I am Sexy and I Know It

It took about 10 hours to remove the rest of the guide coat.  The good thing is it's done and the car looks really good.  The car is just about ready for it's next coat of primer.

But before we apply primer there is a lot of work that needs to be done first.  This includes masking, wiping down the car and building a paint booth to protect the floor and everything in the garage from over spray.  This pre-painting ritual is an all day ordeal.

But now it's done and the car is looking super sweet.  Check out the masking of the hood.  I am getting better.

I didn't do too bad masking the rear window either.

I found out there's a drawback to using the plastic sheeting.  Paint doesn't adhere to the plastic so when you come back to a previously painted area the spray gun disturbs the plastic which sends bits of dried paint airborne.  I think I'll just use masking paper in the future.

Check this out.  The body lines are gorgeous.  You'd never know those wheel wells had been cut out.

What more can I say.

Even the fake louvers look good.

As do the front fender louvers.

I double checked the point on the stinger.  It's straight as an arrow. 

That's just sexy.

Now we let the car sit for a good week or more to let it dry.   After that we will do some light sanding (no guide coat) followed by scuffing with a Scotch Brite pad.  More on that later.  In the mean time I think we will start working on the hood.

We should see color soon, even if it's only a black primer/sealer.

Thanks for watching.

We Gather Here to Join this Body and Frame... Forever

This body bolt is one of 12 used to fasten the body to the frame.  It took a whole day of measuring, shimming and torquing to complete the installation.  A total of 12 Grade-8 bolts were used.  When it was all done, 10 locations required no shims and 2 required 2 shims each.

Switching topics, I removed the chrome American Racing Torq-Thrust D wheels from the Corvette.  The replacement wheels are American Racing Torq-Thrust D's in grey spoke.  The gray spoke wheels were very popular in the 60's and we feel they're more appropriate.  At Dennis K's recommendation we also put the raised letters to the inside.  Raised white letters were popular but the word Radial was not.

The picture does not do the wheels justice.  You'll have to trust me that they look awesome.

We put the chrome wheels on our newly acquired Nomad.  Bob D, my brother Jim and I have owned this car for the last 40+ years.   We just keep handing it off every 12 years or so.  The old Cragars are finally gone and the new wheels and tires look great.

We had three open issues from a recent post.  One was to replace the universal joint bearing caps with the correct U-bolts used in 63.  All 4 U-bolts have been installed and we even gave the rear cover of the differential a new paint job.

Another open item was to replace the transmission shift forks.  In this photo the new forks are installed.  They are made in the USA and are substantially beefier than the ones removed.  Lets hope they work.

Getting the transmission back together was a bit of a chore because of limited space in the tunnel.

We also purchased and installed a clutch fork push rod for the 1963 ball-and-socket clutch fork.

That about wraps up the mechanical work which means I'll be block sanding the body soon.  Either that or I could paint a test panel to figure out what color racing strip we want to use.  I think I like that.

Stay tuned and thanks for watching.