Altima uh oh

This Altima had a bad day, but is quickly on the road to recovery. It came in and was disassembled before I could get pictures of it. So here is what we are fixing, but already under way. A new bumper and head light and a repair on the fender and hood and she will be as good as new.

Black out

Today we put the finishing touches on the body paint. We all prepped up the interior to black out the dash, firewall, inside rear panels and the tops of the doors. This REALLY set this car off. The contrast between the dark blue and the semi gloss black really looks nice. Good choice by the customer on this on!! We also blasted the hood hinges, hood latch and other parts today and got those painted today as well.

Shine on

Lots of work getting done this week on the Camaro.  Starting first thing this morning we all jumped on the body to finish up the sanding. Once that was done, we cleaned the booth up to get as nice a job as possible. After the booth was clean, we tapped the car to keep overspray from getting all over places we dont want paint. Chase was able to get a good coat of sealer on before lunch which is the flat dark grey looking picture. After we got bellies full, Chase sprayed the blue base coat on the body. After 3 coats of color, Chase switched to clear and laid down 3 really nice coats of that. The body turned out great. Chase did a great job on the paint, and we all played a part in the body work which looks really nice too.  While Chase was painting, Chris and I wet sanded the doors to achieve the High Performance Finish. Chris then buffed them up to a super high gloss. We still have to paint the semi gloss black on the dash and inside the doors, we hope to get that done this week too. But this was quite enough for one day.

Dusty work

Today was dedicated to the Camaro. We started by blocking the car out with 320 grit paper then switched to a sander with 320 to smooth out the blocking marks. We then hand sanded all the hard to get to areas. We still have a few places left to sand but this car should go into the booth tomorrow. Here you see Chris going over the fender well lip by hand to get the primer smoothed up in there. A good paint job takes good prep work. Lots of time taken her to ensure the body turns out as good as the parts have so far.

All wrapped up

We finally got the Rogue done today. After replacing the front bumper, radiator, condenser, the Rogue was sent over to the Nissan dealership to get the air bags and all the necessary control modules replaced. They did so, and finished it up in time for us to get it cleaned up and ready for the owner to take delivery. Minuets after we picked it up from the dealership, the owner called the dealership to request an oil change. The dealership then called me back and asked if we could still work that out. After calculating a time frame, we pieced together a plan to get the vehicle washed, oil changed and delivered to the customer for the weekend. It took team work, but the plan worked and all the customers needs were met. I love it when a plan comes together.

Prime time, again

Its prime time again folks. We started first thing this morning doing the final sand in all the hard to reach places. Once we got all those ready we slid it in the booth to apply the epoxy primer. This is the product that loves bare metal. Once that was dry we seam sealed all the seams to keep the interior water tight. We followed that up with a few coats of slick sand. This product will give us plenty of blocking room to smooth out the ripples in the body. It makes the metal flat and straight so the paint looks like a mirror when its done. This is the foundation for a High Performance Finish.

Good day

This Lexus came in this morning to get a new rear bumper. The owner tells me that it got damaged by backing into a block wall while on vacation. She also made sure to let me know that it was her husband that was driving when this happened. With him not here to defend himself, and learning a L O N G time ago that its best to agree with the wife, I chose to agree that men are horrible drivers. (wink wink) Anyway, the bumper wasn’t really all that bad but it was scratched in the lower part that is textured. So the best option was to replace the bumper. This job went very smoothly. The new bumper came in this morning and we were able to get it prepped and painted early enough to get it put back on the vehicle in the same day. We also had time to get it cleaned up for the customer. New bumper and all cleaned up for the weekend.  What a good day!

Shine of the times

Today we did a little wet sanding and buffing on the Camaro parts. Here we have the hood. Chase blocked it out with 1000 grit paper to smooth out what little orange peel was there and to smooth the unevenness of where the stripes are. Then he hand sanded the panel with 2000 grit paper. Once that was done, he went over the panel with 3000 grit paper on a DA sander. This makes buffing much easier. The buffing steps are very similar. Chris took over at this point so Chase could paint a bumper for a Lexus that will show up in the next post. Chris started with a heavy cutting compound and a white buffing pad. This step removes all the heavy scratches. Then he switched to a polishing compound  to bring the shine back up. After that step he went over it with a very fine polishing compound to remove the swirl marks. After all this, a good hand polish to put the finishing touches on it. We also were able to get the buffing on the trunk done today as well, but we didnt get any pictures of that.

Not so blue

Today we finished up the Civic. Its the one that had a deer that wanted to go for a ride. As you can see it turned out pretty nice. After two new doors and a repair in the fender you cant even tell it was repaired. The owner was very pleased with the repair but hopes he dont see us again for a while. Thats something we hear quite often actually.

Oh, how cool

It was back on the Rogue today. Chris got right on it this morning. He built the radiator support and installed the radiator and condenser. We then filled the radiator and charged the A/C system. Once all that was done and tested, we installed the bumper and took it over the the Nissan dealership to install the airbags and the other items associated with that. We sure hope to have this one back tomorrow. The owner is missing her vehicle.