Bondo on. (yes my garage is still a mess...)
Blast with 8"DA. Guide coat.
Longboarded. Looks like they are all low still, have bare metal, paint, then bondo showing.... This is going to be an interesting trade off between time of older worn paper vs cost of fresh sandpaper.
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hit the spots on the door a bit later.
Shoved the truck towards the center of the garage a bit more. And picked up a couple of 8' LED strips. Needed more light, the old fixtures I have are old florescents, and half working.....
A friend who used to do body work cam over. Helped me with technique a bit, got some more sanding done on the door, another coat on the front door and some hammer time. I am going to need a lot more bondo.
When doing a huge panel like that, it is ok to fill the obvious low spots in an effort to level the playing field, but once you get serious about flat, you need to bring out the mud canon.
You want to cover the entire panel and have one of these bad boys to make it level. 24" Durablock with 80 grit. Sharp fresh 80 grit that still looks good when you peel it off and cringe at the cost. Sharp paper makes for smooth panels dull paper makes for wavy panels. You can feel it when the paper loses its "bite".
As you sand down the filler, you come to a point where shiny metal is going to pop up. You have a decision to make. You can't sand anymore because you will just be making a wave around this high spot. You either add more mud to the whole panel and live with a thicker layer of mud, or you make the high spots go away.
Since I prefer thin coats of mud, I like to make the high spot go away with a shrinking disc or a hammer and dolly. Then I go back to sanding until I start seeing the metal start to surface in a uniform manner. At that point I re-skim the whole panel and do a final 80 grit sanding.
This is the second coat that will mostly deal with any issues I created when I made the high spots into low spots. I could have tried to save time and filler by doing localized fill and sand, but it never really works that well. 95% of this will end up on the floor and/or my lungs.
You can see the gray tinge where the filler is thin enough to read a newspaper through. There are a few high spots that made me call this good enough. If you want to repeat the game enough times, you will end up with a mud free panel as the mud is just serving as a guide coat. This panel was trashed from the sandblaster and I am more than happy to have got it this smooth.
Your next step will be a high fill primer and you can tell when tha is done by wetting it down with panel wipe and looking for a reflection
compare the reflection of the ceiling lights before and after. The fluorescent light reflection is circled in the pic below.
None of this took any real skill, just a lot of time on the Durablocks sanding in an X formation and a lot of sandpaper. I used three gallons of filler for the entire car and I estimate 75% of it ended up on the floor. Even when done with the filler and into the high fill, stick with 80 grit until you are convinced that the car is flat as shown by a guidecoat, only then should you start to make it smooth with finer grades of paper.
Pete
In reply to NOHOME :
Pete, that post absolutely rules and I've bookmarked it.
Also, I absolutely without a doubt now know why I've never painted a reasonably flat panel with gloss paint that didn't end up looking like the surface of the ocean during a squall.
In reply to NOHOME :
Thanks Pete!!
Yes I am just doing the big spots, and plan to skim after its like the quarter is. I warped things pretty good welding it seems. 30" Durablock is in the mail now....
Second light installed. First coat on the drivers side is done.
Pass side gets coat number 2
Broke a bunch of studs trying to get the dent out of the fender....
I'm pretty sure the surface area on those old beasts is measured in acres, or hectares, or something...
In reply to Recon1342 :
Yeah I am quickly realizing that..... Im thought almost 3/4 gallon of filler already.
java230 said:In reply to Recon1342 :
Yeah I am quickly realizing that..... Im thought almost 3/4 gallon of filler already.
Stop farfing around and commit...the stuff comes in 5 gallon pails and you are going to need every one of them! Put that E36 M3 on like you are Rue Paul going on a date.
While on the subject of bodywork materials, when I went to buy lacquer thinner for the endless reasons that you need lacquer thinner when painting a car, I ws told that the jump from a gallon of thinner to five gallons was like $22. A single gallon was going to be $38 bucks and I got the 5 gallon pail for $60.
In reply to NOHOME :
Oh lord. I guess I should proably order a 5gal....
Just remember, they were never all that straight from the factory.
ShawnG said:Just remember, they were never all that straight from the factory.
Also becoming apparent!! I am finding wrinkles etc from stamping.....
You will want a bunch of these big boys also bigger if you can find them
I learned to really like this pad of special papers for mixing the filler. Just tear away the top one whe you are done and you have a new mixing surface. The pad had 100 sheets and I used every single one of them.
Beats the hell out of trying to find a piece of beer-case clean enough to mix bondo on and hope the ink does not bleed into the filler when mixing.
Pete
In reply to NOHOME :
I have a couple larger ones, 5 and 6" iirc.
And I bought a pad of that paper!!! It was awesome, until it sat in my garage over the winter and the papers absorbed a bit of moisture and got wrinkly.... They tear off too easily now, when mixing....
Cold War motors has painted the Fury splice car and has really good in depth paint and body info. I have learned a ton watching that show.
In reply to bearmtnmartin :
I'll check it out!
And I skim coated the pass side waaaayyyy too thick.
Sand sand sand sand sand. I used a little less hardener as the last batches kicked off really quick, but the glaze is gumming paper up bad.... Once the glaze is off its fine, but man what a pain.
I think I just made it high all the way down that section now.....
Blocked with 80 grit, a couple highs and lows still, bu getting much better. I fell like there is a bit oh a high still but I cant quite tell
At the rear, you are too low as evidenced by the shiny steel surounding the filler, and the dark prmer that refuses to sand out. I would rais the filler level.
Right over the tire there is a small metal poke-through. I would wack it with a hammer. Same with the bit just in front.
In reply to NOHOME :
Thank you. I'm definitely learning here. I have exactly zero body work experience....
I added more over the areas where the bare metal was coming through. May not have been enough, but that was a bitch to sand all the high spots I made last time....
The wheel well is a mess. It was hit and repaired at one point, so I'm having to reshape the whole thing.
16" durablock showed up, and the 30 is due in today.
Pretty sure these are miles off from the factory.....
Sanded the coat seen above, took some closer pictures. Still lots of lows it seems. Used the 16" durablock, maybe thats part of it.
Annnnnd this is gonna burn thru some paper.
Good youtube vids on using the durablocks.
You have the idea down. Looks like you are still trying t join islands of filler, better to skim the entire panel and sand down to the first hint of metal that pops up. If you then shrink that bit of metal so it is "low" you can go back to sanding until you find the next bit of shine. if it looks like you can get away with it shrink it also, then keep sanding.
Eventually you get to where a lot of metal is starting to show, that is a good place to quit and call it your base, From there on its just another layer to make it all flat and get rid of the rough edges.
In reply to NOHOME :
Thanks again. I think I just need more practice.
I skimmed the upper section, but sanded most of it back off..... I am trying to keep an eye on the bare spots cropping up quicker. Hammer is going to get used more.
Yes joining the islands seems about right. I'm thinking these were way wavy from the factory. Door edges/jambs are all way high.
Either I'm doing something way wrong or this thing is crazy wavy. Third coat shows a ton of lows still???
If you go with a matte clear coat, it won't show as much. Plus, matte is "in" right now...
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