I forgot just how bad this car was when you started. It certainly has come a long way. And I'm sure most of us would agree that we've all junked better cars than this. Kudos on your perseverance and talent. 
BUILD THREAD Project Olds Cool (Recognition!!)
- Thread starter Rktpwrd
- Start date
Yeah, but the REAL reason Donovan is disappointed is because his car talks to him in mysterious ways. He didn't show you the initial sanding picture of the trunklid….but I got hold of an unauthorized copy showing some high spots he uncovered. Words just floated to the top:
your level of attention for what you refer to as " a driver" is above and beyond. However I am admittedly a hack and not ashamed of it. Nor do I likely possess the skill level to even be allowed to post in this thread 
Admittedly this car looks excellent and will only get better. I appreciate that you are using products that I have in my own paint cabinet. So I feel there is hope is there for me to learn.
Both doors of my truck were painted with the near exact same stuff you are using. One looks like the dust fairy did her dirty deed in my final coat. The other has a perfect air line drag thru it. But again I see that with the correct level of experience that it's all up to me and not even close to the fault of the product. My hat is again off to you sir ! Need I remind all the rest of those whom are following this that you are doing this in a 2 car garage.... in the winter... in Calgary AB. Clearly excellent results can be achieved !!
Admittedly this car looks excellent and will only get better. I appreciate that you are using products that I have in my own paint cabinet. So I feel there is hope is there for me to learn.
Both doors of my truck were painted with the near exact same stuff you are using. One looks like the dust fairy did her dirty deed in my final coat. The other has a perfect air line drag thru it. But again I see that with the correct level of experience that it's all up to me and not even close to the fault of the product. My hat is again off to you sir ! Need I remind all the rest of those whom are following this that you are doing this in a 2 car garage.... in the winter... in Calgary AB. Clearly excellent results can be achieved !!
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Man id be careful running my hand down the body lines. Might need stitches after. It looks amazing. Say you did nothing to that trunklid just painted over it. What would happen? Would anyone but you really notice it? Just curious. Great job as usual.
Thank you Jeff. I really appreciate the support. It all helps, especially at this stage.
😊
Yes, I will be able to use finishing putty here, not spot putty. Forget about spot putty, that stuff is garbage. It’s non-catalyzed and shrinks as it dries.
For the finishing putty I just have to lightly sand the low areas first with the proper grit so it adheres well, either with 180 or 120. it’s a bit of an educated guess based mostly on experience to know which lows will fill with another application of high build, and which will need a skim and blocking with putty first.
As for applying high build, I’ll have to evaluate each area on a panel by panel basis. For example, there’s enough areas on the back half of the passenger’s quarter panel that I’ll just re-prime the whole back half. But on the horizontal sections of the trunk lid, most of the surface area is fairly good. So I’ll probably just end up spot priming the areas that get reworked. Depending on the size of the repairs once they’re done of course.
The vertical rear panel of the trunk however is bad enough that the whole thing needs skimming with putty and blocking, then re-priming.
Thank you for the words of encouragement Mike. I appreciate it sir!
I forgot just how bad this car was when you started. It certainly has come a long way. And I'm sure most of us would agree that we've all junked better cars than this. Kudos on your perseverance and talent.
Thank you! As we all know, monetarily it didn’t really make sense to save it, but I’ve always had more time than money. There has been a bit of money invested in it, not gonna say there hasn’t, but most of it has been in time. I can at least afford to pay myself.
😏
your level of attention for what you refer to as " a driver" is above and beyond. However I am admittedly a hack and not ashamed of it. Nor do I likely possess the skill level to even be allowed to post in this thread
Admittedly this car looks excellent and will only get better. I appreciate that you are using products that I have in my own paint cabinet. So I feel there is hope is there for me to learn.
Both doors of my truck were painted with the near exact same stuff you are using. One looks like the dust fairy did her dirty deed in my final coat. The other has a perfect air line drag thru it. But again I see that with the correct level of experience that it's all up to me and not even close to the fault of the product. My hat is again off to you sir ! Need I remind all the rest of those whom are following this that you are doing this in a 2 car garage.... in the winter... in Calgary AB. Clearly excellent results can be achieved !!
Thank you so much. At least someone understands what that’s like! It ain’t easy for sure.
I’ll be the first to admit, the level of quality I’ve been putting into this has slowly increased since I began, despite my best intentions. It initially was supposed to be just driver quality, but the more I did and the better it looked and came along, the more particular I became with it. And now here we are, I’m lamenting all the things that would otherwise be just fine for a “driver”.
Lol
That’s okay, I’m fine with it really. I’ll just have a really nice driver.
😅
Thank you gentlemen. Those razor sharp and crisp clean body lines are achieved at this stage with block sanding. You have to resist the urge to round over the body lines at this point. You just sand each face either side of the line and leave it alone for now.
I love me some crisp sharp body lines, but it’s a bit of a double edged sword. The sharper the line, the less surface area there is for the paint to stick to, so the build thickness is always really thin there. Something to keep in mind especially if the car is going to see a lot of heavy car washes, exposure to the elements, polishing etc.
I’m going to leave them as is until I get down to 4 or 600 grit, then lightly round them over. That way they’ll still look super sharp, but not unnaturally so.
What would happen? Nothing really. But as you moved around it you’d notice and see the waves in the panel. Lighter colors like white don’t show it as bad as darker colors, but I plan on painting almost all of it the dark grey so you’d definitely see it if it’s not straight.
And I’ll be dammed if I’m going to settle for that after putting this much work into it!
I didn’t get much done last night due to having a splitting headache. But I did at least manage to get half the hood done. The hood is the only other panel that I really didn’t do much bodywork to, I just repaired an “outie” dent near the middle back.
So it blocked out somewhat similar to the trunk, to be expected for a factory panel I guess.
Last night’s progress:
Tonight I feel I made up for what I didn’t get done last night however.
Finished off the hood...
... and while it doesn’t look the greatest, it’s actually not all that bad. Another 3-4 coats of high build and more blocking and it’ll be 100%.
Once the hood was done, I moved onto the driver’s door. I tell ya what, after blocking factory GM stampings, I’ll gladly block out something that I’ve already bodyworked. Because it’s already actually straight to begin with!
Here’s the driver’s door, no joke, after only about 3 minutes of sanding:
Huge difference guys. Here it is, finished out:
Only a couple minor little issues with it, both of them caused by yours truly during the install.
One minor little low spot that I must’ve done pushing the bottom front in when we were hanging the door:
This’ll fill with more high build, it’s really shallow. And then this other one at the back bottom which I knew was gonna show up:
The bottom corner was originally in a bit, but it wasn’t terribly obvious until we had the door hung and aligned. So I had placed some wadded up shop towels behind it and forced it out a bit. It was well worth it though because it made all the difference in how it fit and looked.
So I’ll gladly fix up those two little spots without complaint.
On a roll with how well the driver’s door blocked out, I moved onto and got the passenger’s side door done tonight too. It went equally as well for the most part, only one small mystery area showed up
I’m not sure exactly what happened here, it’s directly below the mirror mount. If you recall, I did a fairly substantial rust repair in this general area. The only thing I can think of is maybe some of the filler product shrank slightly after I primed it the second time. It happens occasionally. I know for a fact that it wasn’t there in the bodywork stage, or after blocking out the first round of primer on it.
Again, pretty minor in the grand scheme of things. Here’s an overall shot of the passenger’s door now.
At this point, easily 3/4’s of the car is blocked out in 220. Only the front fenders, the header panel and the back window filler panel are left.
Then we begin the process of going back and correcting all the little issues one by one!
Till the next time gents,
D.
So it blocked out somewhat similar to the trunk, to be expected for a factory panel I guess.
Last night’s progress:
Tonight I feel I made up for what I didn’t get done last night however.
Finished off the hood...
... and while it doesn’t look the greatest, it’s actually not all that bad. Another 3-4 coats of high build and more blocking and it’ll be 100%.
Once the hood was done, I moved onto the driver’s door. I tell ya what, after blocking factory GM stampings, I’ll gladly block out something that I’ve already bodyworked. Because it’s already actually straight to begin with!
Here’s the driver’s door, no joke, after only about 3 minutes of sanding:
Huge difference guys. Here it is, finished out:
Only a couple minor little issues with it, both of them caused by yours truly during the install.
One minor little low spot that I must’ve done pushing the bottom front in when we were hanging the door:
This’ll fill with more high build, it’s really shallow. And then this other one at the back bottom which I knew was gonna show up:
The bottom corner was originally in a bit, but it wasn’t terribly obvious until we had the door hung and aligned. So I had placed some wadded up shop towels behind it and forced it out a bit. It was well worth it though because it made all the difference in how it fit and looked.
So I’ll gladly fix up those two little spots without complaint.
On a roll with how well the driver’s door blocked out, I moved onto and got the passenger’s side door done tonight too. It went equally as well for the most part, only one small mystery area showed up
I’m not sure exactly what happened here, it’s directly below the mirror mount. If you recall, I did a fairly substantial rust repair in this general area. The only thing I can think of is maybe some of the filler product shrank slightly after I primed it the second time. It happens occasionally. I know for a fact that it wasn’t there in the bodywork stage, or after blocking out the first round of primer on it.
Again, pretty minor in the grand scheme of things. Here’s an overall shot of the passenger’s door now.
At this point, easily 3/4’s of the car is blocked out in 220. Only the front fenders, the header panel and the back window filler panel are left.
Then we begin the process of going back and correcting all the little issues one by one!
Till the next time gents,
D.
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