by "Mercedes Streeter" (smart)
Published 09/21/2017 at 10:02
by "Mercedes Streeter" (smart)
Published 09/21/2017 at 10:02
Tags: Chelsea
STARS: 7
Chelsea’s officially rust-free (so far as I can tell right now)! For those that didn’t know, she had some surface rust that I caught before it really started corroding the tridion cell. I had decided to wipe it out and try to keep it from coming back.
I bought a can of Rust-Oleum Rust Reformer and a can of Cold Galvanizing Compound from the same company.
Due to anxiety, I maaaaay have put on a total of 7 or 8 coats, 2 of the rust reformer and the rest the cold galvanizing compound. This resulted in an overall thick coating. I’ll have to blend this into the paint so it doesn’t look so obvious. To do that I’ll likely shave down the edges of my fix then apply clearcoat. The colour’s close enough in person that so long as it’s shiny you likely wouldn’t notice.
But from what I’m told, rust should not return in these two spots, especially since the car won’t be winter driven.
In the future, I think 1 coat of each should suffice, these paints are THICK.
I don’t think it’s bad for my first time legitimately trying to fix a paint issue on a car.
Also, I love the fact that my house was previously owned by a body shop guy, the lighting in my garage is amazing!
"Stapleface" (patrickgruden)
09/21/2017 at 10:33, STARS: 1
Nice job for a first attempt. You certainly got the most important part down (masking; you can never be too careful).
Not nitpicking, just curious. The surrounds around the headlights, they look “weathered”, for lack of a better definition. Is the headlight blob all one piece or could you touch up the paint on the surrounds as well?
"Mercedes Streeter" (smart)
09/21/2017 at 10:45, STARS: 2
Thanks! I was afraid of getting overspray over pretty much everything! Aside from the wiper arms (which need some paint anyway) I didn’t get any overspray anywhere else.
I’m just happy that the rust is gone, blending should be relatively easy as I’ve done that before and the paint isn’t metallic.
As for the headlights, good eye! From what I can tell, the headlight units on the American G&K conversions like this one aren’t smart original, they’re some custom Hella units that output HID-levels of light. The surrounds are supposedly molded in the silver colour of the tridion cell and it seems spending all of its life thus far outside has definitely weathered them.
While not an “emergency” item, I’m either going to paint the surrounds, or replace the entire units with the style of headlamp the car originally left the factory with. I like the Hella projectors so I’ll probably just refinish the surrounds.
