even the parts that were EDP coated (unfortunately nobody thought to take a picture of it until after it was primed) I'm not sure how many coats of primer were put on in between sandings after the original build up primer was applied but it was two or three. I told them I wanted it really straight and boy is it! The car has very, very, little body filler on it. Basically only where there were little imperfections in the sheet metal and in the sail panel area.
11. I think they applied three coats of the blue to the entire car and then two or three coats of clear. They then sanded down the clear on the panels which were to be striped. Then they taped up the stripes with a stencil kit and shot the white stripes (two coats I think). Then they flow coated the whole car with clear. It looks great as it is now except for an occasional piece of junk in the clear which they said will all be gone after they wet sand and buff it. I'm happy with all of the gaps except for on the passenger side where the top of the fender meets the top of the door and on the front driver side where the hood meets the header panel. The top of the gap where the door meets the fender is the worst, it's pretty big compared to the others and the hood one is a little larger than I'd like, I think they're lined up as good as can be seeing how I used reproduction fenders and didn't have them add any extra metal to the areas I've mentioned. Looking back now I probably would have asked them to but they said they would be able to get them pretty good even though they were reproduction fenders. I'm not going to dwell on it though, the car still looks great and considering how bad it looked when I got it looks like a million bucks!
12. I got all new tinted glass for it (except the windshield) from the GP Superstore which now needs to go in. I've got all new weatherstripping to go in as well as a new interior, new seats, grill, and the list goes on.
I can finally see the end of the tunnel and I'm hoping to have the car ready for the road by mid August but who knows.... I brought the wife to see it the other day and she actually said it looked really nice and believe me that says a lot! (she's not a car kind of girl and was not too thrilled when I got it and then had to dump even more money into it :sad:).Thanks to everyone who has helped me out, this is a great site. I have added the most recent pictures of the car to my photobucket site which is in my sig. Please check it out when you get a chance and let me know what you think.