Restoring white paint on my 4,000 mile 'Barn Find' '62 Rambler

[62Rambler]

Restoring white paint on my 4,000 mile 'Barn Find' '62 Rambler


I recently acquired a 4,052 mile 1962 Rambler Station Wagon that has essentially been sitting in a garage for the past 50 years.

I had it shipped from Northern Minnesota to my home in Chicago where my mechanic has serviced it and a new set of Coker tires have been installed. Now the fun but difficult part of detailing the car has begun.

Luckily I came across Mike Phillips thread about restoring single stage paint and I've begun my process using M7 exclusively so far with outstanding results but I can see that I have some challenges as well.


Here it is after its first wash:

View attachment 57097



And the results after lots of M7 elbow grease, a terry cloth towel and a few overnight M7 applications:

View attachment 57098


You can see the 'unfinished' door on the left and the finished results on the right:

View attachment 57099


So here's my first challenge. After all my initial work I still have plenty of of yellow oxidation. It's subtle but it's there. In fact in sunlight you can't detect it but in the shade you see it.

I believe the factory paint is a pretty pure white which in spots I can see but after all these applications I can see there is still plenty of work to do. I know the nature of white paint is hard but should I continue with M7 applications or go to something that will cut the paint more?

 

[ronkh57]

Coolness !!!

I'd try a couple more of the megs 7, then see.

 

[Setec Astronomy]

That's really an incredible find! Mike will have some good advice, and I'm betting he's going to be excited about this car, also.

 

[FocusSTguy]

I would pick a test spot and try a few more more rounds of M7 and do another one with a compound or polish. Check the results and go from there. Nice car BTW!

https://www.autogeekonline.net/forum/how-articles/50162-how-do-test-spot.html

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

I recently acquired a 4,052 mile 1962 Rambler Station Wagon that has essentially been sitting in a garage for the past 50 years.

I had it shipped from Northern Minnesota to my home in Chicago where my mechanic has serviced it and a new set of Coker tires have been installed. Now the fun but difficult part of detailing the car has begun.

Wow!

What a score... kind of... while I appreciate classics and even more I appreciate barn finds, I've always thought the Rambler cars and stationwagons were simply ugly! But sometimes that's what makes it work for a car. Kind of like the Edsel.


Welcome to AutogeekOnline! :welcome:

Luckily I came across Mike Phillips thread about restoring single stage paint and I've begun my process using M7 exclusively so far with outstanding results but I can see that I have some challenges as well.

Just to note, I have a practice I call,

Writing for the future...


By this I mean, I know hundreds and thousands and maybe even tens of thousands of people will find and read this thread over time. Knowing this, I'm going to include this link for these future people.


All Mike Phillips #7 Show Car Glaze Articles in one place

Here it is after its first wash:

View attachment 57097



And the results after lots of M7 elbow grease, a terry cloth towel and a few overnight M7 applications:

View attachment 57098

The pictures a little dark but the paint looks smooth and glossy as well as clear.

You can see the 'unfinished' door on the left and the finished results on the right:

View attachment 57099

Looking good. The paint on the right side is clean, clear, glossy which means smooth and much better looking.

So here's my first challenge. After all my initial work I still have plenty of of yellow oxidation. It's subtle but it's there. In fact in sunlight you can't detect it but in the shade you see it.

I believe the factory paint is a pretty pure white which in spots I can see but after all these applications I can see there is still plenty of work to do. I know the nature of white paint is hard but should I continue with M7 applications or go to something that will cut the paint more?

Now it's time to start compounding the paint. Choose a great compound that uses great abrasive technology and peel off a little of the old, stained paint. The polish and wax.

Normal protocol at this stage would be,

1. Compound
2. Polish
3. Re-apply the #7
4. Seal with wax or sealant

Do you have any type of polisher?


Thanks for sharing this barn find with our forum. Looking forward to your progress.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Weird

I looked at the code in your post and there's NO code that would force your pictures to align centered on the page?

Never seen that before and when it comes to forum... I've see it all.


Every member of the AGO forum gets a FREE gallery. Most people never take advantage of it and I understand that for some it's too difficult to figure out especially if you're on your phone or a tablet as the gallery is really set up for use when you're on a computer.


That said, I downloaded and then uploaded your pictures to your free gallery here on AGO


Here's the link to your free gallery

https://www.autogeekonline.net/gallery/showgallery.php/cat/500/ppuser/93887




And here's your pictures with a real URL Address on the world wide web.

 

[62Rambler]

What a score... kind of... while I appreciate classics and even more I appreciate barn finds, I've always thought the Rambler cars and stationwagons were simply ugly! But sometimes that's what makes it work for a car. Kind of like the Edsel.

This car has grown on me quickly! You just don't find cars with such low mileage and originality like this one. It was clearly used as a fishing car. It has a trailer hitch, an oar in the cargo area and a box of outdoor supplies that indicate that some camping was done using this car. He may have even taken advantage of the famous Rambler bed! The only option on this base level wagon is a heater which makes sense for Minnesota! Otherwise 3 on the tree, no clock, no radio. Totally utilitarian.

Weird

I looked at the code in your post and there's NO code that would force your pictures to align centered on the page?
Never seen that before and when it comes to forum... I've see it all.

Not sure about the centering except it gave me the option and I chose centered. New to the forum and still figuring this out!

Now it's time to start compounding the paint. Choose a great compound that uses great abrasive technology and peel off a little of the old, stained paint. The polish and wax.

Normal protocol at this stage would be,

Compound
Polish
Re-apply the #7
Seal with wax or sealant

Do you have any type of polisher?

Don't you typically advise against using a compound on single stage paint? Would white be the exception because of the hardness?

Any recommendation on a compound?
I have both Meguiars Rubbing Compound and Meguiars Ultimate Compound in my supplies.

No polisher yet but willing to invest in one

 

[62Rambler]

A couple of interior shots. Factory plastic still on the front seats and protective cardboard in the headliner.
The interior is cleaning up beautifully!

View attachment 57103

View attachment 57104

Cargo area line with newspapers from 1965 and an oar.

View attachment 57105

 

[Setec Astronomy]

This car has grown on me quickly! You just don't find cars with such low mileage and originality like this one.

yeah, that's the cool thing to me, just that it's so old and so unused. I'm not sure that would be the original plastic on those seats, though--I'm going to doubt in 1962 they were doing that, but what do I know.

EDIT: Oh, and the oar and the '65 newspapers...it's like the car was buried in Pompeii...here in NJ we have a (Thomas) Edison museum and his desk is supposedly the way he left it when he died. So the owner went fishing, covered the back with newspaper (in 1965), came home, parked it in the garage (leaving his oar in the back), and something happened to him and it's been there ever since?

 

[damaged442]

What a cool ride! Love it!

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Don't you typically advise against using a compound on single stage paint? Would white be the exception because of the hardness?

Nope... I've never told anyone to "not" compound white paint.

I've told people to not wetsand white paint but compounding is okay especially for removing oxidation or paint staining/paint aging.

Any recommendation on a compound?

I have both Meguiars Rubbing Compound and Meguiars Ultimate Compound in my supplies.

No polisher yet but willing to invest in one

I never used the Meguiar's Rubbing Compound but they discontinued it and my guess is due to lack of sales and my guess on lack of sales is due to subpar performance when compared to Meguiar's Ultimate Compound which is a very good compound.

The Megs UC is perfect for what you want to do, apply it by hand with some passion behind the pad and a microfiber or even terry cloth applicator or get a simple orbital polisher like the Griot's 6" DA Polisher.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Meguiar's Ultimate Compound History



When it comes to Meguiar's and other large companies that offer multiple lines for multiple markets, i.e.

Professional Line for the refinishing industry
Detailer Line for the reconditioning industry
Consumer Line for the enthusiast market
Marine Line for the boat detailing world


The products are formulated more specifically for their intended use and their intended user.

It's assumed that anyone working in a body shop has a higher skill level when it comes to machine polishing paint than the person first starting out washing and waxing their Ford Focus.

As such, the Consumer Line, Ultimate Compound, is formulated for ease of use by the masses while still accomplishing the task the name on the bottle says it will tackle.

I find UC much more user-friendly for the average person than M105 and most important, if UC doesn't remove the defects you're trying to remove then chances are very good they're too deep to safely remove using any compound and as a follow-up it's time to start looking at how the deeper defects are being inflicted into the paint and stop the problem at the root cause.

Just to note... the car on the label of Ultimate Compound is one of the many Extreme Makeovers I head up while working for Meguiar's and in charge of the TNOG's also known as The Thursday Night Open Garage classes. Most people don't know that when I started the Thursday Night Open Garage classes they were actually on Wednesday nights and then I moved them to Thursday nights. It is also the TNOGs that I first met Michael Stoops as before he worked for Meguiar's he attended many of the TNOG's.


Here's some pictures showing the Mercedes-Benz on the label of Ultimate Compound.

Here's that Mercedes-Benz looked like when it first arrived to the shop...

After....

My Thursday night guys did the Mercedes, I personally did the BMW

Before

I compounded the entire finish before starting the below process to remove the shallow scratches and expose the deep scratches.


Process

Kind of cool to have two cars, one I was in charge of and one I detailed end up on millions of bottles of Meguiar's products.


There's a little car detailing history for the Car Detailing Coffee Table Book.

 

[62Rambler]

yeah, that's the cool thing to me, just that it's so old and so unused. I'm not sure that would be the original plastic on those seats, though--I'm going to doubt in 1962 they were doing that, but what do I know.

The plastic is definitely original. You can see it used on the Rambler American in this 1962 Rambler showroom photo.

View attachment 57108

The story was that the guy lost his license for whatever reason a few years after buying it. It was registered briefly to another family member in 1993 and on the back on the owners manual you can see in very shaky writing that an oil change was made at 3,992 miles.

Obviously the person was very elderly and driving this car with a manual transmission and no power steering would be a difficult task.

Last fall a scrap yard received a call from an elderly woman who wanted them to take it out of her garage. The scrap yard owner told me it was so buried in the garage it took them an hour to clear the stuff out to be able to access it. All this time the car remained in the same family. I purchased the car about a month ago from the scrap yard and am thankful he didn't touch the car.

It's a joy to unearth this true time capsule!

 

[62Rambler]

The Megs UC is perfect for what you want to do, apply it by hand with some passion behind the pad and a microfiber or even terry cloth applicator or get a simple orbital polisher like the Griot's 6" DA Polisher.

Megs UC it is is...can't wait to get back to work on this!

 

[Setec Astronomy]

Oh, so is that really a plastic seat cover, rather than shipping protection? Maybe I misunderstood.

Seems we've seen that on TV a lot, the old car buried under junk in the garage, whether it's Wayne Carini, American Pickers, maybe even Mike Phillips had one on his old show. I have a friend who has a dead car OUTSIDE, and the junk is inside, does that count, LOL? This is one of those guys that rarely has any room in his daily driver for passengers, as the car is usually filled up with garbage...I'm not talking junk, I'm talking garbage...

I've told forum stories before about seeing these cars in parking lots, once where the back seat was entirely full of garbage up to the level of the top of the front (bench) seat, or the SUV I saw at night in a Pep Boy's parking lot that I initially thought was packed up for a move, but was entirely filled up to the roof with garbage, including the passenger seat.

Then I find out this friend who I seldom see is one of those guys! His house is filled with garbage too, sad really.

 

[Natron]

WOW, congratulations.

 

[62Rambler]

Oh, so is that really a plastic seat cover, rather than shipping protection? Maybe I misunderstood.

It actually is the protective shipping plastic.

I never thought about it but with so many hoarders out there it helps preserve many of these cars.
Most families would've sold the car after the driver lost his license.
By 1969 this one would've been sold to a college kid for $50.
By 1972 it would've been junked.

 

[Setec Astronomy]

It actually is the protective shipping plastic.

I never thought about it but with so many hoarders out there it helps preserve many of these cars.
Most families would've sold the car after the driver lost his license.
By 1969 this one would've been sold to a college kid for $50.
By 1972 it would've been junked.

Ok, thanks for explaining the plastic. And that certainly sounds like the normal history for a car like that.

Are you going to leave the papers and the oar in the back?

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

What a cool story about the car...


Thank you for taking the time to join the forum and share this story.


:dblthumb2:

 

[Papa]

Love it cool story. If you show it.... please tell me you are saving all the historical stuff inside.