Monday, March 10, 2008

1997 Eagle Talon 420a Turbo DSM finally gets Custom Paint

And in the Beginning....




A Long Long time ago.......

(About a month and two days from Feb 10 08)



( drums, dum dum dum da dum)


In a Far Far Away Place .......


( about 7.4 miles according to the gps)







In Advance Collision it began.... There were many parts...

There was one Spray gun, with guey sparkle stuff in it, to rule them all.....

Here you see the Prismatique Crystals in the Clear Coat solution. This stuff sparkes like stars as you look at it becuase they are so small. Unlike metallic coat these change with direction and lighting conditions... Its Precious.. Dum Dum DUmmmm!



And its all up to this Painter , Mr. Jolley




There are still parts that have no coating at all. The two left were the Center sections for the tail lights and the Deck lide needed two tone black and silver paint, then clear over twice. Mr. Jolley cleans the area to be painted vigeriously with a scouring pad and some kind of buffing compound.



Here Mr Jolley taped off the Center section and the slack will be wrapped around and hung from the rafters.



No really we hung it from the rafters. I am digging the spearamint flavored tape. Mr jolley was digging it too.




There are tough descisions to be made. Mr. Jolley had some Captian Morgan to think it over.


Here is the second part that needs paint. Its a rather large one. This is the decklid that will be taped off, primered, sealed, painted silver and the reverse taped and agian painted Black for the top. Mr. Jolley will coat the decklid with the Precious and then coat agian with clearcoat.




Mr. Jolley taped off the black topside first. I think that we have wasted a small spruce worth of paper on this car. I am just waiting for the treehuggers to attack us for plundering their forest.


Mr. Jolley is a perfectionist and goes over the black areas twice for better coverage and depth. The decklid will take a couple hours or more to dry enough to touch. Though we have a Oven to bake the paint its really for production and actually weakens the paint. Its also not the same shine as a car that dried without the 180 degrees of heat.


The Eagle Talon Hood is a beauty in itself. The hood is painted hear but has dust from being sanded some to remove imperfectinos before clear coat.


The hood was pretty dirty after all the sanding and it was very important to clean it well. The solution is water and alchohol he is spraying on the base coat. Mr Jolley is getting it ready for the Precious



Those pesky door handles on the Eagle Talon and Mitsubishi Eclipse seem to dryrot and break. I have a set of new ones The handles were removed completely to make sure they had coverage all over. This is before the Clear coat was applied.


Door handles were removed so why not the gas door. Doesnt the gas door deserve just as much attention. Well it got what it wanted. The door was painted 360 degrees to make sure its fully covered. We really dont want anyone to know that the car was originally white.


The Frost White color really is bright before clear is applied. This ofcourse is the rear after basecoat was applied from the rear.

From the front it looks like barely anything is actually being painted right now. The bumpers were painted by themselves becuase they needed adherence promoter because they are plastic. Then they were sealed before base coat.


Even though the car was just painted and has not left the filtered air of the paint booth, the car is wiped with a tack cloth. The cloth is like a shop wrag thats sticky. It will pick up any small hairs or dust left over from the base coat being sprayed on.

Before Clear coat over the Base Frost white

The paint really looks slick after the clear coat was applied. After this layer becomes tacky another layer of clear is applied. Theres no need to worry about runs at this point as the entire body will be wet sanded and buffed then polished to a Glass shine. Wet sanding removes "Orange Peel". This is somthing caused by the paint slowly moving down with gravity after its sprayer but before its dried. Its a wavy look that most if not all OEM Paint jobs have from the factory. they simply will not take the time to remove the waves.

Removing the door handles made it easier to get to all these edges. I have seen handles painted on the car and they are fine about ten feet away but when you see them up close there are tons of flaws and uncolvered areas. Most get away with that because they painted the car the same color it was before. so a missed spot is not a big deal.


I took this one for my family. I think they were suspecting that I sold my car as I have not had it for a month and its been 6 weeks since they have seen it. I really am getting to warm up to not having a badge. I think that I can survive without it , if its no longer avialable from the dealer.



Bumper as I seen it. I was not hear for the front a rear bumper being painted. They were painted during the day and I was at work. The front and rear bumper were painted together. They both had adhesion promoter applied and sealer. The piece at the bottom of the windshield was painted too at the same time.




The hood was wet sanded about 15 minutes before this picture and then buffed with three progressive compounds from 3M. The hoods orange peel is almost non existant and clear is like glass.




Here is this picture of the difference between W26 Frost White and W12 Northstar White. This picture was takin at dusk but I feared that the next day Mr. Jolley would be putting the Eclipse / Talon back together agian. Then the line would be gone behind a tail light at that point.



Wow the car is pulled out of the booth now. I really with it already had the front bumper on hood for this picture. I am thinking the car will be back together and drivable tonight and tomorrow do all the Wet sanding and buffing. This is good though as it will give me time to remove the racing suede seats so better mounts can be made and the Apexi Fuel computer and new injectors and O2 sensor can be put in. The right turn signal wire came loose. i believe it was pulled loose when removing the front bumper. I hade soldered the wire and then Hot glued the gap closed to seal the inside of the turn signal. Tail lights and turn signals are notorious for getting water in them after a bumper has been removed. I will do it agian. Its a small price to pay for you ride to have some sweet new clothes :)

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