Before we start, many of you will
say, “That’s Bloody Orange”. Well, it’s
not bloody orange - it’s red bloody oxide, and as far as I can gather, that’s the color
Rootes painted the bellies of Alpines.
Of course, then they slathered on a lumpy layer of asphalt undercoating,
which did little to stave off the rust as Alpines tend to (make that, always) rust from the inside
out.
Be that as it may, I finally
painted Alphie’s undercarriage. And for
the record, it’s red oxide primer covered with a clear coat to make it all
shiny. I could spray on an undercoating
to make it look more like it did when it sat in some dealership somewhere,
and I still might. Right now I’m
enjoying the sheer cleanness of it!
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| I really am the one doing the work! |
Last Minute Odds and Sods
Anyone who has ever painted
anything on a car knows that when you think you’re ready for the paint, you’re
not. At about 3:00 am they day I was set to
paint, I remembered that I had not mounted the seat belt anchors. |
| Seat belt anchors in the raw. |
The original anchor eyebolts came out with
the rotten floor pans. Two of them, the
ones next to the doors, clung stubbornly affixed to the floor pans. They had rusted in so permanently, I quit
fighting them and just left them in place. Only a solid accident would dislodge them. The other two, the ones next to the transmission tunnel, practically
fell out. These two had to be replaced.
I cut some 3/16” flat stock,
drilled 7/16” holes in them, welded in 7/16” X 14 nuts and ordered two 7/16” X
14 eyebolts from Bolt Depot. (The eyebolts
were $8.45 each but they are shouldered and look almost identical to the
original. It’s only money, right?) |
Anchors installed. I forgot to take
a pic during the welding part |
I drilled the holes in the floor
pans and welded the anchors in place. An
easy job, but it ate up some of my painting time.
Clean Up
With the seat belt anchor job
done, I wiped down Alphie’s tummy with denatured alcohol for the paint. I started the “clean-up” about a week earlier. The pics show some bright metal in the camera’s
flash where I had ground off some rust spots.
The pics don’t show how much work it takes to get everything clean. Truth is, I started the clean-up when I first
skewered Alphie on the rotisserie.
Red Oxide – I Swear
It’s not orange, I swear by Grabthar's Hammer, by the Sons of Warvan. (Look up that reference!) I did me research, which
didn’t come to much. I asked as many
Alpine folks as I could. I even posted a
question on The Sunbeam Experience forums, but no one answered, what color did
Rootes paint Alpine’s bellies? Silence from
the abyss, and the best evidence I had was the red oxide with clotty asphalt
undercoating bit. So that’s what I did.
 |
OK, I admit, it looks pretty bloody orange. The pics make it look
more orange than it is, I swear! |
The red oxide was easy to spray –
straight from the can, no reducer, no hardener, just pour and spray. I was using a cheap Harbor Freight HVLP
gravity feed spray gun, and it work pretty damn well, not Pebble Beach standards
but who cares. The primer was a bit
thick and resisted running, but it did show me, that although I’m a passable spray
gun guy, a professional somewhere will spray Alphie’s body.
 |
| Before the clear coat |
 |
| Close up before clear coat |
Because of all the horsing around
with seat belt anchors, a spot I found that still had oily engine/transmission
residue and a couple of other fiddly aggravations, I ran out of time before I could
spray the clear coat.
Clear Coat
Since everything was clean and
ready to go, spraying the clear coat didn’t take very long. In fact, cleaning the gun took more time. The clear coat was also dead easy peasy. Straight from the can, no reducer only 4:1 ratio
clear coat to hardener. This stuff was
thinner so there are some runs, which you are welcome to scuttle under Alphie
to find should you ever get the chance.
Besides we garage car painters call runs “signing our canvass.”
 |
| Clear Coated "BLING" |
Big Step
With the undercarriage sorted, Alphie
is ready for the next step – final body work.
Soon he’ll come off the rotisserie and onto a rolling pallet that will
make fitting the doors, and bonnet and boot lids easier. The goal is to have him in a paint booth
somewhere by spring of 2023.
