Well, been super busy with work and not much progress on the car the last few weeks.
I had been given a pretty messed up hood from the twins a while back to test and see if it would clear the blower and with just a little massaging of the bracing under the hood it actually did fit.
So I messed around a bit with it. Passenger side had been bent by trying to close the hood with stuck hood hinges. It collapsed the sheetmetal where the hood bolted to the hinges and put a good bit of a bend in the hood. I built a big bar with the hood bolt pattern and got the hood straight with some help of a buddy and we got creative to pull out all of the dent on the bottom of the hinge section. Getting better.
I kept going and did a little hammer and dolly work on the hood to get it ok, then slapped some body filler on it after sanding down most of the maroon off of it. Jeep in mind, its a really rough hood.
This was about as much as I wanted to do at home, so made a call to a friend who has a friend with a booth.
We scheduled for Saturday for us to be able to work in there.
A little more sanding, we shot some self etch on the bare metal spots.
Then I shot it with some super build primer and got to sanding.....I am without a doubt no body or paint guy so if you are look away, I am just learning this ****.
Sanded with 220 and 320 with a long board to get it as flat as we cared to.....the rest of the car is rough and a perfect hood would not fit well at all. We got it better than I originally had planned.
Cleaned, wiped down and shot some sealer on it.
Just in a t shirt and shorts with a respirator on and shot this. Its OMNI single stage. We got close with a color from Industrial Finishes and I tinted it with some base white to get it as close as I could at home.
Its got stuff in the paint and some sanding scratches from not going to 400 but all in all it turned out pretty good.
I laid down a good amount of paint on the hood knowing that it was going to need some color sanding and buffing. I think I did 1 light and 3 wet coats on the hood.
We let it dry overnight in the booth (No heat but 67 degrees inside temps).
Got to it the next morning and hit it with 1500 to get the **** and scratches out of the hood. It sanded good once you got through the top layer of paint. Didnt go overboard on the sanding so you can see the little nips int he fluorescent lights but considering what I was into the hood and its color matched I am pretty happy.
Ran the buffer over it and brought it home.
The front of the car had received a crappy repaint at some point in the past. Scott shot me an add for a beige car out in the gorge and I met up with the guy last week to snag some parts off of it. Driver side is perfect, its a dead on match for the car paint and finish. So I got to work swapping my better old ****ty fenders onto the car once the hood was done.
Seems as though I like going backwards eh?
I am glad I did this though as I discovered my tire was actually going to hit the firewall pinch weld at full lock so it got some massaging while I was in there.
New Fenders going on. They are so much better than the ones that were on the car.
First time seeing it all bolted together. Hoods far from perfect but fits with the car. Was a bitch getting it aligned and the drivers rear is still a little bit high.
Had to modify the fender roller to work with the lower ride height...
Rolling the new fender, still have the passenger side to do but should be able to get that all buttoned up tonight.
Non rolled and pulled...
Rolled and pulled. I measured the non rolled and pulled on the floor next to the rolled and pulled one and I have gained about 1.5" of total tire clearance, only downside is the gap at the bottom of the door to fender doesnt line up as the metal gets pulled in a little bit.
Tail lights are stuck in transit, gotta get the rest of the frontend buttoned up, bumper on, adjust some toe and get the passenger headlight wired up.
Got word that the wheels have been machined and were heading to powder coat last Wednesday, should be no problem to make Davis and LSFest.