My fingers hurt

O

old soul

Member
Just spent a LOT of time hand sanding/stripping the firewall and front frame section on a '55 Chevy 210. Fenders, radiator support, power brake booster and master cylinder have been removed.

This was a running/driving car that just had the engine removed so all the brake hard lines are still in place and studs, nuts and sheetmetal screws extend through the firewall from parts

attached in the interior (heater assembly, etc.). All the power steering parts are in place (fluid housing, hoses, rack assembly-aftermarket). Media blasting was not an option on this one and

stripping the paint off was not in the initial plan. The firewall had been painted twice before (3 if you count original paint) and the first repaint was the problem. It could be scratched off with

a fingernail. The framerails, crossmember, A-arms, radiator support and inner fenders all had the classic 'black spray can' paint job. Inner fenders and radiator support are getting blasted.

I have a garbage can full of little pieces of 80 grit that I used to strip all the nooks and crannies and my fingers are cut and torn from the sharp edges, factory welding splatter and

sheetmetal screw tips I encountered. Before sanding I soaked everything with a heavy duty degreaser (Purple Power/Simple Green type) and pressure washed twice. It was very clean then

but is now covered with the results of sanding and stripping paint. After stripping a panel to bare metal it usually takes me about 3 to 6 laps with w/g remover to end up with a clean panel.

I do not want to subject myself to that punishment of wiping by hand, 3 to 6 times, every nook and cranny of the firewall/ frame section. It will shred towels to pieces within seconds and

take FOREVER to clean thoroughly. Except for the center 10-12 square inches of the firewall, there is not any area that does not have something sticking through it or attached to it.

No nice flat smooth surfaces anywhere, especially on the frame. -------- Any ideas on how to clean this efficiently and effectively so that the epoxy primer will adhere ? ------------

If it must be hand wiped, so be it. No problem. Spent many hours wiping/cleaning cars and parts before and after bodywork, priming and painting in the past 25 years. I am just looking for

a 'better, quicker' way for the benefit of my customer and my bottom line. Thanks
 
Thats what it will be. Will still be meticulous about cleaning every square inch but being able to wash with a brush will save hours of frustration.

Thanks, guys.
 
Can't beat the knowlwdge of someone like Shine who has done this for 40 plus years. Shame we can't start off with all this knowledge instead lol
 
well one thing for sure...... i can damn sure tell you how not to do it . been there done that.
i think starting out in the days of lacquer with 0 help from mfgr was an asset . we had to figure it out . then the local reps would wont to know so they could run around being the expert. had it not been for some of the old timers i knew and worked with it would have been worse .
try painting a race car that blew up everything on a test run in lacquer primer. trans fluid , oil everywhere. thats when you learn the value of soap and water over a solvent cleaner. soap pulls it out , solvents just break down and thin it .
 
This is probably a stupid question, but can you use the soap and water to clean completely bare metal? I have a frame from a 1950 Chevy truck I'd like to paint before summer is over. I've pretty much stripped it to bare metal all the way around with a body grinder and a DA (had it sandblasted, but we had a sudden deluge on the way home and the freshly blasted frame got soaked with rain water. Montana weather...). I have a gallon of 710 and 700, but I know the frame has a ton of dust and dirt and metal shavings sitting on it from when I was at college.

Also -- this might be better to start a new thread, but here goes -- how would you spray the inside of the frame rails? I boxed the frame last winter and I'd like to get at least some paint inside the frame rails.

Thanks,

Chris
 
shine;29168 said:
well one thing for sure...... i can damn sure tell you how not to do it . been there done that.
i think starting out in the days of lacquer with 0 help from mfgr was an asset . we had to figure it out . then the local reps would wont to know so they could run around being the expert. had it not been for some of the old timers i knew and worked with it would have been worse .
try painting a race car that blew up everything on a test run in lacquer primer. trans fluid , oil everywhere. thats when you learn the value of soap and water over a solvent cleaner. soap pulls it out , solvents just break down and thin it .
Click to expand...

Reminds me of years ago working at the rolling mill. I was a young pup that was very lucky to get teamed up with one of the best welders to ever strike an arc. He was self taught, could move metal with heat and cold like no one else. His eye was as sharp as a laser. A shearing machine with a 4" thick, 18" wide 7 ft long steel platen had its edge flame cut on a 45 degree angle over its entire 7 ft. Dick told them not to cut it or it would warp, engineers said it will be fine, cut it - so we did. 2 days later general foreman came to Dick and asked how to fix it, it warped! Dick told him just a little, he ran back to his meetings. Over the next couple hours he kept asking Dick how to fix it. Finally Dick told him, just let Larry and I go fix it and keep the dam engineers away. Large jack hammer with a blunt bit hanging from an overhead crane, a rose bud tip, a bucket of water and a pump water can. Dick on the torch, myself manning the water can and jack hammer. Dick would heat, tell me what he wanted, water or hammering. 4 hrs later he says that is as good as it is going to get (all by eyeball). Next day we returned to work and the GF was all smiles. Engineers measured the platen after we were finished and the shear blade only had .008 run out, well within adjusting specs. Moral of this rambling story, listen to the old guys that learned it the hard way, they either are real screwed up or brilliant. Its for you to figure out which, lol. (machine made beautiful fusion welds with no filler material in a number of 3xxx and 5xxx alloys)
 
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