December
2001- January 2002
Now that I have finished with the restoration of the small
exterior trim items, it's time to start on the big stuff. First
on the list are the
headlight bezels. Luckily they looked much worse
than they were.
The first thing I did was give them a good washing with Dawn dish
detergent. After they dried I went to work on the outsides with 0000 Steel.
Wow, what a difference. The outsides
of the bezels looked almost brand new -- no rust, no pitting, no
scratches.
The inside of the bezels weren't
quite as pristine. They weren't bad, but there was some surface
rust and I didn't
want it to continue, so I decided to give them a
coat of paint. After they dried I masked them off to keep
paint off of the outside. Masking them off took a little patience,
especially the headlight holes. As I discovered when masking the
emblems, the easiest way to mash off these odd areas is to just apply
masking tape over the areas, then trim off the tape with a sharp
utility knife. You can see in the photo above how I trimmed around
the headlight holes.
I originally tried to mask off the
screw holes by just placing a piece of tape over the holes on the
outside. The problem was
the holes are deeply recessed and I couldn't get the tape to cover
good enough to keep from painting part of the hole on the
outside. I solved the problem by inserting short pieces of dowel
rod in the four screw holes from the inside. The dowel rod was
slightly larger than the holes so I tapered the ends with a pencil sharpener.
After masking, I wiped the
bezels down with lacquer thinner, then I
applied two coats of rust- preventative primer and two coats of a
silver colored enamel - both from rattle cans. After the paint dried I polished the outsides
with Autosol.
The fender eyebrows were
next. Sometimes when I'm on a roll, I get so wrapped up in what
I'm doing I forget to take photos. 
That's what happened when I
was restoring the eyebrows. I don't have photos of the restoration
process, but mainly I used the same procedure I used on the headlight
bezels. First, a good washing, then buff out the chrome with
0000 steel wool. The insides of the fender eyebrows where badly
rusted, so I painted them with the same rattle can primer and silver
enamel paint I
used on the insides of the headlight bezels. The eyebrows
also have a section that is painted black to match up with the black
sections of the grill.
Before masking off the black areas,
I sanded the old
paint with 400 grit sandpaper to feather the chipped paint and rough it
up. Then I masked them
off and applied two coats of primer and two coats of a satin black
enamel from rattle cans. A couple of days later, I applied
Autosol metal polish to the chrome areas for protection.
Well, I have been putting off
restoring the grill, but I am now out of excuses. I have
been putting it off for a couple of reasons -- it looked to be a
fairly large job and, more
impor- tantly, I was
afraid to see what kind of condition it was in. It looked pretty
good when I removed it, but you never really know until you start
restoring an item what kind of shape it's in. I hoped it was
okay because reproduction grills are very scarce (they just began making
them this year) and they cost around $500.00. Even getting one
chromed can run $400.00 to $600.00. And forget about getting a
good used one, they're just not available.
Like with the other trim items, the
first thing I did was attack the grill with 0000 steel wool. Since I
discovered the wonders of 0000 steel wood, I've even give up on
washing the item first. It works wonders on bug guts, road tar,
mud, what-have-you. I was pleased to discover that the chrome
portions of the grill were in relatively good condition. There
was a little surface rust that was easily removed with the steel wool,
but there was no pitting and no large dings or dents. There was
a small area on the center bar that had been scuffed and a small area
on the top rail where the chrome was slightly discolored. I
could live with both of these flaws. The scuffed area was not
very noticeable and the discoloration would not be seen when the hood
was closed.
The inside of the grill was fairly
rusted, so that meant I needed to do the paint routine, like I had
done on the other trim items. After I was finished with the steel wool
I washed the grill with
Dawn dish
detergent to cut any oil or grease residue and then I
proceeded to mask off the inside in prepara- tion for painting. To
say that masking off the inside was a pain in the ass would be an
understatement -- lots of area and all of it is curved and odd
shaped. After I had it masked off (about 2 hours), I wiped it
down with lacquer thinner and applied two coats of primer and two
coats of silver enamel.
Now I was ready to paint the black
detail on the outside of the grill. Before masking off the areas
to be painted, I dry sanded the old painted areas with 400 grit
sandpaper. I didn't try to sand off all the old paint, just
feather out the chips and rough
up the paint. I figured if the paint was still sticking after 30
years, it was best to leave it on. After sanding, I started
masking off. If I thought masking off the inside was a pain, it
paled in comparison to masking off the outside. It not only had
the same curves and odd shapes, but I had to be more particular in
applying the tape because the paint lines of the detail areas would
show for all the world to see.
It
took a couple of
hours to get it masked off, after which I wiped it
down with lacquer thinner and applied two coats of primer and two
coats of satin black enamel. After the paint was dry I took off
the masking tape and applied Autosol to the
chromed areas.
webmaster@pattson.com