My 72 Comet Build.....

It is 16 gauge aluminum(.062)..... Not so much for flex, the trunk area has to be isolated per NHRA/IHRA rules..... The tube is part of the fire system, that tube is for the trunk nozzle.....

Thanks, I was fairly through with it, I used 1 decent coat of sound control inside and out..... Then 2 coats of ceramic insulation inside and out..... Part of what I like about this stuff is it is extremely light and effective.....

 

Today I removed the bushings and ball joints from the front control arms..... Then I removed the rest of the old powder coat from the control arms and k-member..... I also added tie down tabs to the k-member..... Then I took everything to work and started getting it all bead blasted.....

Here are the tie down tabs I added to the k-member.....

 

Got all the suspension and bumper bracket stuff bead blasted and over to the powder coater, the called and told me it was done Friday afternoon..... I will go and pick it all up Monday and drop all the hot side stuff off for ceramic coating at the same time(I got everything but the headers cleaned and blasted today, tomorrow I will get the headers done too).....

I also worked on the front of the car today..... Got bulkhead holes for fuel and trans cooler lines drilled and bulkhead nuts welded in place..... I also plugged all the holes for the factor outer tower covers and ground them smooth..... The I went over the entire engine compartment and out wheel well areas with some 40 grit to try and get the rest of the loose stuff off in preparation for paint.....

A couple of what it's looking like.....

 

Today I got the entire front and bottoms of the front torque boxes sanded and washed thoroughly..... Then I coated the insides of the frame rails with Eastwood internal frame paint and seam sealed a couple areas that were necessary..... I will be able to mask it up and paint it nest weekend, I didn't bother to take any pic's because it really don't look any different.....

After that I went to work so I could bead blast and wash my headers..... I will take the hot side stuff and drop it off for coating tomorrow, I will pick up the powder coated stuff tomorrow.....

 

Got all my powder coated suspension/brackets and ceramic coated hot side stuff back this week..... I also picked up a bunch of an hose and fittings to get started plumbing next week after I get the front end painted this weekend.....

 

Today I finished prepping the front end for paint, masked it up and got it painted with POR15 paint..... Tomorrow I will get a couple coats of Chassis coat on it and texture it.....

All masked up and ready to paint.....





2 coats of POR15 applied.....

 

Nice, are you spraying the Por15?

 

Thanks..... I am spraying it..... If anyone decides to spray POR15, make sure you have a good respirator because this stuff is nasty.....

 

holy cow.. I thought I was bad. Not only is your engineering over the top but you also paint on the side of overkill like me, Frank. I think the tires and all the rubber and plastic bits on this car will disintegrate long before the paint and metal ever does.

In fact(you knew I couldn't just leave it at that, right?), this car might just last into the next millennium with all that extra metal protection and 20 generations of your future kin will surely thank you for the extra effort. Course they'll probably all be driving in highly regulated autonomous cars running on hydrogen by then.. but at least they'll have one hell of a museum piece sitting in the old historic part of the garage to remember you by. And maybe one of your great nephews will even figure out how to hook up some new kind of hydrogen based NOS by then too.

PS. biggest problem with epoxies isn't just the smell.. it's the slower drying sticky nature which clings to the throat and lungs somethin' fierce. Even gets in the eyes if your not careful and I learned a long time ago that full face respirators are worth their weight in gold when it comes to industrial type coatings like these.

 

If your gonna bother, you might as well do it right.....

 

I figure the same thing too.. but rarely ever meet anyone else who has that same mentality.

Fer instance.. I'm blueprinting/radiusing oil channels in my oil pump right now(well.. taking a breather to type this).. and the manufacturing of something so critical to engine life is absolutely horrible! One of the holes that was drilled for the pressure relief spring actually had metal flashing peeled away and layed back off the edge of the hole. Tough not to want to disassemble everything these days in attempt to make it better due to all the corner cutting techniques used to increase profit margin. Builds like your renew my faith that there are others like me out there who care to take the extra time to raise the bar back up where it should have been in the first place.

 

Thanks Frank, thought that was the case.

Groberts101, your post instantly took me back to an old Rush song!

 

Wow! I haven't been here in a while to see your progress but you are doing an incredible job

 

Thanks.....

 

Got it painted and textured with Chassis Coat today.....

Here is what the POR15 looked like this morning after drying over night(it is semi gloss).....




and here it is after textured Chassis Coat(last one is a closer look at the textured finish).....