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A bit of Tunebug progress

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drooartz

drooartz

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Have the house to myself tonight, as my wife is off visiting her mom. Spent some quality time out in the garage, and got the 1275 engine and transmission separated in preparation for getting the engine torn down. Clutch (from the outside) looks newish to me, but what do I know...

clutch.jpg


Also pulled the old vinyl off the dash. It's got some surface rust I need to deal with. What do I do? I've never worked on metal before. No rust through, just patches of rust on the surface. Do I sand and paint? Special paint? Special sand paper? I'm open to any suggestions.

dashback.jpg

Combined 2 photos of dash back. Writing on back of dash, its original to the car... neat stuff
 
Surface rust is no big deal. Just sand it down, prime, and paint. Do you want a painted surface, or are you going to cover it with vinyl? If the latter, the paint isn't terribly important; you just need it for protection. I'd just use good ol' Rustoleum spray paint. If the former, and you want a nice surface, the Rustoleum will look good but won't be terribly rugged. My favorite is water-thinnable epoxy paint from Nelson Hobby, which is a tad pricey and requires decent spray equipment, but is really tough. Any decent enamel is probably OK too, but again you need spray equipment. (Or, need to know someone you can borrow it from!)
 
If a painted surface is desired, I would recommend a puff-can paint available at Home Depot called Appliance Epoxy. It takes a little longer to dry than most (rule of thumb: the longer a paint takes to dry/cure, the more durable it is) but provides a beautiful gloss finish (like an appliance!!) and is tough as nails! Before applying any paint, remember, a good finish is created in the prep. work! Sand, prime, sand and prime again before painting. Paint covers flaws, but it does not hide them!!

Glad you photoed the writing on the back of the dash! Neat stuff!! Clutch LOOKS good, how thick is the lining?, that's the key! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/thumbsup.gif
 
If vinyl goes back over this and you want it to pretty much last forever, I would recommend going over it all with a wire brush and then coating it with por-15 with a brush. The stuff is expensive but its the best and a can goes a long way with with just using a brush and a brushed on coat is much thicker. I gave about $35 for a quart and used this for about all the places on my midget that had rusted and I had sanded down or wire wheeled. I used it any place I thought rust might be likely to come back. I bought another pint for about $20 that I am going to use on the inside of the fenders and other parts that I took off the main body and have not finished yet. The stuff is great, you don't have to get all the rust off, just any that is flakey (this is not that cheap non-working crap they call rust converter that they sell at the auto parts store), it soaks through rust and hardens it all up in one super coating. I did all the floors and trunk of my midget with this stuff and right before it dried I top coated it with liquid truck bed liner, I don't expect to have any more rust problems in these areas. I found the Por-15 on ebay. I talked to a lot of people that restore expensive cars and this is what many of them use for rusty floorpans,etc after they clean them up.
 
The eyeball check on a clutch is how far the rivits set into the lineing. 3/32 or so is good stuff.
 
Drew, if it's only surface rust, just wire brush, sand with regular sandpaper, clean, prime, and paint. Exotic coatings such as POR aren't necessary, regular old rattle can Rustoleum will work just fine. The cheap paint they used at the factory has lasted 50 years!!
Whatever you do, don't disturb the grease pencil markings on the back of the dash!
Jeff
 
Do not touch the yellow writeing on the back.
 
I'm going to try to avoid messing with the writing on the back of the dash, but as can be seen from the pictures there is rust forming underneath some of the writing. I'm more concerned about protecting the dash than I am about the writing. I've written down what it says, and have pictures as well. I can re-created it if I wind up having to sand over it.

I am going to recover it with vinyl. The old clips came off cleanly, so I should be able to reuse them as well. This small of a bit of vinyl shouldn't be too expensive.
 
I found the markings on the back of my dash also, mask around them and sand and paint the rest. When I cleaned my rearend I also found the factory markings there.
 
Wire brush, Phosphoric acid, paint.
What is the active ingredient in POR-15?
 
derf said:
Wire brush, Phosphoric acid, paint.
What is the active ingredient in POR-15?
Click to expand...
I don't know but once it dries other paint won't stick to it unless its sanded. You have to top coat before it dries, and its almost impossible to chip or scratch it off once its on there. I got some in some threaded bolt holes and it was a bear to get them clean, ended up running a tap through them. It says it won't come off your hands either with laquer thinner, acetone, etc. It says nothing will remove it from your hands but time /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/lol.gif and its the truth. I wore some gloves but they got a cut and my right hand was black for 3 days /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/lol.gif
 
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