Page Forty-Four - A Parable of Pulling Primer

 

Where have I been since my last post?  Oh yeah, SANDING!

It’s taken four years to get to painting, and painting Alphie became a three-week ordeal of mostly sanding problem spots and frustration.

The saga begins on September 26 when I bought paint, having worked with the guys at Sherwin-Williams for a couple of weeks to get the right color – more on that later.  I had mapped out three weekends for primer, color coat and clear coat with consecutive weekends for the color and clear because I didn’t want to wait too long between them.  I thought it would be plenty of time, well…

To answer your question, the finished bonnet latch tray compared to the original tray.  Pictures don't really show it, but the finished one is slightly darker than the original.  I wasn't expecting a perfect match,but it's damn close!

Step 1 Primer:  I bought the primer that works with SW’s Ultra 7000 (“ultra”-expensive) paint (yeah, that occurred to me too – sounds like an expensive condom), mixed it up, found I had not thinned it enough but eventually sprayed the whole gallon.  Remember everything needed primer, boot, interior, engine bay, underside and topside of bonnet, boot lid, doors, hardtop, and three sections of the soft top covers.  It used the entire gallon, which made me worry if the gallon of color would be enough.  Turns out, it wasn’t.

With Alphie coated in primer gray, all the little places that I thought I body worked so well popped out, scratches, filler outlines, high spots, air bubbles, you name it, it all daringly grinned at me.  No way was I just going to paint over them, so out comes the filler, sanding boards, and sandpaper.  I had two weeks to fix all the problems before the consecutive weekends, and it took every minute of it.

Spraying an entire car - every nook, takes loads of primer (in this case)

All the primer pics look great here, but if you could look closer, you would see many problems

Mistake (a big’un):  Since I was out of the good primer, I sprayed the problem spots (which were numerous) with rattle can primer, bad plan, a very bad plan.

Step 2 Color Coat:  The SW guys mixed up the color coat ready-to-shoot, meaning they mixed in the reducer so all I had to do was strain it into the paint gun and go to town.  Highly recommended, by the way. Dutifully, I loaded the spray gun and commenced creating a blue fog, a pretty blue fog at that.  All seemed fine, color coat going on as planned, my two-weekend schedule intact.  Then I walked around to check out my work.  Big spidery ridges wherever I had used the rattle can primer.  (Insert intense swear words.)  See the pics.

Pulled Primer! Just an example - there were plenty more

The re-repaired front left wing.  This is one of the first places
I repaired and I clearly didn't prep the metal well

Even after a bit of sanding, the spider webs are still visible.
I had to get below the rattle can primer to elminate them.

Step 3 SAND MY HANDS OFF:  The large swathes of paint that looked like cuneiform bas relief had to be sanded down, reglazed in many places, and in a week!  I also found a spot on the driver’s side front wing that had a resilient crack that came back even after I slapped some hardened glaze on it.  I know what that means, the filler isn’t sticking to the metal, and ignore it at your own peril.  Sure enough, when I poked at it with an icepick doohickey, the filler popped off!

In a week, I had to fix all the pulled primer and re-bodywork the front left wing.  I got it done, but it cost me a lot of skin, mostly from my fingertips.

Next problem, what to prime the refixed fixes with?  Clearly filler primer was a bad choice.  I found some sealer primer at the parts store that seemed to offer a solution.  Sand, sand, fix, respray with the sealer primer, sand some more.  Ready for the next coat of color, I hoped.

I swear I'm not making Meth Breaking Bad style

It looked good when I was sparying the first coat

An action shot

I love laying down to spray most

Step 4 Second Round of Color:  I guess I didn’t mention above that I used the entire gallon of Ultra 7000 on the first round but ran out before I sprayed the top of the boot lid, hardtop, bonnet lid and the outside of the doors.  Don't forget the other body colored bits that needed color, headlight bezels, cowl vents, door hinges, soft top covers, petrol tank mounts, boot hinges, etc. etc.  Back to SW to throw down some more $$$, It was beginning (continuing!) to add up.

Mix, load and spray!  Good news/bad news – the refixed spots with sealing primer didn’t pull, good news!  But several spots on the doors and boot lid pulled even though they never had rattle can primer on them, bad news and alarming.

I sanded away at these new trouble spots, and with about two spray gun cups worth of color coat left, hit the doors and boot lid with a second coat.  No surprise, the same spots pulled again, AND I was out of color coat to fix it.  (Insert your most refreshingly colorful swear word here.)

Step 5 2K primer:  Two-K primer!  Why didn’t I use it the first time?!  Truth is, Ultra 7000 doesn’t require a 2K primer (if all your bodywork is at Jay Leno level) so the paint shop boys were trying to save me some money.  AND the parts that I primed with the original primer and didn’t sand off to fix a spot, sprayed out as advertised.

While I was getting the 2k primer, I had the boys mix up another half-gallon of color coat, that 2 ½ gallons for those keeping count.  (To be fair, the original gallon of color coat wouldn’t have been enough even if I hadn’t screwed around with rattle can primer, but this last half-gallon was the price of ignorance, possibly hubris.)

I mixed, loaded, and sprayed the 2K - what silky magnificence!  Two K is hardened so nothing pulled, and I was ready (and relieved) to lay down the last coats of color.

Buttery smoothness of 2K primer!

Ummm, looks tasty!

Step 6 Clear Coat:  I decided to get SW’s best clear coat (Ultra CC200 “Dynamic” Clear) for a pretty penny, but I wasn’t going to scrimp on such an important part of Alphie’s restoration.  As it turned out, my second weekend was a three-day one, a day I sorely needed.

With the color coat looking satisfyingly blue and wonderfully smooth, I mixed up the 4:1 clear to hardener with 15% reducer in for good vibes.  Money well spent!  The clear flowed from the gun and laid down a glassy smooth gloss with the first coat.  I had the fluid flow on the gun a little too high, so I signed my work with some runs.  (I had bragged to my neighbor that I usually don’t have runs; never claim the high ground until you’re actually atop it.  Also, runs are very fixable with yep, lots of SANDING and buffing, ugh!)

It's now October 10, and the clear has been on for a couple of days now.  I can see how much sanding a buffing it’s going to need, but Alphie’s new coat of color looks AWESOME.  (I don’t know how long it will take to get the blue off my fingers.)

SHINY Alphie!

This pic shows the dust that I will have to sand and buff out.
Inevitable with a garage job.

Finally got the doors and boot lid painted.