First - Let me say thank you to all who participate in the ROTM contests. It isa fun part of the forum to visit! It is also an honor to be voted ROTM. Thanks again....

Second - and the reason for my post, is the question of paint. The paint on my car is shot. It may not look that way in the photos, but it is pretty bad.
How far do you need to go in prepping your car for paint? I have several cracks in the paint, stone chips, a little seam separation near the nose and so on.
I do not own a garage, so unless I do all of this in my driveway I am going to have to farm it out. What methods are cost efficient, environmentally acceptable and so on?

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The one piece of advice that I got before I painted mine was to strip the factory paint down to the factory primer. I didn't do it and regretted it in about one year. Even tho we laid down a good sealer and primer, the old paint caused the new to start checking/spider webbing. I filled my seam cracks and most of them have reappeared.

My best advice is to find some recently painted Corvettes that have one or two years on them and if you like them, find out who did the body work and paint.

 

Uh, it was this one here



And I did like you said, I talked to the owner about the car. He only paid 30 grand to have it painted..... I'll be lucky if I can come up with 5!

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Wonder what kind of shape it was in before? Here in the KC area for about $10K and no real body damage, you can get a real good two-stage urethane paint job. Maybe he went with lacquer. Nice looking car. It might be the camera or my monitor but the color looks more like mine than the Ontario Orange of that year.

 

[align=left]It might just be my opinion... but lacquer is a waste of time on a fiberglass car. It is was too brittle for the flex of the glass. Mine had been repainted by the prev. owner in lacquer, the stress cracks were many, rock chips abundant, and you know those little stars on the front fenders that come from rocks hitting the underside... horrible. Urethane works best for me.
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If he paid 30 grand to have that car painted, I would love to do some work on his car for him!!! I had mine media blasted, quite a bit of body work done, and painted for ten grand. Don't see 20 grand of difference between his paint job and mine. I think sometimespeople tend to "overstate"their costs to maybe impress people. Does'nt work for me though. I think if you shop around you'll be surprised at what you might find price wise.

 

If you're gonna do it yourself and what ever you do Sand it, blast it etc. You need to get below the cracks. My suggestion would be to have it media blasted with plastic, walnut shells or baking soda and then rent a spray booth or buddies garage and get some primer/sealer on it asap. Then you could do the sanding where ever. It will make a mess of your driveway though. It really needs to take place in side where you can clean up every day. maybe you could rent a small storage building, just don't tell them you're gonna do your car in it. You can cover the walls and floor with plastic and nobody will know you were there. Good luck with it.

$30K...$10K?......Maaaan! ...Like I said before,....I'm in the wrong business. With out extensive body damage/panel replacementor custom work anything over $5Kseems a rip. I guess I need to get"Stanton's Custom Rods" up and runnin'. Got all the equipment andknow-how, just need to advertise I guess. Even got a stock of rollin' sheet metal, LOL! I guess people pay a lot for stuff they love huh? I guess that's why I've always been a do-it-yourself kinda guy......Saves money and a lot of fun besides.

Oh yeah! DON'T use liquid strippers. The active ingredient is Methylene-chloride and it will eat right threw the fiberglass resin and leave you with a pile of goop on wheels.

 

Hey blueshark!

I might have to negotiate the Tail of the Dragon, then drop Christine off with you for an extended visit. I'd be bringing my checkbook of course..... Stanton's Custom Rods could do the rest!

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I'm up for that, It'd be fun and by the way, Congratulations on the ROTM win. You certainly earned it. I just read your rite-up, truly a labor of love and what a great ride. I'll leave the lite on. Cheers

 

Does your paint look anything like this?



I just call 'em my "Heat Sheilds",to prevent burn up duringre-entry in the "Starship". [sm=shades.gif] ( )

Yup, it's gotta come off, at least to the factory primer.
How you do it will be your choice. You can sand it down, and wear out your arms, or you can have it blasted. Blasting gives you clean removal and more even surface when you're done. (...and ya can get it all off )