Another Build Thread - My '32

[J. Robinson]

OK, here is the picture I promised above. This crossmember is not visible with the body in place unless you crawl under the car. I can weld brackets to it, drill holes in it, or whatever and do no damage to the pretty polished stainless spreader bar.

[J. Robinson]

Monday I put the final pieces on the tailpipes; they are 304 stainless. I made hangers out of perforated strap and bolted them through the crossmember I installed in the last posting. For now I just attached the pipes to the hangers with hose clamps. I'll replace those with something better in final assembly.

[J. Robinson]

Nothing picture-worthy, just an update - I have everything disassembled and have finished all the final welding. I am beginning the tedious task of prepping the frame and all the chassis components for paint. I hate this part of a build, but gotta do it.

Anybody used paint from TheCoatingStore.Com ? They have really reasonable prices and a lot of tantalizing colors. I should be ready to load my spray gun in another week or two...

[J. Robinson]

Not exactly earth shattering, but I did make a little progress this past week. I sanded the entire frame with 80 grit on my D/A sander and then wiped on a thin coat of Ospho. I already sang the praises of Ospho in an earlier post, but for those who may be just joining this discussion, Ospho is an acid based metal treatment that turns iron oxide (rust) into iron phosphate which is an inert substance that is not affected further by moisture. It also etches bare metal slightly and prevents rust. It's like Metal Prep extreme. The Ospho turns bare steel a dark gray; rust turns black. The first pic below is the frame after being Ospho'd and drying overnight.

After an overnight curing, I lightly scuffed the frame with Scotchbrite (red) to remove any dust/flakes. Next, I finger-molded the welds around the headlight/shock stanchions with body filler and sanded it smooth. Finally, I sprayed on a coat of primer (second pic).

[Mike P]

Very nice Jim!


.

[40FordDeluxe]

Very nice! When you say finger molded, did you sand the welds or? Curiosity has me wondering.

[J. Robinson]

OK, what is "finger molded"? - I ground off any lumps in the welds so they wouldn't show. Then I mixed some filler and used a finger to wipe and shape it over the welds. It makes a nice fillet that needs very little sanding to finish. This hides any differences in the welds and makes everything look nice and smooth.

[40FordDeluxe]

I was guessing this is what you were meaning. It definitely makes it look a lot nicer!

[J. Robinson]

I haven't done anything too dramatic recently; I just prepped and painted some of the attending pieces. I debated on the color for a long time. I won't paint a hot rod black - black is done to death. I know, it shows perfect body work and there are a lot of beautiful black cars, but for me it's a "lack of imagination color". I've spent too many hours behind a spray gun to do that. Also, any flat or satin color was not a consideration. Flat and satin paint is primer to me. Again, I've done too much paint work to have that; if it doesn't shine it ain't done. At first I considered Ford Grabber Blue. It's a color that draws attention, but you don't see a lot of it on hot rods. Most of the blues we see are dark metallics… What about red? Red is another color that is done to death, especially on fenderless cars,.. but red is my favorite color. I remember many years ago there was a bunch of complaining in Street Rodder Magazine because there were too many red cars in the pages! Then a friend of mine said he would disavow our friendship if I painted this car bright red... I asked him, "how about candy red?"... "Well, that's different", he says...

I went in search of the right paint and I was pretty disgusted at first. I looked at Axalta's Razzleberry - it's beautiful. It's also ridiculously expensive. I refused to buy it. Ford's Grabber Blue was suddenly back in the running. For the difference in price I can buy the Air Conditioning unit for this car... but I just couldn't "pull the trigger"; I didn't want a blue car. I was so discouraged on the price of paint that I was about to put this thing in gray epoxy primer and leave it! Then I discovered an online paint supplier - The Coating Store. Great prices and beautiful urethane colors.., but is the stuff any good? I ordered a quart kit of their "Scarlet Fever" red pearl. I have painted the rear end (pic below), truck arms, torsion bars, panhard bars, and transmission mount with it. So far I am pleased. It sprays about like Ditzler's urethane paints and the Glamour Clear has an impressive "wet look" shine. I am going to paint the engine with this also. I like the stuff enough that I have ordered Apple Red Eye Candy for the frame and body. I'll post a pic when I paint something with it.

[J. Robinson]

Something else I did - I got some "Killer Chrome" from AlsaCorp. Below is a pic of my front radius rods. On the left is one in the black basecoat. On the right is one after spraying with the Killer Chrome. The info on the site says the finish will look like highly polished aluminum - it does! It's interesting to watch the stuff change before your eyes - spray it on as silver paint and watch it turn to chrome. Unless it's right next to real chrome, it's hard to tell that it's not. It's not cheap, but it works.

[34_40]

"Then I discovered an online paint supplier - The Coating Store. Great prices and beautiful urethane colors.., but is the stuff any good? I ordered a quart kit of their "Scarlet Fever" red pearl. I have painted the rear end (pic below), truck arms, torsion bars, panhard bars, and transmission mount with it. So far I am pleased."

Could you share a link? Please...

[53 Chevy5]

Picking a color sucks but it looks like you nailed it, it looks beautiful! My next one will be red just because my first car was red. That kind of thing sticks with you.

[J. Robinson]

34-40 - Yes. here is the link to The Coating Store: [url]https://www.thecoatingstore.com

The folks there are really courteous on the phone, too. I ordered my paint online, but I had a couple of questions first. I called and they were helpful. Also, they accept Paypal if you prefer that over giving credit card numbers online. I live in central Florida and my first order arrived 3 days after they confirmed shipping.

My local Axalta store priced the Razzleberry paint at $1148.00 for a gallon of paint plus the activator. The price did not include sealer, clearcoat, clearcoat activator, or any reducer. I got the Apple Red candy from The Coating Store for $584.96 including 2 quarts of sealer, a gallon of silver base, a gallon of candy red, a gallon of glamour clear and all the needed reducers and activators (catalyst).

If it arrives tomorrow I may get my frame painted this weekend and start reassembly. If so, I'll show it here.

[J. Robinson]

Yay!! My paint came today (Thursday). Now, if the weather will just cooperate...

[34_40]

34-40 - Yes. here is the link to The Coating Store: [url]https://www.thecoatingstore.com

The folks there are really courteous on the phone, too. I ordered my paint online, but I had a couple of questions first. I called and they were helpful. Also, they accept Paypal if you prefer that over giving credit card numbers online. I live in central Florida and my first order arrived 3 days after they confirmed shipping.

My local Axalta store priced the Razzleberry paint at $1148.00 for a gallon of paint plus the activator. The price did not include sealer, clearcoat, clearcoat activator, or any reducer. I got the Apple Red candy from The Coating Store for $584.96 including 2 quarts of sealer, a gallon of silver base, a gallon of candy red, a gallon of glamour clear and all the needed reducers and activators (catalyst).

If it arrives tomorrow I may get my frame painted this weekend and start reassembly. If so, I'll show it here.

Thank You Jim. I've begun helping my friend Mark working on his 53 F-100. We're at the sanding stage.... and sanding.. and sanding.. well you know that story. So I'm "urging" him to make some decisions now, or sooner than later. 8-)