redneck1545 Posted August 6, 2010 Share Posted August 6, 2010 Ok so i've exhausted all my search button options for the past few days but I know somehow, someone will post a link to an old thread answering these questions but here goes. So i've completely stripped the z of all the paint...so now's not the time to ask well did u really need to strip to bare metal an such...yes i needed to...rust and 1/4" thick bondo pretty much EVERYWHERE. so I decide to start fresh as possible...for those of you who have seen Mull's progress on HUGO, i'm pretty much dealing with the same kinda issues as far as rust severity goes. So shes stripped...combination of paint stripper, wire wheels, sanding discs, and black beauty media blasting. The panels were stripped with chemicals, discs or wire wheels while the engine bay and heavy metal/rusty areas were done with the media blasting. For those who are intrested I sanded with a 7" 80 grit sanding pad on a variable speed buffer and yes it creates ALOT of dust. The aircraft stripper was Mar-Hyde Tal-Strip, and yes that stuff burns, and yes its a mess, but it works wonders on thick bondo and about two layers of paint at a time. The media blasting was done with a harbor freight 40lb pressure pot blaster at about 50 PSI with 30/60 grit Black Beauty picked up from northern tool in 50lb bags for $8 a bag...couldnt pass it up. Ok so now all the mumbo jumbo is out of the way lets get down to the steps once it is in this bare metal form. My plans are to take phosphoric acid and treat the metal, wash with water (even though it causes flash rust) hit the surface once again with 80-120 grit on a Dual action orbital palm sander and then clean with acetone until all the grease/wax/oil and such has been removed from the surface of the metal. After all that I have an epoxy primer im going to spray down until I can take care of all the necessary body and metal work at a later date. Question is are the above steps completely correct? I'm not trying to go through all this work just to mess up a simple step that will cause alot of headache down the road. Any more suggestions or comments are welcome. I will be posting pics and/or making a build thread soon so dont worry!!! Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nelsonian Posted August 6, 2010 Share Posted August 6, 2010 redneck1545, I am one step behind you and right on your heels with my rebuild project. Here is how I'm approaching it. I have so far removed all the undercoating and also electrical rubber coated clips in the engine bay. I brought my car to an excellent welder fabricator and am having it structurally strengthened, and all rust issues dealt with, (floors,rails rear patch panel, battery area, etc... After it is finished there, it will be blasted by a second generation blaster who has been blasting since 79', wiped with pre paint degreaser, then finally epoxy coated. My car will sit for awhile after the epoxy coat while I save for the body mods and paint. Bye the way I know what you mean about 1/4" bondo, damn po did one ffddd up job of repairing a previous accident on the rear passenger side. I know I did not exactly answer you questions, but just sharing my plans. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneck1545 Posted August 6, 2010 Author Share Posted August 6, 2010 Nice to hear someone else out there is as bad as I am when it comes to tearin things appart! I picked this car up for $150 from a junkyard with three doors, no hatch and no fenders. Found hatch and both fenders for about $100 from a local z yard. A few trips to the pull-a-part yard and picking up some q-45 diffs hub to hub for $65 a pop (I picked up three for that price!!!) Then I get a call from my dads friend that has a 289 bored to a 293 rebuilt about a yr ago, sitting wrapped up on an engine stand he simply has nothing to put it in and wanted it gone...so of course i went and took a freshly rebuilt engine with stand off his hands for FREE!!! (I'm gonna go through it of course...and i also have a 400hp 357ci engine sitting with no ride currently as well!) so basically Ive got a couple hundred bucks in a car that I couldnt resist tearing completly apart!! I picked this thing up about 4-5 years ago and stripped everything out of it about a year after that (when I thought I would really start the project) and then it has sat in that condition for about 3 years...I couldn't take it anymore and decided to strip all the paint off and figure out what I have left under all the rust issues and finally get things going on it little by little. I just know how much work is ahead and I really dont want to be setting myself up to re-do some of the same steps from doing somethign dumb the first time around ya know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneck1545 Posted August 6, 2010 Author Share Posted August 6, 2010 so stripping, clean up any flash rust with orbital, phosphoric acid treatment, wash to nuetralize acid, clean any new flash rust with orbital and finally clean metal with acetone before applying epoxy primer... right steps or wrong steps??? thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
McClain87 Posted August 7, 2010 Share Posted August 7, 2010 ugh im about to start my processess aswell. some of it is rust so i have to get that off. i should be getting it within the week so ill be gettin started on it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmoothZ Posted August 7, 2010 Share Posted August 7, 2010 subscribed.... Thinking of doing something similar with my car as far as prepping it for paint. Need to strip it down to bare metal just to be sure I get all imperfections out of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneck1545 Posted August 7, 2010 Author Share Posted August 7, 2010 Ok, so I promised pics and here they are... the pics arent great quality but it gets the point across, I'm just about to start the phosphoric acid treatment and then palm sand with 80 grit one last time before cleaning with acetone and priming with epoxy! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneck1545 Posted August 10, 2010 Author Share Posted August 10, 2010 so this is what i get for not reading my paint labels sooner i suppose... I pulled out some paint i bought about a year ago that says EPOXY PRIMER on the front and I have the EPOXY PRIMER ACTIVATOR as well. Reading the directions on the back it says bla bla bla is a self etching epoxy primer containing zinc phosphate... So in light of what I have found out today I think im going to skip the Phosphate step i had planned earlier and just hit it with some 80 grit on the orbital and clean with acetone before i lay the primer down. The reason im skipping my phosphate step i had planned is because the Epoxy primer I have contains Zinc Phosphate and would therefore do the same thing anyways. After reading about all the risks with base coat adhesion using phosphate as a seperate 'step' in the process im just gonna lay down my primer and hope for the best. I just thought there were two distinct different kinds of primer...Epoxy based primers with form a barrier better than self etching primers, and then the self etchin or zinc phosphate based primers...Never have I heard of them being in the same product. Anyone wanna shed some light on the subject??? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodoldjam Posted August 10, 2010 Share Posted August 10, 2010 (edited) I been using some phosphate but only for ultra fine pitting then I sand it back off the clean metal. I try to get everything down to clean metal if I can. I do have some Epoxy etching primer, it isn't buildable at all. I would still need to put something buidable on top of it. I don't trust the primer to take care of the rust but at the same time I don't want to spray it over the top of a car covered with the spray on Phosphate. The job of the primer is to adhere to metal. Edited August 10, 2010 by goodoldjam Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneck1545 Posted August 11, 2010 Author Share Posted August 11, 2010 (edited) I snapped some more pics just after hitting it one last time with the orbital sander and cleaning with acetone. these pics are in the garage with crappy lighting so hopefully ill have some better ones up tomorrow sometime with it out in the sun. Today I got both front fenders, the hood and hatch in primer. All in all it turned out ok...got some crap that was floating around in the air to settle down on the paint before it dried even after cleaning the dust outta the garage and keeping wet floors the entire time so thats kinda a bummer but its not the end of the world. Edited August 11, 2010 by redneck1545 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneck1545 Posted August 12, 2010 Author Share Posted August 12, 2010 (edited) Didn't get to do too much today...finished media blasting the door jambs, bottom of the rockers, gas filler area and some other places that a die grinder or orbital cant get. Kinda undecided on what to do tomorrow...i need to do some work on my daily driver so I dunno if ill have the chance to work on the z on the plus side of things the paint looks ok...got it out in the sun and saw a few runs and a little grit but hopefully wetsanding WAAAAAAAAAAY down the road will take care of those issues. I'm only doing all this stripping and priming as a first step before all the metal work an fabrication start...oh yea and another plus note, my dads friend has a miller mig welder fully setup and ready to go that i can borrow for FREE! so hopefully ill be able to make my "build thread" soon when i start all the frame an floor pan work. Edited August 12, 2010 by redneck1545 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneck1545 Posted August 13, 2010 Author Share Posted August 13, 2010 i got the body DA'd one last time before taping it up and degreasing before paint tomorrow...i think this time i might degrease during the evening and wait till about 4am to paint in the garage with the doors open and see if that helps with the grit from the air settling down in the wet primer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k14 Posted August 13, 2010 Share Posted August 13, 2010 i got the body DA'd one last time before taping it up and degreasing before paint tomorrow...i think this time i might degrease during the evening and wait till about 4am to paint in the garage with the doors open and see if that helps with the grit from the air settling down in the wet primer. 4 am? It's still dark at 4 am. If you paint at night the only thing settling into the paint will be bugs.....lots and lots of bugs! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneck1545 Posted August 17, 2010 Author Share Posted August 17, 2010 after more DA'n (i didnt paint it the other night and some flash rust started to take hold again) I finally got the rest of the exterior of the body in primer. Im not gonna upload a whole bunch of pics cause this page already takes forever to load an resize the current ones. Anyways, progress on the car is gonna take a back burner as school just started back and I've got to buckle down on that crap now. Good thing is I ordered a mustache bar from arizona z car for the q-45 as well as the front mount from techno toy tuning. Im looking for a 280z parts car to pull the stronger stubs and companion flanges out of before I ship those off to russ from Modern motorsport to get his axles and conversion flanges to round out my q-45 install. O yea and the rest of the exterior will also be blasted as well as the interior and undercarriage sometime in the near future. HOWEVER, im taking back my harbour freight 40lb pressure pot blaster and putting the 100 bucks towards something that will work a little better. I plan on renting a 50cfm tow-behind deisel powered air compressor as well as a 100 or 300lb pressure pot blaster from a tool rental place for about 200 bucks a day. I think it will be well worth the money over blasting for 10 mins and waiting on my compressor to catch up to continue...and the HF pot blaster gets clogged alot, has already blown of the hose due to the crappy hose clamps supplied with it as well as busted the air/water filter only after 2 uses. I just think my money would be better spent on something more powerful...even if it is only to rent it. So far ive used about 300lbs of media and only got the engine compartment, jambs, and windshield seal areas. Im thinking about another 500-600lbs will finish the car...i guess we'll find out soon enough. Enough talk...enjoy the pics Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneck1545 Posted September 24, 2010 Author Share Posted September 24, 2010 ill be moving this thread to the "members build" section soon. but as far as an update goes HERE GOES! Since the last post I have built a rotisserie from engine stands ended up costing me a days worth of work and about 150 bucks. WELL WORTH IT and purchased the following- 15gal aluminum fuel cell w/sending unit valued at 250 brand new...I paid 125 for a never been used one from a guy who bought a truck accessory shop techno toy tuning Q-45 front mount. Paid 150 Arizona Z car Q-45 rear diff mustache bar. Paid 220 a pair of sandblasted and painted 280z stub axels/companion flanges with brand new bearings thnx to hybridz! a set of coil-overs and tokico HP struts from another member on here one gallon of ZERO RUST! for 70 bucks I think. after exhausting my search for a t-5 transmission and finding out that people want WAAAAY too much for a "world class" t-5 with xxx,xxx miles on it i ended up finding a t-56 out of a 95 camaro for 350 bucks! the guy was open and honest and said it needs syncronizers but hey for that price i couldnt pass it up. Bought a stock camaro shifter for 25 bucks and today the steal of the century goes toooooooo....drumroll please. A BRAND NEW fidanza conversion flywheel for my 2 piece rear main seal block and a brand new stock clutch for a 150 bucks from a guy on craigslist!!!! about an 800 dollar value for 150 bucks...cant beat that in my mind...both are brand new never been used parts! so thank you to all the honest hybrid z members out there who ive sent my money to and who have come through in supplying me quality used parts! Much appreciated! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneck1545 Posted November 30, 2010 Author Share Posted November 30, 2010 ive been busy...srry for not giving an update. pictures can do the talking better than i so here goes! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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