Project Boondoggle (or, so I went and bought a Z!)

[grannyknot]

1 hour ago, rcb280z said:

Boy I bet that's a fun car to drive.

Yes sir, that it is

 

1 minute ago, siteunseen said:

I thought you had internal engine problems?

I'm a month or two behind.

That was last August 2017, the engine has been rebuilt and purring again.

[charliekwin]

Busy weekend with family in town and kiddo's birthday (by the way, who opens a kid's restaurant and thinks a creepy anthropomorphized rat is a good choice for a mascot!?), so I only had a chance to start blocking a couple of panels. Still, that was enough to temper a bit the enthusiasm from last weekend: some panels are blocking nicely, some look like they'll need just a bit of filler, and probably everything will need end up needing another coat of primer.

I also decided to upgrade my gun. Couldn't justify a really expensive one, but I think I'll get better results with this thing. And now I need a new air compressor. If you give a mouse a cookie.... 

[Patcon]

23 hours ago, charliekwin said:

 

I also decided to upgrade my gun. Couldn't justify a really expensive one, but I think I'll get better results with this thing. And now I need a new air compressor. If you give a mouse a cookie.... 

I basically have an older version of the same gun. I had thought of upgrading but when we had Cody's car at the paint shop I asked the manager if my spraying would be any better with a higher end gun and he flat out told me no. He told me there were plenty of guys with high end guns that didn't lay paint down as well as what I had done. So that was encouraging.

It's always amazing to me how many flaws that black can show up. As a word of caution, and I may have mentioned this earlier, many panels like the top of the fenders and the hatch flats are very thin. They need very light pressure to block out flat. If you push too hard they won't block out smooth

23 hours ago, charliekwin said:

Busy weekend with family in town and kiddo's birthday (by the way, who opens a kid's restaurant and thinks a creepy anthropomorphized rat is a good choice for a mascot!?),

Evidently someone that started a business near you ?

[Pmg]

I haven't been on the forum in a few years, but I've always kept up with this thread through email updates... Just want to say this is great and you're doing an awesome job!

[Zed Head]

On 2/27/2016 at 7:35 PM, Zed Head said:

You can see in the FSM that the brown link should be of lower capacity than the green.  How it got to 50 amps and red is still somewhat of a mystery.  I think that someone took a guess may years ago and it has lasted.

Interesting posts on Hybridz.org regarding fusible links (that's me in my other pen name).  dmorales used to post over here I think.  Edit - actually he still does, just on different topics.

http://forums.hybridz.org/topic/123252-280z-restomod-progress/?page=7&tab=comments#comment-1207295

Edited September 14, 2018 by Zed Head

[charliekwin]

I hope to have a color picked this weekend.

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[charliekwin]

I still don't have a color, but had a pretty productive weekend nonetheless. The three blues I had were BMW Santoriniblau, Rover henley blue, and Alfa polizia blue (in that order on the first picture). In the shade (first picture) they looked...not bad. In the sun, not quite so much. My wife and I both liked the henley blue in the middle the best, but in the sun, it kind of washes out and starts to look a little too close to pastel.

Photos are of colors on cars are hard, but this Mini in the same color is pretty true to life, and it's just not quite what I'm looking for.

After all this, I came to realize that I want a darker color that has more green and less red in it. It's down to WV's dove blue and slate blue.

Meanwhile, I got some more primer on the doors, hood, hatch and fenders after blocking and doing some touchup on the body work. Flat gray paint doesn't photograph real well, but the three biggest problem areas I had on these are almost there. Ran out of time before I could get some more paint on the shell. I'm hoping to get color on before the end of October.

 

[wheee!]

It always helps to colour test a shaped panel if possible. It gives so much more life to the finished colour in both sun and shade exposures.

[charliekwin]

A milestone! Everything is filled, primed, blocked, and cleaned. It's ready to paint!! Just need to clean up the garage and remask the shell. Phew!

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[Patcon]

21 hours ago, charliekwin said:

A milestone! Everything is filled, primed, blocked, and cleaned. It's ready to paint!! Just need to clean up the garage and remask the shell. Phew!

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Excellent! Do as Homebuilt does and wet the floor down some to reduce dust in your paint. Just don't drag the slimey hose through your paint like he did. 

[charliekwin]

The shell is painted! Also the air dam, but that's less exciting. One coat of epoxy as a sealer, then 3 coats of color. I went with VW's Dove Blue (at least a version of it -- seems like there's some variation out there). Between the color temp in the garage (cloudy + flouro lights), camera flash, and Lightroom processing, I'm not sure any of these pictures are getting the color right, but the rear quarter shots are probably closest.

So far, pretty happy with how I did. My test panels had a fair amount of orange peel, but with the exception of the driver rear quarter, I got the paint to lay on pretty flat and without runs. Body work looks pretty good, but I'll know for sure when I can roll it out into the sun. For now, I've got it in the garage with a space heater keeping everything warm.

Also, I gotta give a shout-out to some guy on one of the auto body forums I read who had advice on compressors. I don't have a 240 volt outlet at my house, and can't add it as a renter, so all those threads that say "just buy a bigger compressor" aren't that helpful. But connecting two cheap-ish Harbor Freight units with some check valves did the job pretty admirably! The Devilbiss gun wants 13 CFM, but it felt like it was getting enough air the whole time.

Business trip to Vegas at the end of this week, but hopefully I can do all the parts on Sunday. Woo!

[AZDatsun]

What compressors did you use?


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