Hey all, Pretty new into Hot Rods and have never attempted something like this. I don't really have an old head to lean on and bounce ideas off around, so I am hoping some of you will be willing to help! I have a 41 Chevy Business coupe that I am "attempting" to take down to bare metal and correct body/metal work and then re-paint. At the end of the build I want a matte black finish, so the top layer on it now is what I am after. Do I have to take it down all the way to bare metal? Or just attack the problem areas like in Picture 1, fix those, and then respray the top coat? As you can see in the pics the car has a few layers on it (picture 2). I know it's going to be a lot of work and I have a lot of time this winter so I am not worried about that. However, there HAS to be a faster way. The 3rd picture is about 14" by 8" and it took me about an hour. I put down a layer of Stripper, scrapped it off, put down another layer of Stripper, scrapped that off, then went to town with 60 grit on the DA. Please tell me I am missing an easier way to do this!!! I don't want to pull the drivetrain as it's a perfect running driving car and I don't want to mess with that, so media blasting is out. I think elbow grease and hard work are in order. The 1st picture is some of the problem areas that I have on the car. Most of the top layer (I think its a Matte/Flat black primer) is in great shape, but it has a few spots like this. What's the best way to address those? Thank you
Stripping completely will guarantee a good job. But if ya just want to fix the bad, feather and prime, that’s ok too. However, be prepared to have possible lifting issues if you spot it in (primer areas) Incompatible products, prior poor prep work..... Can cause wrinkling. So just be aware of that.
Try 80 grit on the DA sander, and if you have to, lock the DA into spin mode instead of random orbital mode until you're almost all the way down to steel. Can you take a picture of your DA sander? I think a lot of people have a palm sander and think it's the same as a DA but it's not, a DA with 80 grit should take off a LOT more than that in an hour. Also, was your sandpaper getting plugged up with old stripper gunk? That's often an issue sanding after stripping with chemical strippers. Just want to cover all the bases here since you're new to bodywork, I don't want to make any assumptions since I don't know what level you're at. Did the stripper actually soften up the paint? How long did you leave it on? Some guys will lay the stripper down and then lay a sheet of plastic over the top, it's supposed to help it from drying out although I never do that. But stripper takes time to work, depending on what you're trying to strip off it might get softened up in 10 minutes or it might take an hour or more, hard to say.
On the aira your working it looks like it's been worked before so stripping it may mean hours and hours of redoing all the filler work. The upside is you get the opportunity to improve the bodywork and paint... Feathering out the bodywork from old filler to new can be tricky, the old is rock hard and difficult to blend with new fillers but it can be done.
Yeah, its a lot of work, thats why the pros want a lot of money. I think any areas that you have put stripper on, you are committed to go all the way to bare metal. Any original paint will not like any modern epoxy or acrylic paint, like Anthony mentioned, you may get lifting / wrinkle issues that some times dont show up for a long time.
If stripping. Do one panel at a time. Try different methods. Razor blades. Sanding. Chemical stripper. If sanding, I’ve had to use 40 grit before. Most of the time 80 grit handles it but sometimes ya have to step the grits down. I’ve had to use a grinder in places. Take the top layers off then finish with a DA. NO SPARKS For chemical. Tape up areas like jambs. Sand the area with a course grit. Apply the stripper. If it jumps off quickly, scrape it. If it takes a little time, placing plastic over it helps. Wear rubber gloves, glasses, respirator and ventilate the area.
As Rusty Valley mentioned if you already started using chemical stripper the paint around those areas won't be happy. If you want to dry strip it, try a barrel drum sander like Eastwood's couture SCT. Worth the money and works really well. Personally, I never touch bare metal with anything harsher then 150grit. if you use 40/60/80 or whatever you will then need to go over the metal again with a finer grit to remove those deep scratches before primer otherwise they will show underneath if your material shrinks.. You can use a harsher grit to remove most of the material but when close to bare metal I switch to 150 or 220 if the area is clean.
I have always used 36 grit 3m disc' here are some 50 grit at Summit. A good sander/polisher and a light touch to keep from heating the metal up and it makes for fast material removal.https://www.summitracing.com/parts/...u-knuOx4ip803i2wQr3oZZ5HCK--v26AaAgy7EALw_wcB
If you're going to strip it down to bare metal, these work great! Blackhawk strip discs Chuck one into a 4-1/2" grinder and it rips right through layers of paint, rust, whatever. I bought the above 5-pack and wound up using only 3 discs. Took me about 4 hours to strip the entire car!
Whatever you do to remove the paint, the bare metal needs to be sealed at the outset, use a 2k based etch primer et al otherwise any subsequent porous 1k paint will allow the finish to rust from underneath.
I stripped a 39 Chev coupe in a day, using a heat gun and a wide blade scraper, don't get the panel too hot, move to scraping when the paint starts to bubble, and keep the gun moving.. Then finish off with an orbital sander to take it back to shiny steel all over..
I strip ALL the paint off any project I'm working on. You never know what's underneath, that will ruin your paint job. Now I use paint stripping disc, like eventho mentioned. A 4 1/2' grinder is good for lots of other duties, so it's a good investment.
There are many variables that can change what you are doing. First are you just looking at cleaning up some rough areas and feather edging or stripping the whole car. Some of the new sandblasting process work well on a complete car and pretty fast. If just small areas the strip it discs work well with the proper tool. Looking at the pictures it looks like at one time they did a sink primer and possibly epoxy coating and that some tin me is tough. i stripped a whole car with strip it disc in a full day getting ready for a 80 Grit DA then 150. Worked well on a enamel respray and OE paint.
See all the rust under those areas you stripped? That needs to be removed completely to guarantee a finish that's going to last. You can grind til the cows come home, but that will only be on the surface. Rust makes pits as it eats into the metal, and the remaining rust down in the pits will come back some day and either bubble up the paint, or eat through to the other side. You will have a bunch of guys tell you all about the wonderful chemicals they use to "convert" the rust to some magical black coating that will never come back. Take the advice of those snakeoil salesmen if you must. I never do. You can either use some chemicals like naval jelly or its modern equivalent that will dissolve the rust, or do as I do and sandblast it out. Excessive grinding to get down to the bottom of the pit will just make all that metal as thin as the metal under the pit. If you want paint that will last, it needs to be done.
Those roundish lumps are poorly filled holes where the 41 Chevy fender top detail trims reside. The rust pockmarking resembles the shape and placement of those pieces. If they are to remain filled then cutting the bad bits out and redoing is probably easier and quicker than trying to work with what is there, if you have the knowledge, skills and equipment (or substitute, with money or talented friends). Big problem is that there's a boat load of those trims all over the 41 (especially the Special Deluxe) and yours looks to have had a major delete in that regard, so further digging is likely to reveal more of the same. Not the end of the world but it could feel a bit that way! If you were able to do the legwork (step drill the holes and make up the round sheetmetal plugs) a good friend with a tig welder would have them sorted quite easily. Chris
I'm doing my 56 Dodge PU now. Similar issues, several coats, old bodywork etc. After doing the front fenders and doors I've finally found the best method for this one. Heat gun, razor blade in a good holder and followup with the stripping disk on 4.5" grinder. Finish small hard to reach places with coarse surface conditioning disk on a die grinders.
I think that's my main fear, I don't want to do something that will cause me more anguish down the road! That's why I am just going to metal, then I know it's right and I can only blame myself if something is off haha.
Thank you for the detail this is awesome! So newbie mistake and I know better, I have a palm sander, not a true DA. I know the difference and just always call it a DA because I am a moron haha. My sandpaper was getting plugged quite often. The stripper did soften the top layer or two. I left it on for 15-20 mins as the bottle says. Some of it was drying out already, some was still wet. I took a plastic edging tool to scrap it off with a layer or two of paint but not much, then went to town with the palm sander. It seemed to work better if I let the stripper dry out, is that not the correct way?
Haha that's all I was saying internally while I was working on that tiny spot! A good body man is worth every penny.
If the stripper is the type that is commonly available now, instead of the old stuff that really worked, you might want to cover it with Saran wrap and let it sit for hours...at least that's what I've read....it doesn't work very well, and needs a lot of time, while still wet, to work. might want to do some more research on this topic. I've used the old style stripper several times over the past decades, it worked pretty well, but those times are now gone.
Thanks for the tips. I was going 40 or 60 grit (testing to see what responded better), then 100 grit, then 220 once I have the area almost done.
First off, love the car! I have a couple of these discs but I wasn't sure about using them on the car. Did you do anything else before you started attacking it with this?
That depends. We can't see your location in your profile, so we can only guess where you are. It looks green....so probably somewhere where there's moisture in the air....so my southwest desert advice to keep it indoors and seal it whenever you get around to it, is probably not going to help you.
The palm sander isn't going to do much, and a plastic scraper isn't going to work nearly as well as a razor blade on a handle or even a sharpened metal scraper. That will help a lot. But if you're going to try those grinder discs, skip the stripper all together. It'll just gum up the works. Sanding and stripping works best when the paint is bone dry, any kind of gummyness will ruin the paper. If you've got a big air compressor, invest in a real DA sander. They're not real expensive and they take off a lot more than the palm sander will. It takes a lot of air to run one properly though.
I was afraid of this when I saw all the trim my car doesn't have versus all the trim a "normal" 41 has haha! Luckily I work in a metal fab shop (I mostly MIG) and have buddies that are expert TIG welders so it shouldn't be a problem getting the metal fab knocked out and doing it right!
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