In reply to TVR Scott :
POR is hard like Patrick says. It is not durable as a top coat if it gets any U.V. exposure. It also prefers another primer over it before color top coat. Brushed on it levels out very well, I only spray it if there will be a top coat visible. It sticks well to sand blasted bare steel, but peels right of clean new steel. The silver seems to work a little better than the other colors. This Mini had been in a damp garage for many years. One half pint brushed on.
In reply to TurnerX19 :
Your comment about clean new steel is dead on. It really likes it to be a little nasty.
This is all great info, everyone. Thanks!
Although it may not look it, this is another couple hours of work. The engine bay is finished minus the firewall opening for the trans. Everything was still tacky so I coudn't turn around and get it or reach from the outside. I've started to be able to use a 3" brush and it's making much quicker work of everything.
Tick off the third 4AM painting visit. If it appears that I'm running full speed and not getting anywhere, it also feels that way! Footwells done, top of scuttle done, firewall done, hinge pillars done. The rest of the car is pretty wide open flat bits so it should go quickly save the rear suspension pick up points.
Had a bit of a "You idiot" moment this morning when the threaded plates to which the hinges bolt to would not move. Their movement is what allows adjustment of the door. Paint had gotten in behind them and dried. Luckily I was able to break them free with just a little tapping.
That's more like it!
Not pictured: The underside, which is about 40% done. I ran out of steam and paint in my container at about the same time last night so I decided to call it at 1030 rather than be miserable. POR-15 is an interesting substance. I am far from an expert but it seems like it could benefit from being a bit thicker but what do I know. There are endless runs to track down seemingly no matter how thin you put it on. It also doesn't like to set on either horizontal or vertical edges.
Big news - my first parts order is on its way. Wiring harness, hard brake lines & fittings, hard fuel lines & fittings and all the body and firewall grommets. Should be here Tuesday. I'm doing my best to remember the order of operations of taking it apart and reversing that. I've got a 9-week timeline laid out for finishing the car. 8 more orders to come.
Bigger news - the painter is finished! We're going early this afternoon to grab everything. He sent me one picture earlier this week before sanding and buffing and I couldn't be happier. The color I chose is 60's Porsche that recently has been a paint-to-sample option and I was worried about getting the right mix. I can't decide whether I'm going to post pictures of the color now or wait until the body panels are back on the car...
berkeley it I'm way too excited.
Once all assembled, it will go back for a final buff. He was unable to get it as good as he wanted sitting on the stands. A keen Healey eye will notice that he filled in the holes where the front emblem goes. No biggie, I'll just drill them out. Not much could put me in a bad mood right now.
That looks awesome
I like the color.
Bet you sweat bullets hanging the panels. Tape the edges.
Pete
My recommendation would be for you to do every mechanical pit humanly possible prior to even looking at the body parts. I can't tell you how much I've regretted not following that advice in the past. I'd also suggest taping in about 6 in from every single conceivable Edge prior to messing with the painted panels
Patrick said:That looks awesome
Thanks man!
NOHOME said:I like the color.
Bet you sweat bullets hanging the panels. Tape the edges.
Pete
Considering it was one of the most stressful drives I've ever had coming home, yes you're right.
Dusterbd13-michael said:My recommendation would be for you to do every mechanical pit humanly possible prior to even looking at the body parts. I can't tell you how much I've regretted not following that advice in the past. I'd also suggest taping in about 6 in from every single conceivable Edge prior to messing with the painted panels
Yes. I'm actually planning to leave them in the truck until I'm ready for them unless there's a reason I need the truck.
The 6-inch suggestion is a damn good one, thanks. My painter also told me to use at least three layers of tape.
Yeah, blue masking tape is way cheaper than paint repairs. Just don’t get the hdx brand at derpot, it doesn’t stick for E36 M3
In reply to AxeHealey :
Gorgeous color. I excited, and it's not even my car.
You got the right painter for sure, and the color is totaly rad
In reply to Indy-Guy :
Thanks!
In reply to TurnerX19 :
Yeah, seems like it, thanks!
Got to spend much of the afternoon with POR15 today. I won't miss working with it once I'm done. I'm covered in it... at least I won't rust?
The entire chassis is painted except for where the jack stands are. I overestimated how much paint I would need to finish so I had left over in my container.
I also wanted to do the steering column and arms but couldn't separate them. I'll need a puller. I did get one of the castle nuts off. The other cotter pin is giving me fits.
Tomorrow will be painting those 4 little sections, checking for touch up areas and then seam sealer. I'm well into the losing sleep about timing, etc. Cannot wait to be done.
Got the arm separated from the steering box but I still can't get the damn cotter pin out of the idler side. Painted the steering column and box, arm, collar, panhard rod and flipped the springs to get the rest.
I'm now probably 80% done with seam sealer too. The underside is finished. Tomorrow should mean finishing the seam sealer, painting back over it and touching up and finalizing the frame. Considering the wiring harness and hard lines should show up Tuesday, I say that's good timing.
I wish I would have gone with brush-on seam sealer. Either that or just left them as beads. This is messy work.
No pictures from last night but I was at the shop until 12:15 finishing the seam sealer and painting back over every seam. The wiring harness and hardlines should show up today so it's officially time to start putting it back together.
I also placed my next order of parts this morning (suspension components) and hopefully they get here Friday as I've got Monday off.
OH and I ended up drilling that berkeleying cotter pin out. Haven't been able to get enough leverage on the castle nut yet to break it free. It's currently soaking in 50/50 ATF and Acetone.
Woke up yesterday with a miserable cold that got worse throughout the day. My wife had curriculum night so by the time she got home and I could have gone to the shop, there was no chance. My first parts order arrived, however, with nothing missing.
I also packed up all four shocks along with the front calipers and sent them off to Apple Hydraulics this morning. I'm not 100% but much better so I'll be back at it tonight.
Still wasn't feeling great but I needed to make progress. First things first, that damn steering arm.
berkeleyer. It would seem that I blew out the seal on the idler with the heat unfortunately. One more job... Next I started digging through all of the various parts boxes looking for what I remembered to be a detailed diagram of where the wiring harness ran.
Not so terribly detailed. I did, however, thank past Andrew for labeling just about every harness (and brake and fuel lines too) clip and where it went on the frame. The way the wiring harness was run, I never would have remembered. I pulled out the completely labeled nasty old wiring harness, laid it out and got to work. Annoyingly, nothing on the new harness is marked so I had to compare each section.
First came getting the main harness through the firewall. Then I ran the rear harness.
The wiring for the high beams comes out of the main harness in the engine bay, over where the master cylinders mount and then back down into the wheel well. There are a number of sub-harnesses that branch of in the engine bay and come back inside through a different opening.
I worked my way through some of the engine bay routing but I need to spend time looking at my pictures as well as others to get it right.
Tonight should allow a good long time spent at the shop and then I'll have an early morning there tomorrow. I went to FAU and my wife went to OSU. For the first time (I believe) they are playing each other in Columbus on Saturday so we're going. Saturday night we have my cousin's rehearsal dinner and Sunday is the wedding so very little, if any, shop time this weekend. I should be able to spend a big chunk of Monday there.
All the work ahead is a bit daunting but it's damn cool to be past the fixing phase and into putting it together.
The lesson for today kiddos: Never trust the shiny happy person who cobbled together your cobbled together car.
I thought I was helping myself keeping every single hard fuel or brake line in tact (save a couple ends that broke off due to rust) when removing them from the car. Turns out, if one of those things was completely wrong to begin with, it is impossible to make the new part match AND work. When looking at the new straight fuel line compared to the old bent one, it seemed much longer but I've never bent line and thought maybe the bends take up more that I think. I painstakingly matched every single bend, electrical taping the two together after every one. When I got to the end, I had about 2-3 feet of extra fuel line. No amount of casual looping would make it work. WTF. In the middle of all this, I had to run out and get an actual bender because a couple of the bends were too tight to do by hand.
I pondered, cursed and was just generally pissed off. I even considered cutting the line and splicing in rubber or doing rubber the entire way. I moved on to brake lines. Now that I know I can't trust the previous "builder" this may seem strange but I matched the line exactly. This shouldn't be a problem because all of the braking equipment will be in the same place. This took me probably 40 minutes.
Is it perfect? No. Is it close? Yes. Should I have just waited until everything was on the car to make nicer bends? Maybe, but progress needed to happen. That's all I had to show for 3+ hours last night.
I got home and spent until about 12:30 researching how the fuel line is supposed to be run. As you may have figured out by now...nothing like how it was on this car. Instead of running up the driver's frame rail, it runs along the passenger and then across the front cross member. I went back this morning (EDIT: straightened the line), spent about 40 minutes and ended up with this.
Still needs adjusting but the fuel pump end looks like it'll be perfect. Depending on how my day shapes up, I may spend lunch at the shop finishing this line.
OH. You also can't trust yourself. I left about 1 gallon of gas in the tank. Last night was wonderful.
Sounds a bit like you have hit the "Ordeal" part of the project. It happens when we want stuff to come together so that we have something to show for the work. Stuff that was "Fun challengine" starts to become frustrating.
Take a moment to read your build thread from the start so that you get a sense of all you have accomplished, you are doing an amazing job and moving at an impressive pace for a Healey restoration.
Pete
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