GBpaint0906

More Upgrades For Our Shop Truck

Winter is just around the corner and this is my rainy day car. We're the second owners of this CA car and don't treat her as well as we should. The previous owner didn't take very good care of her either, but he put sheetmetal screws through some of the trim instead of replacing worn clips! She lives (has always lived) outside in the sweltering heat and pouring rain, it's sad to say but my other toys have priority. It has had some bare spots that were really beginning to look nasty last year so it's time to paint it.

Normally I would paint it myself but I just don't have the time. I've said before this is NOT my first color choice but it is correct for this car. I think it will be awesome with the paint having some depth and sparkle, I've been looking at it like this for about 8 years............ It's knick name comes from it's colors, Green Bean, or affectionately as Beanie and in general as GB. No, I don't know who started naming the cars but they all have one............

So, I struck up a deal with a body shop (El Camino's Plus customer) to get her cleaned up. Son and I spent about 9 hours removing trim and weatherstrip this weekend. I was surprised at how little damage and bondo there was in this car! My suspicions about the tailgate did turn out to be true, it has had some heavy damage that wasn't prepped correctly in the past so the skin was badly rusted under the bondo.

9-6-05 Dropped it off at the shop today to have the tailgate changed and the bed media blasted. While at the strippers, the front fenderwells, radiator support and another tailgate are going to be blasted for the black car. This car will be DA'd to bare metal, body work (not much) will be done and then primed with epoxy primer and a couple good cross coats of sandable primer. I will do all the blocking and long board work then deliver it back to them for paint. Son and I will do reassembly. It sure will be nice to have the old girl pretty, it's never been nice since we've had it. Ha, it'll look like a new 70's era fridge!

9-16-05 Well, delays have taken their toll, I visited the shop today to deliver some parts and take some pictures. The new (used) tailgate is on the car and the holes in the body are rough filled. Boy, it's very disheartening to see my old girl like this..... We had to delete the metal and rubber parking lot protection from the side that we can no longer get. The body guy has a great eye and found lots of things that I hadn't. He was able to massage the metal and only used minimal amounts of mud.

She was delivered to the stripper today to have the bed blasted, we were told 9 days until we get her back. Meanwhile, this weekend we'll be polishing bumpers and sorting through our trim to find a nice set. Only 2 pieces were bad on it but I have some nicer that I'm going to add.

Stay Tuned, more soon.

10-7-05 She's back from the sand blasters! I was really happy to see how well the front bed area cleaned up, it was really ugly but as it turns out, not as bad as I thought. They'll finish stripping the old girl, epoxy prime and guide coat it then give it back on Wednesday. I have most of the trim already polished and waiting to go back on! The weather is supposed to be high 80's this week, I would like to be done blocking by the following Monday anyhow. We'll see how it goes, now it's turning into a race to finish before the rains set in!

10-13-05 She came home today, and I'm sanding my life away!

10-18-05 More sanding but I think I'm starting to close in on it!!

10-23-05 Finally ready to go back to the body shop!

11-04-05 The first color is on there now.

11-08-05 Getting ready for the second coat color.

11-14-05 Here's both colors! They've got some small stuff left to do and then the old girl comes home again! More work.................

11-16-05 She came home today! Geez, just the caps and trim rings make her look much better! It's only fitting that our front fender emblems were the first parts to go on.