Fender beads look kinda lousy, sealer?

[TulsaFred]

I primed the car but before I paint I'm wondering about the fender beads.

The paint shows cracks intermittently along the sides of the beads.

What do people do with this,
just accept it, or is there some kind of sealer that can fill the gaps?

thanks
Fred

 

[Trevor Jessie]

Do you mean you can see the gap between the bead and the fender, or that you can see cracks in the paint?

If you are seeing cracks in the paint, then it is time to start removing paint.

 

[TulsaFred]

no it's the gap,
The paint bridges the gap discontinuously so it looks crappy

paint was removed down to bare metal before priming

Fred

 

[Trevor Jessie]

OK.

My first preference would be lead filler. But it takes a little practice to get it right. The easiest way would be to work in some All-Metal body filler. I had similar gaps on my midget, but the poly-fill primer actually closed the gap. Do you have some feeler gauges that you can measure how much gap we are talking about?

 

[TulsaFred]

lead filler is a good idea, it is malleable so maybe wont just crack out. I've never used it though, and don't know where it is available.
I saw some Bondo "metal fill" at autozone the other day ("aluminum reinforced body filler").
What type of "all-metal body filler" do you recommend?

Gap varies along the bead from almost no gap to maybe 40 thousandths or so at it's widest

Fred

 

[Trevor Jessie]

I was thinking USC All Metal, but someone else may have a better suggestion.

 

[nomad]

I just used 3M body putty. The stuff that comes out of the tube looking like thick paint. Worked in with a plastic sqeedgee.

Kurt.

 

[jlaird]

I would also think hard about 3M body putty.

 

[Jimflorida]

I was thinking about something similar to the 3M for small gaps around my headlamps before I repaint my Bugeye. I assume this is somewhat similar to seam sealer,but is paintable, correct? Jim

 

[sqbsprite]

Paintable seam sealer works well. Just scrap off the excess to leave a nice edge before it sets. You don't want it to look like a caulked seam with rounded edges.