Paint Part 1

With winter approaching it is important to take care of some things that can't be done in cold weather. One is paint. The car isn't ready for its finished paint just yet but in order to continue to work on things during the winter some paint work has to be done now.

I'm planning on electrical and interior work this winter and painting the jams and dash now will allow this work to be done and I won't have to remove some or all of it in the spring to do paint work.

Perhaps the most important and visible item was the dash. Although the flash makes the red appear a little pink it really is a dark red color, specifically 1964 Ford Candy Apple Red.

Here is the trunk lid. Don't let anyone kid you, glass bodies do require a fair amount of work before paint and this is a perfect example. I probably spent two days getting everything smoothed out, especially the edges where the inner and outer halves were joined together. It's presentable now though.

The design of the trunk jam could have been a little better at least when it comes to water drainage. That large lip on the bottom allows water to pool and I was concerned this would allow water to get in the trunk in a heavy rain. The solution was to put a drain hole on each side with a tube through the trunk floor to drain the water. I'll post a picture after the paint is dried and I install these drains.

The grill shell had been ready for paint for a couple months so now seemed like a good time to take care of that task.

Here's another shot of the dash. Painting in your garage or driveway is not the "recommended" way to do it but if you're careful it can be done with a minimum of dust particles and bugs settling in the paint. Up here we don't have many flying insects so that really isn't a problem. The main bug-a-boo is dust. When I do the body it will be in a temporary booth which will cut way down on dust.

OK. Once the masking is removed I'll be ready to start the electrical work. This should go pretty quickly as this is a very simple car with no complicated accessories to get in the way.

Check back often for more updates...

Back to
Project 32 Home Page