1985 Gothwagen Polo - End 10/01/13

[TheFrequentFryer]

Yep, Black enamel is great for sucking everything into a lightless void of despair. Which should work quite well for the look you want.

[Vulgalour]

This made me chortle.

[Vulgalour]

Tiny update since I've not done much today. I'm posting about the paint since this is the first time I've used it and thought it might be of use for others to see my mistakes and my successes.

So, turns out the first coat was applied a little thinly due to my trepidation, but after flatting it back, including one sag, I had it nicely prepared to take the second coat.

Unfortunately, I rushed the second coat and the paint wasn't applied evenly. I also seem to have got a lot of unpopped bubbles, probably as a result. However, the good news is that this second coat fixes many of the shortcomings of the first and come tomorrow afternoon will be ready for flatting and coat three.

Paint takes 5 hours to become touch dry and about 8 to be hard enough to sand, so it's really a one coat per day job.

You are seeing right, this is how the paint appears most of the time. Blackblackblack.


You can see the texture here from me applying a bit too much paint unevenly. Wet and dry tomorrow will fix this.


I love this picture, it's my picture of the moment for this project.


So, after I'd done the wing I wondered what else I could do. Out comes the sander and the hubcaps.



I'm sort of happy with the progress today, but really disappointed in myself for making a bit of a hash of that second coat of paint. For someone who claims to know what he's doing with paint, I'm not really demonstrating that here.

So yah, tomorrow is flatting back and coat three. It might be the last coat I need to apply and it might not, but I shall only know tomorrow.

[PhilA]

Looks good, coach enamel has a real deep gloss to it, looks very good with a bit of time flatting the pocks out.

You going to detail the hubcaps?

--Phil

[Vulgalour]

Jul 23, 2010 2:04:23 GMT PhilA said:

You going to detail the hubcaps?

Yep. Once I've got the black nice and smooth I'll be doing the recessed bits in scarlet. Ideally, I want the VW logo itself to be chrome, but I'm not sure how to go about that since chrome paint isn't going to be good enough for what I want, I think.

[MatRich]

nice work! I'm looking forward to seeing this one when it's finished. ;D

this does also give me alot of inspiration for my mk2 bready

[Vulgalour]

Jul 23, 2010 22:01:11 GMT MatRich said:

nice work! I'm looking forward to seeing this one when it's finished. ;D

this does also give me alot of inspiration for my mk2 bready

Heh, I think there's a long slog ahead of me until this one is going to be finished yet, but I'll be sure to keep you posted. Slightly concerned as to how I've inspired you too, now

~~ UPDATE TIME ~~

Coat 4 of the coach paint has gone on and I've got the hang of the paint and getting rid of the bubbles, so I think things will speed up from here on in. I also realised I should probably have started with a larger flat panel like the bonnet or the roof rather than the fiddly front wings, but I couldn't have got those on the train.

Today I come down to see how coat 3 has settled out. Very nearly there, just a bit wibbly in some places. If nothing else I've learned that I need to do more preparation to speed up the process of painting.



First job is to key back to get a nice smooth surface. Got a bit heavy with the sander in places so some of the primer came through, but that's not too much of a problem.


Then coat 4 goes on and it really makes a difference. This is as the paint is wet after just being dressed and it's already smoothing out to an almost glass-like finish. The little section that isn't shiny has been left deliberately since that's going red.




I may need to put a fifth coat on and I may get away with just four coats, it all depends how this one settles out.

[GeezerGarage]

Good effort. I like brush and roller painted stuff.

[Vulgalour]

Jul 24, 2010 14:07:29 GMT GeezerGarage said:

Good effort. I like brush and roller painted stuff.

Thanks I'm finding brush painting tidier, less smelly and more relaxing than previous spray attempts. I only wish it were a little faster, those drying times are really slowing me up... maybe I'll go do some more interior work.

[Lawsy]

thats looks really cool mate - going to look awesome when its done

jesus that looks good for brush paint..... or even a spray job for that matter.. well done mate.. should look spot on if you keep going the way you are

[Vulgalour]

Jul 24, 2010 17:15:40 GMT @retrowagen1234 said:

jesus that looks good for brush paint..... or even a spray job for that matter.. well done mate.. should look spot on if you keep going the way you are

That put a big grin on my face! It's now settled but too soft to sand so I shan't be able to get coat 5 on tonight, but I reckon that the next coat will be the last one... then wait a few weeks/months for it to fully harden before attacking it with cutting compound and polish. Exciting stuff, and very satisfying.

[Vulgalour]

I seem to have bought this (possibly homemade?) parking light on eBay for £3.70 inc. P&P

Must stop making impulse bids on things I don't need... it is kinda cool though.

[Vulgalour]

Getting there, happily. Fifth and final coat of coach paint went on the wing today, so I thought I should move on to some fine detailing.

First up were the hubcaps. These will need another coat of red to bring it out brightly, but I'm really pleased with them.



Then, after spending time getting fingerprints all over the gloss black, I thought I should move on to the front wing.




I can't tell you how satisfied I am with how it looks. The paint isn't perfectly smooth, but it's no worse than fresh spray paint before polishing, so I'm optimistic about that.

As for the coach stripe, I didn't expect it to look so good when I lifted off the masking tape. The line I used is a step in the bodywork, just about the right width for a coach stripe, and kicks up behind the rear window. At the nose end of the wing I've tapered it to a sharp point.

Mojo meter is probably at about 11 right now.

[Vulgalour]

Paint's nicely cured, light was being good for once and I thought I should perhaps plan out where the wing mirrors were going to fit.

I'm limited by the Desmo trim I got from Ben117200 on here since it will only fit so far down the wing. I can't fit it to the top of the wing since it'll be right back at the windscreen, which is no better than where I'm at now and I can fit it lower down the side of the wing because that will look daft. So, It has to go on the side above the coach stripe and this is about as far forward as it goes.

As you can see, depth is a bit tight and I might have to cut a slot in the inner wing since it does fill out most of the nose end of the wing here.


Fits about here, any further and the trim is wider than the metal.


Did I mention I'm impressed at how shiny my black paint is?

[Vulgalour]

I've gone and exceeded my website bandwidth so I'll be moving the pictures when I get half a chance and/or upgrading my bandwidth.

Hopefully this issue will be resolved soon, apologies for the inconvenience.

[Vulgalour]

So... I'm going to be raising the bandwidth on my website to deal with the increased traffic, but in the meantime here's a mini update of what I got up to today.

Vauxhall speedometer from Matt. Awesome looking bit of kit and, if I can get it to work, will probably be the centrepiece of the new binacle I want to build eventually, probably flanked by a rev counter and a clock in front of the steering wheel.


Then I got the paint stripper out. Don't bother buying Nitromors, that stuff is expensive! Instead, buy Wilkinsons' own brand paint and varnish stripper. The Wilko brand stuff is just as lethal, slightly slower acting, but does exactly the same job for about a 5th of the price.



All cleaned up with a tiny amount of non-bubbly surface rust scrubbed off with the wire brush. I'll be painting the hinge mechanism red I think, with the rest of the flap being black.



More to come soon, I hope, just got to wait for my sprained knee to heal up before I can get on with more panel work. Can't stand for long periods of time so paint stripping and painting big panels is a no-no. Boo

[mrj]

a mate of me has a body shop, and they paint stripped a baywindow.... they applied the stripper and put on a huge plastic foil ... after a couple of hours they pulled down the foil and most of the paint & stripper was on the foil, saved them a lot of time rubbing it down from the metal .....

[Vulgalour]

Not sure I can make use of that system, unfortunately, since I'm doing everything piecemeal in the house :/ Sounds like a nice tidy way to do things though.

[Vulgalour]

Right, now that I've updated the entire build thread with links to my Photobucket thread so everyone can see what's happened (and that took a loooong time) I thought it best to show you what I've been up to since the last update.

Not much, actually. Had to cancel a driving lesson due to a badly sprained knee (which is now nearly healed, happily) and I've barely been able to concentrate on anything, let alone the car or my work, but I did manage to squeeze out an idea or two.

I've been collecting chrome letters, or trying to at least, and so far have 3. The E is from a Ford Escort and the Z and C are from a Ford Zodiac. I knew the Zodiac ones were gold (plated or anodised, I'm not sure) and I wanted to take the silver paint off them.


I was very gently-gently at first, trying nail polish remover, then brasso, then white spirits, but they only got the paint soft. Eventually I got out the WilkoMors and tentatively stripped the paint off, which revealed over-polished gold letters. Perfect.


I still need more letters, and maybe some magnets... Did you know, there's an amusing two word anagram of Volkswagen that ends in Gloves? I didn't until earlier, but it amused me to no end.

Anway, I remembered that I'd been hoarding bottle caps when clearing out odd places in the house (we're still chasing a rat that's been evicted, I suspect, from a neighbouring house that was all boarded up recently, it stole one of my crumpets last night the cheeky blighter!) to turn into a picture frame when I had this idea.




I need about as many again, so there's some serious drinking ahead. I'm going to make a removable panel making use of some lightweight wood, the tile adhesive and the black grout left over from the bathroom. I'll have the comedy bottlecap insert and another, padded insert to match the interior. It's like a budget Smart Car.

Apart from that not much has been happening really. I'm hoping my knee and the weather are good enough tomorrow (or later today, working nights messes with one's perception of time somewhat) to get the paint stripper and wire brush to the driver's side wing. I need to get the wings finished by the 5th of August since I've had opportunity of free delivery-collection of the parts on the 6th combined with a visit to see my Gran, whom I've not seen for ages.