And So It Begins.... 1970 340 Cuda Restoration

[loco340cuda]

Body shop sent over some more picts, looks like the passenger fender is done.  They also cleaned up the bottom of the hood, it had peeling paint and moderate surface rust on it.  Still looks like they need to fix the swiss cheese where the hood scope insert goes.

[peterro]

Hey it looks great. I sure like that original yellow. One thing I wish I had done was to make it a driving restoration. That way I could have enjoyed it during all the YEARS it sat waiting (for paint) to be completed.

[loco340cuda]

The BEA grille that I ordered showed up today.  It is all there (plastic grille, trim, red bars, plymouth logo, and parking lenses) but it will need to be painted.  Where can I buy the correct paint for the grille, I'm looking for the light argent color?  I'm planning on having the body shop paint the grille.

Also, in the meantime I decided that I am going to put the old grille back on while the car is in primer.  I want to shoot it with a spray bomb silver paint just to make it look a little nicer then the spray bomb black that it is currently.  I heard Krylon has a silver that is somewhat close to the argent, does anyone know what color I am talking about?

-Thanks

[Topcat]

Rattle can: totally auto
 http://www.totallyautoinc.com/

Spray gun and correct: Roger Gibson/Frank Badalson
http://www.rogergibsonautorestoration.com/catalog.htm   

Rogers stuff is really nice. 

[anlauto]

Krylon Fusion ...Textured Argent available at most places like Walmart etc...

[anlauto]

...or you could pay $24.95 per can for the same stuff at one of those restoration places

[loco340cuda]

Topcat, thanks for the links.  That Roger Gibson paint is pricey!

Alan, that is the Krylon paint I was looking for thanks for the pict.   

[loco340cuda]

My front valence insert came today.  It is molded in a medium gray color, what is the correct color for this part?  Just trying to figure out if it needs to be painted a different color.

[anlauto]

Use the textured Argent I posted above

[loco340cuda]

Thanks Alan.

[loco340cuda]

A little progress update.....  I purchased the new BEA grille and it is a really nice piece but it needs to be painted.  I looked into buying the correct grille paint from Roger Gibson and it is $125 plus I will have to have my body guy paint the grille.  So I decided to hold off on that for right now.  In the meantime I figured I would try to refresh my old grille so it would at least look presentable and I could use that on the car while it is in primer.

Over the weekend I sanded down the old grille, it had about 2 coats of auto parts store black spray paint on it that had paint runs in a lot of places. Needless to say it looked like a piece of crap (see picture below). I used JB weld to fill in a couple of cracks and sanded it down.  I then got some of the Kyrlon paint that Alan recommended and spray bombed the grille.  I will say that Krylon paint is hard to work with, it keep getting clogged and then clearing itself with a burst of paint so it was difficult to avoid paint runs due to this (I was able to keep these to a bare minimum so that they are not really noticeable unless you are really looking for them).  In the end the grille came out pretty decent looking for what I am going to use it for and it could be used on a driver quality type car IMHO.  Below is a picture of the grille after being painted, it definitely looks much better then it did.  I will work on putting it in the car this week.

I still need to paint the bottom valence insert and I have found a similar color Rustoleum spray paint that I am going to experiment with to see if it works better then the Krylon paint.  If so, I will use that on the valence insert.   

Right now I am waiting for the hood to come back from the body shop so I can install it.  At that point the front clip will be done in primer for now and we will move on to the doors.  I'll post some picts once the hood is on.

[usraptr]

I'd say that's a definite improvement.  Looks really good for a rattle can paint job! 

[loco340cuda]

Finally some more progress (two steps forward, one step back)...... the two steps forward are I finally got all the pieces to the front clip back from the bodyshop and back on the car, after being gone for a couple of months.  The body shop sent out the hood hinges to another company to be rebuilt.  Well the step back is that after we got the hinges back on the car and installed them it turns out the rebuilt hinges are about as bad as they were before I sent them out.     So the body shop guy called the company today and of course they said to send them back, so off they come again this weekend.  While the hinges are gone we are going to take off the doors and send those to the body shop to be done.  The front clip still need some final tuning (adjusting of the sheet metal, final sanding, etc) before it gets paint but that will be done later when I take the car to the body shop for the final body work and paint, for right now it looks fine for a driver.

Needless to say I am going to get in some good drives this week before the car goes off the road again for about a month.   So I started today by going on a nice long drive on a beautiful afternoon, nothing like rowing thru the gears behind a 340 stroker.   

[anlauto]

That grill looks awesome

[loco340cuda]

Thanks.  The rattle can Krylon you recommended worked pretty good.  I did the grille and lower insert with it.