Wrapping it up

Today was dedicated to the Mustang. Like most of our projects, once we reach a certain stage in the restoration things tend to speed up and a lot of work seems to get done rather quickly. Like you see here. Last Monday we painted the body, today we have a car again. We really got quite a bit of work done today. Both doors, both fenders and the hood. When you list it out like that, it doesn’t seem like all that much until you consider how careful you have to be not to scratch the paint and make sure the body lines look as good as possible. Yes.  A pretty tough task, but its  impossible to do quickly. Tomorrow we have a few more little things to button up on this project and it will be ready to go back home to the owner and get the rest of its goodies installed.

Knick knack, pony wack

Today we spent the better part of the day working on tid bits for the Mustang. Inner rear door panels were up first. The paint on these was flaking so badly that we had to strip them to bare metal then paint them. The grey on there is the epoxy primer that must be used to ensure the paint adheres to the metal. The next set of pictures is of the little tid bits. Bumper brackets, hood and trunk latches and catches and things of the sort. While those were drying, we started putting the rear valence on as well as the trunk lid and quarter extensions. Tomorrow we will do some final buffing and hopefully start installing the doors and fenders.  Moving right along. This one wont take much longer.

Now that’s slick!

We spent all afternoon wet sanding and buffing the Mustang. We started by blocking the clear coat with 1000 grit sand paper. This assures that the paint is as smooth and flat as possible. Next we switch to 2000 grit paper, then we do a final sanding with 3000 grit on the DA sander. That makes buffing the paint back up to a shine much easier and faster. With buffing, we use a three step process as well. First we start with a heavy cut compound with a white pad. This step is the step that removes all of the sanding scratches.  Next we switch to a grey buffing glaze with a black pad. This step removes the light buffing swirls from the first buffing step. Lastly we go over the panels with a blue pad and blue polishing glaze. Yes, its a bunch of steps and it takes quite a bit of time, but the results are worth it.

 

Hahaha  good one Chase! Now we can say you helped!!

Painting the Pony II

Yesterday was paint day for the body, today we got busy on the the rest of the parts. We spent all morning sanding and prepping these parts you see here in the booth for paint. After lunch, Chase got busy making them RED! As with all of our High Performance Finishes, we started the paint process with a coat of sealer, followed by 3 coats of red base coat then finally 3 coats of high solids clear. The clear is layer that makes this color actually POP. It also protects the base coat from the sun. Without clear over the base, the color coat would be eaten up from the sun because there is no UV protection in the base. These parts will get wet sanded and buffed just like the body will to ensure a super slick, mirror like finish. Hopefully we will start that process tomorrow on the body.

Painting the Pony

Today was FUN day at JMC. Today we finally got some color sprayed on the ’64 Mustang and as you can see it turned out pretty good. If you remember, we have already painted the hood, doors, trunk and the left fender for this car. Tomorrow we will get this car out, block the right fender and hopefully paint it and a few other little knick knacks that go on here. Chase started out by applying a coat of urethane sealer over the primer. Then 3 good coats of the Candy Apple Red, a factory color for the 1966 Mustang, was applied. Once those dried sufficiently, 3 coats of urethane clear coat was applied. This will allow us to wet sand and buff the clear and still leave enough material there to protect the color coats underneath.  So all in all it was a good day at the shop today.

Prime time

This Mustang has reached a milestone here at the shop. All of the body work is done, and pretty much all that’s left is to block out the body and paint it. We do have a couple of smaller pieces to do but all of the hard work is complete. Yesterday we finished up the body and today the guys got it in primer. Sometime over the next few days we will do the final blocking and get this one painted.

Mustang update

Here is an update on what we have been doing on the ‘64.5 Mustang. A month ago we painted the hood, both doors, the trunk and a fender. Well, we finally got around to buffing those out, bringing it up to our “High Performance Finish” standards.  We also were able to get the slick sand on the body blocked out and a great start on the body work.

These pictures show Chris doing his favorite pass time. Blocking slick sand. This process ensures the body is as straight as possible. It flattens out the small little waves and ripples to provide a mirror like finish.

Here is a finished shot of the hood. All buffed up and ready to go!!

This is what the paint looks like after wet sanding in preparation for buffing.

These final pictures show what little amount of body work that has to be done.

Slick as glass

Back in the saddle! Today we were able to get this left door wet sanded and buffed in between our collision work and the Adam 12 car. This Mustang is getting our High Performance Finish so we go the extra mile to make sure the gloss is as good as can be. First we block sanded the door with 1000 grit paper to flatten out all of the orange peel. This process makes the panel flat as can be so the reflection will be sharp and crisp. Next we sanded the panel with 200o grit paper. This step is to smooth out the 1000 grit scratches to speed up the buffing process. The last step is to go over the panel with 3000 grit paper on a DA sander for the only purpose of making the buffing steps quicker. Buffing starts with a heavy cutting compound to quickly remove the sanding scratches. The next step is to buff the panel with a milder compound to remove the buffing scratches in the first step. Lastly we do a super fine buffing to ensure their are no swirl marks left in the panel at all from the buffer. As you can see from the pictures it came out pretty slick.

Rub-a-dub..

Monday we painted some parts on the Mustang. Today we wet sanded and buffed them out. We were also able to get the interior of the doors painted. The interior of the Mustang is  semi-flat black. We started wet sanding the parts with a block and 1000 grit paper. The block is used to flatten out the clear. This gives you the super slick look. After the 1000 block, we hand sanded the panels with 1000 grit. Once that was done, we hand sanded with 2000 grit paper. This is to smooth out the 1000 grit scratches. After that, we wet sanded the panels with 3000 grit paper on a dual action sander. The purpose of all this is to make the buffing much easier. When these parts get buffed, they also go through 3 steps. The first step is the cutting step. We use a heavy cutting compound that removes all the sanding scratches but does leave buffing scratches in their place. These are taken care of by the next step. A mild polishing compound is used next to remove the cutting scratches. Finally the third step smooths away swirl marks left by the previous one. A hand polish finishes out the High Performance Finish. The last picture shows the results of all this time consuming hard work.

Shine on

Today was a good day. We were able to get the Mustang parts painted. The color is from  1966 Mustang called Candy Apple Red. Chris and I spent the morning setting these parts up, prepping them and getting the booth ready to paint. Before lunch I was able to get a coat of sealer on them and 3 coats of the base or color coats. After the parts had dried, I started clearing them. The sealer ensures a uniform coverage and provides a bit of cushion between the primer and the paint. we sprayed 3 coats of color to ensure coverage of the red and 3 coats of high solids clear. Since this will be a High Performance Finish car, we will still have to wet sand and buff these parts. This will really make this red POP even more then they do now.