50 CJ3A "Nuthin' Fancy"

[squidtone]

The windshield round tubing (framework) had severe pitting behind the round tubing and I realized that this would be quite visible also when sitting in the Jeep, so I cut up some tiny spreaders, and mixed tiny batches of filler and carefully filled the pits on the tubing. I sanded and primed with a big spray gun but it's hard to get paint into these crevice areas. I ended up priming the crevice areas with some spray bomb green etch primer just to get something on there. I'm quite pleased how well the windshield came out considering what it was like before resto.

[squidtone]

The trans cover was pretty rotted and needed patching on the flanges. It came out okay and I filled the pits on this thing too. This is one of the parts that will be painted gloss black so I have more detailing to go in order for it to look decent.

[squidtone]

The hood was pretty wonky and required many iterations of filler, sanding, filler, sanding, priming, filler, sanding...bleah. The filler work is thicker than I would have liked, but I don't own an english wheel to smooth wrinkles, so I just banged away as best I could with a dolly/hammer before going for the filler.� I also did smoothing work on the inside surface too. Wouldn't want ugly wrinkles visible there! I stayed away from the center seam with the filler. Like the other parts, it's a case of heaping my labor on a pretty beat up part. I am happy with it however.

[squidtone]

I spent time on the floors too since they also are very visible on the finished Jeep. Since this body is 70 percent reconstructed, I didn't worry too much about some details, but I did want to smooth all signs of patches. For the tunnel sheet metal transition to the flat floor pans, I simply used my finger to create a radiused fill. It was ugly, but after sanding it cleaned up really nice. I used a small tube with sandpaper to sand these spots.

[squidtone]

So with all this work done, I sprayed a final coat of epoxy primer on all the parts, and tub. I ran out of my older can of black epoxy, and when I attempted to purchase a new gallon, they would only sell me the low VOC stuff and it was only available in Gray. But it's actually quite dark gray, and it does seem like good stuff. I got it from Summit Racing (their "store" brand) but it's actually made by Kirker and I'm quite happy with it.

I did all my seam sealing this evening. i used SEM gray and it's a bear to use, but it's sandable so I should get it to look okay. I used 3M "Drip Chek" for the hood center seam, and rear tail panel seams. This stuff is meant to shrink significantly and show the seam. I also used it on the cowl to side panel seams.

So that's my update. Lots of pix I know, but I like seeing pictures on other threads, so I'm doing my best to do the same on my build thread!
Dave

[squidtone]

August 27, 2018.
I've been working on the wheels. They seem to be straight, with perfect lug holes, but they are pretty rusty with severe pitting in some spots. Rather than attack with wire wheels and sandblasting only, I figured I'd try some electrolysis. I filled a plastic tub with water and a third of a box of TSP (trisodium phosphate), then made an "electrode" with a piece of rebar and welded a steel plate to it to increase surface area. This is the anode and I connected the positive lead of my manual battery charger to it. The wheel is placed into the solution (not touching the anode!) and I clean a piece of the wheel and connect the negative lead of the charger to it. This is the cathode. I fired it up and let it go for hours at a time. I'd interrupt occasionally to pull out the anode and clean it off; it gets quite gunky. At the same time I'd rotate the wheel, turn it around, and generally try to get full coverage of the electrolysis action. It works pretty well. The wheels don't come out clean, and in fact they are rather gunky too. The remaining paint turns to mush and some rust rather than fall off turns to the black oxide stuff. But when the wheel is removed and wire wheeled, all this comes off really easy.
With the newly cleaned wheels, I found a date code of April 1950 and the Kelsey Hayes logo. I only have 4 original wheels so I picked up a 1955 wheel and found out it has a slightly different backspacing. I also think it's military since it's got the small hole near one of the lug holes. I"ll use this as my spare.
So I think the electrolysis saved me quite a bit of labor by loosening up the heavy rust.
Note the picture of the face of one of the wheels: notice how the extra layer of paint from the pinstripe prevented pitting. I did measure the pinstripe location before I stripped it (last photo).
Prepping, pit filling and primer is next for the wheels.

[toolman_ar]

Just read through this tread. May I say you do amazing work!

And thank you for saving an old crusty from the scrap heap.

On those rust pock marks there is a Devcon product that you can use as a bondo that when dry is hard as steel.

Carry on and great work.

toolman_ar

[squidtone]

Thanks Toolman_ar
I think what I liked most about this Jeep was that despite its decrepit condition, it was mostly complete and hadn't been bubbified much.
As for the devcon, I'll have to try it sometime. It happens that this past weekend I epoxied the wheels, then applied a couple coats of "2K" primer, and then used 3M 801 2 part spot/putty filler. It seems like good stuff and very easy to use. It sands easy. Note the picture of the "worst" wheel....it took an hour of filling and sanding, and looks much better.

[squidtone]

I got pretty far along on the wheels but not before making a rookie mistake of trying to do glaze work on epoxy primer. Epoxy primer is GUMMY stuff and not conducive to fine sanding work. It took forever to sand away some glaze/spot filling work I did (tons of clogged sandpaper). But I finally got through it, then waited a few days for the epoxy to harden up a bit more, then primed with 2K, tried again with glaze/spot putty and the work is 10 times easier to sand. Still a little bit more spot work, but I'm just about ready for color for the wheels.

[squidtone]

I started to do some body parts 2K priming last weekend, but it was super hot and humid, and like the previous thread I made another kind of rookie mistake as I only had "mid temp" hardener for the primer. With the high temps, the primer dried just about as soon as it hit the panels. Not pretty. I gave up and had another go today. The weather was cool, cloudy and perfect for priming. I primed everything I could and it sprayed out beautifully. It's kind of exciting to see one color on the Jeep, even if it's drab gray. I had some vexing times with yet more sand popping up from crevasses. (No matter how hard I try I can't get every last bit of sand and trash out of the tub before I paint....) But it's easy enough to "repair" these spots. I'll be sanding this all out and then I'll be out of town for almost a couple weeks so unfortunately I'll not get to paint color until probably October.

[athawk11]

Looks terrific. 8-)

[RICKG]

Splendid! 8-)

[squidtone]

Hi 3A folks,
As noted in previous thread, I sprayed out a first layer of sealer (epoxy primer), then 2K primer, and block sanded this all down. I applied 2 part spot glaze (3M 801...nice stuff) as necessary to fix all the pits and defects. I started to run out of film thickness so I sprayed another layer of 2K and repeated. This time I experienced an order-of-magnitude less defects and with some small glaze repairs, I got it good enough for paint. (No pictures of the blocking process of the primer....just a tedious process that pays off in the end)

This weekend I painted it.
I used urethane single stage. I had to use low VOC stuff, which is a new requirement in CT, and new to me. Dang I don't like it at all. The data sheet gave mixing instructions, and I had a go yesterday. The color was pretty, but the finish was not. But I slogged through painting the tub inside and out, as well as the undersides of the tailgate, hood, fenders and grille. Problems were horrible orange peel in complex areas. Flatter areas not as bad, but still difficult. I got enough on there so I can wet sand it all out.

Despite the trouble (at first) of finding the right paint mix formula, I was quite happy with the cleanliness (I painted outside of course)....I had very little dirt problems. My basic method was to vacuum the surfaces, then wipe off with a soft cloth, then blow it all off with an air gun, then wipe down with tack cloths. It worked well for me.

Today, I painted the topsides of the fenders, hood, tailgate and grille. This time I mixed in 15% urethane reducer. What an astonishing difference. The stuff flowed on so nice and smooth. No runs. What a joy to spray it. Live and learn...I'm writing this down for next time!
I may sand down the floors and wheel wells and respray. I'll see if I can get the orange peel out with wet sanding first.
Overall, I'm happy this part is almost done. The windshield is not done...I must weld on the cloth top channel first. The wheels are ready for paint, hopefully tomorrow I'll shoot those. Looking forward to seeing the cream color.

[Bob W]

Looking good!!

[squidtone]

Thanks!
Napa paint chip "Cream". I like it.