Post painting

After letting the paint cure for over 24 hours, I removed the rest of the masking tape that I missed.

I also started the wet sanding process. From the previous post you can see that there was a fair amount of orange peel. This is pretty easily rectified by wet sanding. Granted many new cars have orange peel, but this is more than I usually notice.

I started with 1500 grit wet sand paper. I probably could have started with 1200 for a light first pass. Instead, I did one pretty heavy pass with 1500 on Monday evening. Then Tuesday and Wednesday evenings, I proceded to use 2000 grit.

The photos below show how basically the wet sanding process produces a dull surface. However it takes the high spots off the paint texture. I used a spray bottle for wetting the surface. I rinsed with a garden sprayer. Come Saturday, it should be much shinier.

Remember that nasty water spot/fish eye cluster from the water that dropped off one of the connectors. Well it is much less noticeable now.


I could have easily wet sanded further. However being a novice at painting, I was concerned about the thickness of the paint I laid down or should I say the potential lack of thickness. I want to make sure I have paint to polish.

Another area which I could have likely sanded further. Oh well, its a race car.


My spray bottle full of water with a couple drops of dish soap.

Yikes, it practically looks like it did before I painted. With the exception of the clear coat failure, the fully exposed base coat, and minus a couple dents.

Painted!

So, I got the car painted today. I am less happy with these photos than i am the paint. The paint, for my first attempt at painting a car, is not all that bad. I still need to wet sand, that will take care of some of the surface imperfections and paint texture.

Tack Cloth, essential prep.		Wax and Grease remover, more essential prep	Bag full of Summit Racing Stickers to cover what I mess up.
In-line pressure regulator and disposable dessicant filter.		Paint Strainer, always strain before putting paint in your gun.	Cheap spray guns, HVLP is nice. I actually dig the little detail gun.
A little cheap insurance against fish-eyes. Works great except if you dump water or silicone on your surface (ask me how I know).		You must add this to make your paint harden.	Dexter Style paint booth. I positively pressurize the booth with a box fan, blowing through a good furnace filter. Air exits through another filter.
Viper Red paint. The closest I will ever get to a viper.		Look at the shine!	Die flies, mwhahaha. I really did not want one doing the back-stroke in my new paint. So I put these up about a week ago. By the way. Flies make little groaning noises when they get trapped. Kinda weird.
The booth.		Umm, yeah, I am glad I wore this.	This is a crap photo. The color is off.
This is what happens when water drops on your paint as painting. I had a leaky connection before the moisture filter by the gun. Dropped on hood. Then got covered in paint and pushed out by the paint and air. (Place summit sticker here)

More paint prep

The entire car is scuff. I washed the car real quick with a basic detergent. I am in the process of masking the car. The windows are masked. I am in the process of masking the engine bay. I still need to do the door jambs, etc. I am exhausted at this point, so this is all I am writing.

Paint Prep

I started paint prep today. I started scuffing the paint. This is fun but scary at the same time. Taking the leap from a mostly painted car to sanding it off is quite the interesting experience. I placed a small amount of filler in some shallow dents, etc. So far so good.

The CAS back in place. My fat chubby hands do not squeeze between the engine and the firewall too well. While I struggled to get this back in for about 30 minutes. Two days later when helping a friend put his back in it took him 30 seconds. To my defense he does have small carnie hands.

Hmm where does this go again?

Yep, I fit in there. Barely.

Getting out is pretty fun.

Hood release and scuffed bumper.

Wrapping things up

So the first order of business this evening was to replace the CAS o-ring. I did so following this directions. http://www.miata.net/garage/cas_oring.html

I ordered a pack of 25 CAS o-rings. Cost about $11 total from Mcmaster-Carr. The material I opted for was Viton. The durability and hardness is similar to the buta-n ones. However they have a greater chemical and oil resistance.

I spoke with a Tire vendor today. I am going to call a couple local places and see what I can work out with a local one.

I have started body work. I am by no means an expert or even that knowledgeable about body work. I bought a book and have done some research online. So this is a learning/money saving opportunity.

Vrroom.

I was able to take it out for its first spin. It handles very well. It is not the most powerful thing I have driven, however it has got to be one of the best handling. While there are going to be a few alignment tweaks to get optimum handling. All I can say is wow. Oh yeah, and its pretty loud in there.

The alignment process was pretty straight forward. When you weigh as much as me you must make sure you dummy up the driver weight. It was impressive to see the camber and ride height differences with and without driver weight.

I am using zero toe front and rear at the moment.

On the list for tomorrow is the following.

- Finish mounting the hard top.
- Order a few items including the fire bottle, transponder, SCCA stickers
- The fuel filler bolts need to be put in.
- Inner shift boot replacement.
- Put together a pre-alignment check list. I ran into a few false starts today. No dummy weight, sway bars, connected, etc.

Will try to get some video tomorrow.

Even closer

The brakes have been bled. I used Castrol GT LMA brake fluid and my new bleeder bottles. I used a technique I just read about of gravity bleeding. The pedal is nice and firm. So it seems to have done the job. I also adjusted the rear brakes. There is a small plug on the back of the rear calipers. Once this is removed, you use an allen wrench to adjust the rear brakes. A very simple task.

The battery is mounted and on the float charger. I had to fabricate the j-bolt from a thin piece of threaded rod. This was a super simple job. I simply cut it to length, heated with a torch and bent on of the ends.

The slave cylinder was replaced. The replacement of the actual part was simple bleeding presented some challenges. Since the line was essentially drained. It would not bleed. I tried gravity and traditional ways of bleeding. Nothing worked. Not being in possession of a vacuum or pressure bleeder, I had to improvise. The stock filler cap has a vent hole. I opened the bleeder, and blew a small amount of air into the resevoir. This caused a make shift pressure bleed to occur, at least to the point where there was fluid at the bleeder. Well actually, it shot out of the bleeder. Regardless of its velocity and volume, it worked!

The seat is mounted. I used 3"x3"x1/8" backing plates underneath the car. Overall it worked very well and resulted in very solid mounting. The sub straps were pretty challenging to mount within the manufacturers spec as the "frame rail" is directly in the way. So, I was able to mount close to the spec, but not the exact spec.

As far as pressure washing the engine bay, well I maybe a giant leap in the way of that. We purchased a pressure washer. I tried it out on the mower. Very nice. It should work very well.

I also purchased a new floor jack. My old 3 ton unit finally gave up its ghost. I let the car down on Wednesday. The jack was already too tall for the car so its not that big of a loss. But I could not remove the jack from the car on Friday. Nor could I lift the car. So, I purchased a 2 ton low profile service jack.

I started pre-alignment today.

I am running through my checklist and well its getting pretty short.