Work starts

Yes, work starts, and what a better way to start working than making a great barbecue with the family?


I started with the left floor pan. The metal is in great condition, but had several surface rust spots. Also, the floor pan was covered with anti chip material that in most places was starting to peel off. I think the paint and anti chip was original, as the metal was covered with a red primer that I can see all over the car, then a layer of antichip, and then all painted Riviera Blue.

In this photo you can appreciate the original state of the floor pan. As I said, the metal was very sound, but I thought a little bit of cosmetical work would be nice.

Next I scrapped all the paint and antichip with a spatula, and finally used a very coarse grinding paper. I removed the hole plugs. After cleaning the metal with some solvent, I gave the fist of two layers of primer. Once again I have been using the Dupli-Color primer which should give a good result. 

Once the primer was dry, I was ready to apply the Riviera Blue colour, that my paint shop prepared specially for me in a spray can. All of the paint materials I buy them at Gosan in Madrid, a shop where auto specialists use to buy. The spray paint they prepared, is top quality. This special spray cans are specially made for cars, because the nozzle has a special patern and will make a fine horizontal spray, rather than a circular spray patern found in common spray cans. I gave two coats of colour.

Final result was superb, but had to go home so could not see final result once completely dry. But so far, so good!

Next week end, I plant to paint the right hand floor pan. But the interesting thing is that I am planing to use POR-15 as a base coat and apply it over the bare metal. Then I would sand it, apply the primer, and then the blue colour. I have a POR15 can that I got from Holden & Vintage when they used to come to the Retromobile anual show at Madrid, so I was not paying the shipping cost. I am seriously thinking in applying POR15 to many parts, as the more I read and see YouTube videos about it, I am more convinced about it's great quality to treat and prevent rust. I need to search for local shops where I can buy it to reduce shipping costs.

I have seen at YouTube a video of Chris from VW Classic Bugs where he has completely covered the underside of the care just with POR15 and the job looked superb! But first I have to finish all the mechanical side of the car, pass the MOT test and lots of other important jobs.