norms 55 chevy pu build

[washington blue]

My exhaust fan is a belt driven fan, the electric motor is not in the air flow and cannot get shop dirt or overspray mist on it, so there are no electrical spark or dirty motor shorting out worries. The electric motor is outside the building, protected by a separate roof to keep the elements from weathering it and the belt.
This way, no matter how dirty it might get inside the shop from grinding, welding, torching, painting or whatever, the motor and belt are outside and clean. I've seen guys use house fans and even a bin fan to exhaust fumes and it makes me nervous. I've also seen guys use nothing and that's worse, imo.
I've been wondering about the saran wrap working, I saw a guy use it when spray foaming my basement and it has me curious. I have replaceable films from "Hobbyair", the company I got the setup from, but they are not perfect.

[dsraven]

good plan with the fan.
the saran wrap works pretty well if you have the time to put it on with no bubbles. the problem can be if you happen to get some spray blow back while painting. it takes a minute to get the saran on plus you already have gloves etc on so you gotta strip that off, apply the saran, then gear back up again. if you had a heper nearby it would be simpler but not by much. I find it great for spraying primer and if you gotta stop mid application, well, it's just primer. when I spray the paint I try really hard not to get overspray on the saran and then change the saran between coats each time when there is a bit of time.

[washington blue]

Got the cab and 4 fenders blocked and found a few flaws, mostly just small stuff a speck or two of spot putty fixed. Re primed those things today, funny how much nicer they look after one blocking, and then a respray.

[dsraven]

you sure you got enough dust on the floor? mine always looks like a bomb went off when I'm sanding.
nice work. keep the pics coming.

[washington blue]

Lol, everything I touch has a layer of dust. Pretty sure 50% of what I put on this metal does not stay there.

[Jason 56]

Looking good! I felt like %80+ what I applied to my sheet metal got sanded off and thrown in the trash. lol. Any ideas on color?

[washington blue]

In 2005, 06, and 07 Corvette had what they called "LeMans Blue". I'm leaning towards that.

[washington blue]

Not much new going on. I've gone over the stuff in the picture 3 times and I think that stuff is ready for wet sanding. Now I think I can move to other pieces. Got to figgure out how to spray and sand the doors, I like to lay them flat to sand and I don't want to scratch them while they are laying down for sanding both sides.

[washington blue]

Sanding, sanding, sanding. I think the letters on the endgate say "Chev sore back and fingers rolet". lol

[washington blue]

The endgate has turned out really well considering it hauled cattle (one at a time) and scrap iron and anything they needed hauled. And somebody backed into something somewhat smashing it and bowing it. Of course it has several days of work in it.

[dsraven]

looks good. lots of work, I know.
what I use for sanding the small sppts is a plain old office eraser. woeks pretty well and you can get really soft bendy ones or fairly stiff ones, different sizes available too. works really well for wet sanding. easier on the fingers than holding the sandpaper only

[dsraven]

sorry, forgot to edit te fat finger spelling mistakes

[washington blue]

Office eraser, what a good idea, thanks for it. My index fingers are like raw meat.

[dsraven]

no problem, Ii suffered with the sore hands too.
if you are block sanding high build for the super smooth look you probably wanna find the longest and least flexible one that will fit your space. I find they work well on the small spots where a regular sized block is too big but you also don't wanna take the hide off your fingers. they also work really well for reconditioning plastic headlights that have gone yellow or look like wax paper. on those I wet sand using a spray bottle of lightly soapy water and/or a bucket of the same. start with a 600 grit and work my way up to 2500 grit then polish with plastX. use the paper with a lrft to right motion for one grit and an up and down motion for the next., wet sand. when starting sand with the lower grit until the water coming off is white, not yellow, then go to the next grit and change the water

[washington blue]

Still priming and sanding. After the hood and box sides are done, I have about 20 small things left like the ashtray and garnish moldings, etc.

[dsraven]

looks like you will be spraying paint soon. do you have a color picked out? mettalic or solid color? base clear?

[washington blue]

I don't know about soon, lol. I''m sloooow. I still have to wet sand everything, probably screw that up somehow per usual. It's going to be some darker shade of metalic blue, every time I see a neat blue car/truck going down the street I like it and think that might be it, lol. Yeah, base clear. Then I'll have to cut and buff that, be 2029 by the time I'm done, lol.

[dsraven]

get'er done before you gotta pull the engine and install a motor. haha
I like the blue that toyota has used for a few years. not really dark but not too light either.
I had a 63 that was dark blue. looked nice but I spent a lot of time cleaning, it shows every bit of dust.

[washington blue]

Hit a small milestone last night. Everything that will have blue on it now has primer on it. Still have to block the hood one more time, also a couple small spots here and there. Next it will be 400 wet over the whole thing so there's lots of opportunities to sand through and find even smaller problems. Not complaining, this is my hobby, hope to keep doing this kind of stuff another 13 years - I'll be 80 then, lol. But, hey, Gene Winfield is still going. Too cloudy to see the eclipse today, South Dakota is not in the path anyway, sure is on the news a lot tho.

[dsraven]

keep at it man, you're getting close. thats gotta feel good, eh?

[Jason 56]

Nice progress! Amazing how much gets painted on these old trucks. Can’t wait to see some color.

[washington blue]

Seems like a lot of parts, and that's not counting the chassis which I did earlier. I've painted several cars before this, but cars don't have boxes that come all apart with seperate fenders to boot. I think that is the difference.

[washington blue]

So close, guess 1 more coat aught to do it. the darker colors are where the metal is peeking through.

[washington blue]

Been wet sanding with 400 grit. Finishing up this door, then I have 4 fenders and the cab left. All the little stuff in the pics are done. Can see the lights reflected in the wet, and all the sanding with the long paint stick was worth it, no waves. Been using that same hard rubber block for 40 years, lol.

[dsraven]

nice work. tedious but worth the work
for the long straight parts I prefer to use a longer rubber block, a firm one that won't conform easily. light pressure, a spray bottle or a bucket with clean water. sometimes a hose with a trickle of water above the sanding area. sanding in a crosshatch pattern to avoid flat spots or ridges. this helps avoid ripples. I wet it down and stand back to look at the reflecked light every so often so i know how it looks.