TOPIC:

Jonny you are one of the bests on this site to restore and paint a body

Just interested to know, why did you use Araldite to fix the body? - I though you don't like the stuff? Personally, I would've used styrene cement on ABS body parts, or perhaps hot welded it if the break is old & oxidised.

I'm still not really sure about the Bush Devil - I actually like the dodgy colour scheme, it's the Blackfoot/MB setup that puts me off owning one. Don't much like the lexan body & xmas-cracker bullbar either. Still, it's tons better than the re-re!

Pretty sure it was the 24 hour cure time of Araldite "Rapid" and the running everywhere properties of Araldite "Precision" I was complaining about ... anyway, I used the regular stuff here for its gap-fitting properties - because the former owners "repairs" had turned the edges of the breaks to sponge, the by the time I'd trimmed/sanded back the edges to sound material, the broken off parts weren't touching in most places.

Ah, I see, top plan!
Something for you to try in future with ABS gaps - get some styrene cement & mix it with polystyrene foam or slivers of plasticard. Mix it up & you should end up with some goopy stuff that will solvent-weld itself to the parent ABS whilst also filling the gap.
Another trick is to get hold of some industrial ABS pipework cement. NOT the clear stuff for use with domestic uPVC & ABS, I mean proper gap-filling ABS solvent welding cement, which is usually ABS dissolved in MEK. Unfortunately, this stuff is usually only available in relatively large quantities (Think 500ml is the smallest) & it's quite expensive. eg Durapipe ABS cement

I've dusted off the strangely brown spare body & made a little progress .. this is where I'd got to:




Excess resin & paint sanded off, wet, with 120, 320 & 800 grits:





Then on to the filler - holes in rear bumper & tailgate where closed with small bits of styrene sheet on the inside & small round pellets in the holes beforehand; front grille had to be glued & reinforced with resin & galssfibre cloth as a big chunk snapped off

Nice work as always chap

Taking advantage of the warmer weather, I've made some progress here too...

Last bit of rubbing dow:





Two coats of red plastic primer:





There are a few faults on the bonnet (excessive rubbing down of the area forward of the centre rib, filler slightly high on the back & left edges of the glued in bit, some loss of definition on the left edge of the "power bulge", and a group of pinholes) - but the chances of me being able to do any better 2nd time around are pretty slim, so I just left them alone





Went slightly through the primer in a few places, but as the paint will be black, I left that too





Two coats of black (BMW Black Sapphire Metallic, again):






Grille & bumpers with Silver Hook "Chrome":





28 Celcius & low humidity have their own problems for spraying clear coat - it dries so quickly it's difficult to get enough on for it to wet properly ... I got there in the end, but rubbing out (whenever I get to it) will make it even shinier

I ummed & ahhed about repainting the KBF body, but in the end I wasn't happy about the standard I'd done it to in the first place (in summer 2009), twunting a park bench & breaking the tailgate with excessive wheelying helped make up my mind too...












Paint (Humbrol Hobby Spray) came off pretty easily - just two cycles of De-Solv-It Grafitti Remover:

Jonny wrote:

Taking advantage of the warmer weather, I've made some progress here too...

Last bit of rubbing down

Two coats of red plastic primer:

There are a few faults on the bonnet (excessive rubbing down of the area forward of the centre rib, filler slightly high on the back & left edges of the glued in bit, some loss of definition on the left edge of the "power bulge", and a group of pinholes) - but the chances of me being able to do any better 2nd time around are pretty slim, so I just left them alone

Went slightly through the primer in a few places, but as the paint will be black, I left that too

Two coats of black (BMW Black Sapphire Metallic, again):

Grille & bumpers with Silver Hook "Chrome":

28 Celcius & low humidity have their own problems for spraying clear coat - it dries so quickly it's difficult to get enough on for it to wet properly ... I got there in the end, but rubbing out (whenever I get to it) will make it even shinier

Absolutely top work JR! I'm feeling inspired to take on a bigger challenge top work mate!

andyaus wrote:

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Absolutely top work JR! I'm feeling inspired to take on a bigger challenge top work mate!

Thanks