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Body off

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G

Gordo

Jedi Hopeful
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Hi,

I've been reading the "How to Restore TR2,TR3 & 3A" by Roger Williams. I'm sure alot of you guys read his books.

He says to wait to blast/dip the tub till all the metal work is done.

I'm in the camp of blast/dip first, to see what your up against or what you have going for you. My thought is dip, etch and epoxy prime the tub, then do metal work and reprime.

Any opinions pro or con on this?

Gordo
 
Gordo, I dipped the body on my GT6 before attempting any metal work, and I'm glad I did. Areas that looked pretty sound turned out to be less so after the dipping process. No real major surprises, but it made me change my strategy a bit regarding the repair or replacement of some problem areas. I did all the metal work first before I epoxy primed everything. There was a rust barrier coat applied at the dippers that prevented the bare metal from rusting while I worked on it.
I also had the body left in the neutralizer bath for an extra period of time, to insure that there would be no problems with the leaching of the stripper later. 12 years later, there's been no evidence of that happening.
On my next project, I'll do everything the same way.
Now, to finish the GT6! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/grin.gif
Jeff
 
I've done 2 body offs and in the first case I had the inner tub dipped then the metal work was preformed by the shop that did the dipping. I know they dipped first. The second time I did the metal work. Replaced floors pans inner and outer rockers etc. Many patches and lips recreated. After all that work was finished I thought it wasn't as bad as predicted and elected not to dip. Sand blasted and cleaned up panels the best I could. Then I used the cavity waxes and special rust proofing with wands to seal it up.

I've read that after doing the metal work there is almost no way to properly clean the back panels. How do you clean the back side of welds in a area where it's boxed in? After doing the work the entire car including patches are thoroughly cleaned after dipping. The dippers also now offer corrosion protection and e-coatings so they look factory.

You may also consider doing any structural repairs first and any other large repairs that may present a structural or alignment problem after dipping.
 
I disagree with MANY of Roger Williams opinions in his book.

He opinions should be just that...opiions and not fact (in many cases). While his book is very informative he generally disregards any effort to keep a car original and makes much of "improving" a sidescreen TR. Many of us LIKE our cars "unimproved"...

I always prefer a car to be stripped before undertaking the body work...it seems to be the logical thing to do...
 
I agree:
Stripped down to bare metal, so one can see what one is dealing with {No suprises}
 
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