Progress on the SB Honda

[ZRX61]

Living in the Mojave kills cars. This shitbox lives outside & there's a small window most days when it isn't too hot to work on it. Did the left third of the roof this evening...

In the interest of being honest, this car cost precisely $1.00 & it's value varies with how much gas is in the tank.

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[Bobby B.]

Just take your time with it. Good luck!

 

[Sizzle Chest]

The portion you worked on looks better than the other, so good going so far!

 

[ZRX61]

A bit more progress on the right side, as you can see some parts of the paint/clearcoat is completely buggered. I think the previous owners son may have buffed it with a paver...

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[ZRX61]

Was just reading Mikes posts about the Meg's #7. I found some in the garage yesterday that must be more than 12 years old. Gave it a shake, still liquid. Sounded like there may be a *lump* in there though. Shook it some more. Grabbed a plastic straw, removed cap & gave it a poke. No lump, gave it a stir. Pulled the straw out to find there was nothing sticking to it, looked clean enough to drink through (I didn't test that possibility). Bizarre
Thought I'd try it on a small spot...(about half that spot on the right rear of the roof) right now it's about 105deg outside & the car is so hot you can't touch it. It instantly *hid* (fixed?) some of the damage. Will follow up in the morning when the car is still in the shade. Not going to try leaving it on the car for 24 hours though...probably have to chisel it off with a jackhammer.

 

[ZRX61]

Got ambitious & did a few more spots/areas about 90 minutes ago after the car was in the shade & had cooled down. Just went back out there to give it rub to remove it. Can't report of progress as it's actually dark, will have a look in the morning... however I could see clear delineation between the bits I did & the parts I didn't.

 

[ZRX61]

Gave it some more #7 this morning & then it got hot. Mixed results. The crazing on the fender/hood pretty much disappeared where I made some effort. The roof looks like a patchwork quilt & there are still parts that haven't been touched. Some of the patches came out well, others not so much.
Deck lid resembles another quilt.
With that said, that untouched stripe in the middle of the roof is what most of the paint looked like a week ago:

Fender & hood crazing (yeah, that's going nowhere, altho it did diminish after #7 a bit):

Decklid looked like that stripe on the roof, getting there (ignore the bumper)

And it rained...(hood)

On the upside, It will be in the garage for a week in a couple of months & then I can get stuck in. Given the value of the SB Honda it's just not worth the effort to paint it, so I'm going to mess with the paint & see where I get with it. I'll concentrate on the roof for now. Haven't fired up the power tools yet.

In contrast, my '99 Kaw 1100 (120k mile) looks like I just uncrated it

 

[ZRX61]

In my continuing exercise in futility I attacked the hood today....It will look good 100 yards away at 100mph...on a moonless night.

This is what looked like this morning...

Bought some Griots compound stuff at the A Zone (was actually looking for something else, but seduced by the pretty colors)

Fired up the PC, tried a spot... used one of those godawful disposable 3in pads (white) I bought some time back.

Dagnabbit, now I have to do the entire hood..

The paint on the hood has what looks like a near terminal case of acne. There are more pits, holes & cracks in this paint than you would think possible without driving through a nailstorm (that's not a typo)

The front of the fenders & hood looks like this:

Rolled it back outside before I got too ambitious...It's only 83deg today.

 

[Sizzle Chest]

I think you have done extremely well on that paint. I feel that you are pretty much as far as you can go. It does look night/day better!

 

[ZRX61]

well I still have to sort the roof out. The first pic in Post #7 is a bit confusing. That is indeed the reflection of clouds in the very lower left corner, but that isn't cloud reflections in the rest of the pic.. it's the paint/clear...
Maybe I should just drive it on cloudy days

Also: Everyone else can say "At least I wasn't starting with paint like that SB Honda"

 

[ZRX61]

Gave the roof some attention this morning...It still has *clouds*

I'd already done the other side before I thought to take a *before* pic...

Somewhat later:

By way of contrast, under the hood looks like this (almost 200k miles):

 

[Rsurfer]

You crack me up, just like your paint.:laughing:

 

[ZRX61]

I've got some Diamond Cut in the garage, you could buff a sidewalk with that stuff. I'm not sure it's worth the effort on the SB Honda though. Pretty sure that damage goes all the way to the primer.

 

[ZRX61]

Decided to give the Diamond Cut/wool pad/rotary a go.. (practiced by polishing the stucco on the garage wall first) Removed some of the clouds on the deck lid.

& this wasn't my spiffy DW849 variable speed rotary... this was my El Cheapo variable speed rotary I got from Horrible Fright about 15 years ago that up until now has only been used with 9in #80 grit Norton sanding discs to strip the paint down to bare metal on resto projects. Stripping an entire car in a morning is the equivalent of spending 25 hours at the gym, it's a work out. Don't want to fill the 849 with paint dust.
It's also an excellent tool to teach autobody newbs just how far you can throw a fender or deck lid across the shop. Most only do it once, if they do it twice they get to find a new line of work.

There's still some clouds on the right side of the deck lid..

Noticed that one of the clouds on the roof has reappeared... How do I prevent that? It's the right/rear of the roof, which is the left side of the 2nd pic. Or is just a case of "That's Honda paint"

Today:

Last week:

 

[Sizzle Chest]

Engine bay is fantastic for that mileage! Yeah, your paint is done, and I am enjoying this thread!

 

[ZRX61]

Car is in the garage until Monday, got ambitious.

Did some clay work to get the yellow paint off the left quarter panel & rear bumper (aerosol can was rolling across the road, nailed it with the left rear wheel about three months ago). Bit more compound & polish work (on the left side). Then gave the entire car a coat of the Ice polish from the Turtle & after I buffed that I gave it a coat of Meg's Hybrid Ceramic Wax too.
Garage now smells like a cheap bordello... (the best kind)

 

[ZRX61]

So I see the post about the Megs HPC so I decided to get some for the bike & the Camaro. Went to AZ & paid $28.65 for a kit.

That was the good part...

The bad part
I backed the SB Honda out of the garage, paused while the door closed & the lawn sprinklers went off on the right side of the car. FFS...

The bizarre part:
Get back from AZ, park in the garage, walk around to the other side of the car & there's not so much as one water spot on the side of the car.

 

[ZRX61]

Just realized there's no pics of the sides of the car...So here ya go, all sorts of scratches, dings, dents & chips.... plus the PAX side door got keyed before I owned it. Actually pretty shiny.
That small piece of wood next to the C25 gas bottle is Teak. About 25 years ago a guy I knew imported a bunch of aircraft engines & other parts from SE Asia. It all arrived in teak crates & on teak pallets. There was a LOT of stuff, truck loads. He piled all the wood outside his hangar & I asked if I could have some of it before it went in the trash. He said I could take all of it for all he cared. I bought piles of it home in my CC LB F350 Dually every day for a week. I turned some it into a bunch of slappers & mallets etc for sheet metal work, some I gave away (B-i-L made himself a teak baseball bat) & the rest was sold.... for $5k. The small piece is all that's left unused.

& yes, the garage is carpeted. This house was one of the tract models & the garage was their office. They left the carpet.

 

[ZRX61]

Bit blowy here today, CHP just closed 8 miles of freeway owing to multiple wrecks from the dust storm. I guess I'll be getting all my work sand blasted when I have to go out in about an hour.

 

[ZRX61]

Car survived running around town during the dust storm, but now it's parked outside again. Just put the trash out & the car looks like I could grow a crop of taters on it...


Update....
Yesterday:

Today:

Grabbed the California Car Scratcher... I think it's as dead as the paint, all it did was move the dust around.