The holidays are over, and it’s now time to begin the dreaded bodywork and paint.  It’s been almost 50 years since I’ve done any bodywork (on a 1963 VW bus), and I’ve never picked up an auto spray gun in my life.  How hard can it be?  Yeah, right!  When the cab was originally media blasted, it was primed with epoxy primer from Southern Polyurethane.  I didn’t really want to mix paint brands, and since I don’t know which brand I will be using for final paint, it made sense to me to just stick with Southern Polyurethane.  So I ordered a fresh gallon of epoxy gray primer and activator, a gallon of regular 2K primer and activator, and a gallon of single stage gloss black and activator. 

Southern Polyurethane recommends using filler on top of their epoxy primer, and the fillers recommend using filler on bare metal.  No controversy there!  For filler, I decided to go with Evercoat Rage.  It’s a little more expensive, but it supposed to go on smoother and be easier to sand.  I also bought a small can of Evercoat Fiberglass stranded filler as it is stronger and waterproof.   I plan to use the Evercoat Fiberglass around the windshield and cowl vent where I don’t want any water leaks.  The Evercoat Rage will just be used as a skim coat where I have either butt welded patch panels, or there is some significant scaling from the remnants of rust after media blast.  All rust through spots or panel thinness have either had the panel replaced or the pinholes have been welded shut.  There are no pinholes to be filled with filler!

Before starting the filler, there is area of metalwork that I decided to fix.  At the lower corners of the firewall where it meets the inner fender, there are a couple of panels that are attached with sheet metal screws.  It looks like an afterthought, so I decided to make my own in the same shape, but to weld them in place.  They came out pretty good, and I can always shape the edge if I need a better fit.

So I began the filler at the firewall.  Using various sanding blocks and 80 grit sandpaper, I was able to smooth over the areas where I had welded over a series of holes.   There was also a small dent where evidently the engine had come in contact with the firewall during disassembly, which I managed to pound out as best as I could and fill the imperfections.  Next I moved to the interior, mostly around the rear cab braces where I had plug welded in new ones, and around the new upper windshield brace.  These don’t need to be perfect, as they will be mostly covered by trim, but I wanted to get rid of most of the glaring defects.  Same for the kick panels, they are already mostly straight, but needed a little cleanup where they had been welded in place.

Next I moved to the cowl vent area.  There were originally a few pinholes, but the metal was still pretty thick.  All the pinholes had been welded shut and the metal ground smooth.  I used the Evercoat Fiberglass for the final smoothing, especially around the rubber gasket surface to try and minimize water leaks.  Next I moved on to the roof and cab corners.  These were already pretty straight, so it was mostly just skim coat and block sanding for final smoothness.

The last major area to attack was the rear of the cab.  Most of the cab rear will be covered by the bed when it is installed, but there was significant damage to the rear of the cab from stuff bouncing around the bed over the years.  I did the best I could with a hammer and dolly to straighten most of the ripples.  The inside is behind the seat and will not be visible.  I took my time and also made sure there was no “oil canning” of the sheet metal where a dent could pop in and out.  My 12” sanding block just wasn’t long enough so I bought a 28” flexible sanding block that worked great!  I took my time, and it came out pretty straight, and I don’t think there is any filler over 1/8” thick, mostly much thinner.

After filling around the cowl near the outside mirror locations, I noticed there was filler around the mirror attachment bolts, and that there was a gap between the body and the inner brace where the mirror attached.  I had a concern that when I tightened the mirrors, it might crack the filler near the bolt holes, so I opened up the holes, welded in a spacer on both sides, and ground everything smooth.   Now when the mirrors are tightened, everything will tighten against metal.

Now that the bodywork on the cab was about done, it was time to flip the cab onto the firewall, and take a look at the underside.  There were a few pinholes around the driveshaft relief I had welded in place which I closed up with some additional weld, and a little grinding and finishing on welds that I had done from above.  While the cab was sitting on the firewall, I was able to finish the block sanding on the roof.

Now that the bodywork is done on the cab, it was time to verify the paint strategy.  In a perfect world, I would build this truck like they do on the TV shows, and I would complete all the bodywork and paint on the cab, trial fit everything, disassemble, and do the final paint.  It looks so easy on television!  But this is how it’s going to go.  I’m going to prime the underside of the cab, the shoot a couple of coats of gloss black.  Then spray the flat surfaces of the underside with paintable rubberized undercoat, and a final coat of gloss black.   The underside is now done.  Then I will flip the cab back upright, mask off the underside, and finish the priming on the interior and top side of the cab.  Then I will mask off and paint the firewall and the interior floor, behind the seat, the kickplates and behind the dash with gloss black.  At this point, I have still not welded the dash in place.  This is because I wanted everything behind the dash epoxy primed and painted to prevent rust.  Once the cab is fully primed and painted behind the dash, I will prime the dash, prime and paint the backside of the dash, and weld it in place.  Then I will finish the metalwork around the windshield, touch up the primer around the windshield, and be ready to final attach the cab to the frame.  Since the underside, firewall and interior floor and behind the dash are painted black, I will be able to install the wiring harness, all the electronics, and the heater-A/C and get everything drivable in primer.  I may even install the glass without sealant to make sure it all fits and still be easy enough to remove for paint.   Once it is drivable in primer and mostly complete, then I can take it somewhere for paint, and either they or I can do whatever disassembly is necessary for paint.  It may not be a perfect plan, but that’s what I’m thinking.

The first step for painting is to build a paint booth.  As an engineer, I, of course, tried to overthink it.  In the end, I just screwed some 1x2 strapping into the ceiling and stapled plastic sheeting to the strapping giving me a apace about half the size of the garage covered on four sides with plastic.  Then I would prop open the garage door by a couple of feet and run a room fan blowing air out of the space.  Not great, but good enough for primer.  Southern Polyurethane has some pretty good instructions for preparation and paint that came in a booklet with the paint when it was delivered.  I used a Harbor Freight HVLP gun, and gave it a shot.  Painting is HARD!  But it is fun!  Priming on the underside came out pretty good on the first try, but the gloss black was a lot tougher.   I was getting some orange peel, and thought I had read that the problem was either pressure too high or not enough paint flow.  So I reduced the pressure and increased the flow and it just made it much worse!  I went back to the instructions and read a little closer, and realized that I had done exactly the wrong thing!  So I increased the gun pressure and returned the flow to normal and it came out much better.

Between the priming and the gloss black, I also had to go over every seam with seam sealer.  For the intearior and underside, I just used the AC-Delco single part seam sealer in a caulk gun tube.  I did use painters tape to mask off a straight line on either side of the seam, and removed the tape while the seam sealer was still wet.  It all came out great!  The rest of the cab priming and painting was without incident, and I was getting a little better with each try.  Once the cab was done, I primed and painted the dash, dash brace, tunnel, and battery box cover which came out great.  Welding the dash in place was fairly easy, except that once I had it all welded in place and was admiring my work, I looked up and realized that I had not installed the dash brace in place before welding.    In the past, I had always installed the brace before setting the dash in place, and I wasn’t sure it would fit with the dash already installed.  It took me a while, and a little panic, when I finally found the spot where the brace would drop into place.  Whew! Dodged a bullet there!  After the dash, I welded up all around the windshield, and made sure that it was all metal without holes all around the opening.  At this point I was finally able to install the split windshield brace that I had been waiting so long to install.  Then I ground everything smooth as I could and filled the imperfections with the waterproof Evercoat Fiberglass filler.  There was also a spot above the passenger’s windshield where the previous owner had replaced the metal and the bend wasn’t exactly right.  I was able to make up the imperfection with the Evercoat Fiberglass so that now the entire windshield opening looks great.

The other thing I noticed was a gap between the rain gutters and the body.  I was originally just going to use the same seam sealer as I used everywhere else on the rain gutters, but decided it would probably be better to use the 2-part epoxy seam sealer in this location.   I also had to replace my caulking gun with a much stronger one, and I had read warnings that it would be too difficult to press the trigger on a standard caulk gun since this tube had both epoxy parts in the same tube and it mixed along the way as it came out.  Luckily I found a 26x gun on Amazon. 

 It was a little tricky to mask everything off to only expose the inside and outside of the windshield opening and the dash attachment points, but once masked, it was easy enough to do the final primer touchup.   At this point, painting is done for a while, and I was able to roll up the plastic sheeting while still stapled to the ceiling and tie strap it up and out of the way.  When I next need to paint, I should be able to quickly roll down the plastic sheeting and recreate my spray booth. 

One thing that became apparent during this priming and painting exercise is that there is just no way would I be successful at doing final paint in the garage.  It is just too difficult, and there are too many variables to have it come out well.  It takes talent, practice and equipment and a much better facility than I have.  So for now, I will limit myself to priming, and painting brackets, inner fenders, and the like, and when I am ready for final paint, I will leave it to the professionals.