Next up is a very exciting stage – painting!
Now I have never
painted anything properly, I’ve use the odd rattle can on very small items but nothing
to this extent so this is a learning curve. A very steep one. This is turning
out to be the most frustrating part of my project so far.
First up I dug out all the old body work sections I buried 6
months ago. The rear tub being one.
Having reviewed the condition I decided to remove the
capping sections of the tub and paint them separately.
Then I took the tub in to my new spray booth (cheap gazebo,
note the word cheap this will be important later in this post)
I put on the etch, then two high builds. So far so good,
seems easy! Next base coat – Epsom Green, again went well - seems to good to be true...
Then after this was the lacquer, first coat was great. Second
coat sagged – gutted. Oh well, rub it down, blow over the lot again…..
I rubbed down too much, decided to touch up with some base and
the paint reacted. Large patches of leather grain paint. So at this point I
move the tub out to let it fully cure. But during this time I did get the seat box, 2nd
row floor and bulkhead brace painted and finished.
While the tub was drying I moved on to the roof and wheels
(in Fuji white).
Went pretty good, wheels are complete, but the lacquer ran
again on one side of the roof, so rubbed down and finished for the night to let it dry
ready for another coat the next day.
Went to work, weather got a bit windy, came back to find
this….
