SP1600 Restoration after the fender-bender

[Bushpig]

HR, It is Bushpig at the Paarl office. Louisroux red beetle can be seen from the road just before crossing the railway line.
It would have been great if you poped in. Christo was there, louisroux didn;t come for the pannel, Jolas was tied up, but the chat was good.
Helped take the call joints out of Timones Bus. Sorry we missed each other.

[rouxlouis]

Hi Bushpig, Jolas, HR & Christo.
My sincere apologies for missing you guys. The flu had me man down since Friday and I did not follow the thread.
However, Bushpig, it's wonderful news that you found some panels!!!! What would you ask for them and can I take them off your hands?
Please advise when you will be around after hours for a quick meet.
I feel a lot better now and hopefully the winter-sniffles will stay away for good.
Regards

Louis

[rouxlouis]

Slowly but surely the rear-end is coming on.....compaired to the initial damage...

[Bushpig]

Hey dude nice progress. I am still getting some stuff together for sand balsting and will give you a shout when ready. Hope it's not urgent.
How far are you with the door pannels? Do you just want the pockets since you may need to recover the pannels anyway. I have found a pair which I may want to hold on to I will check them out. But when you are closer to needing them I may give them up for the sake of completing yours. The thing is they match some seats I have (I think). I will hold them for you if you come short. Have the drivers pocket on hold for you.
I will come for a visit sometime as I have to drop a donnor bus for Timone one weekend coming.
Till Later.

[rouxlouis]

Yesterday it was time to give some good tender loving care to my petrol tank.
Went down to bare metal, re-primed it and gave it black basecoat and afterwards a bit of clearcoat.
No mess, no fuss and now it looks brand spanking new:

[jolas]

looks great - I'm busy with my '59 bus petrol tank, just not getting it right with the primer for some odd reason, leaving a very rough sandpaper(ish) finish - not sure what I'm doing wrong ...

[arnocill]

looks great - I'm busy with my '59 bus petrol tank, just not getting it right with the primer for some odd reason, leaving a very rough sandpaper(ish) finish - not sure what I'm doing wrong ...

Normal grey primer are very thin and won't hide any sandpaper marks. You must try ms primer wich is a filler type primer and then you sand it till smooth.

Rouxlouis did you clean the tank on the inside as well? I need to clean mine and are looking for some advice.

[rouxlouis]

Hi Guys

Paul, I agree with Arno.
MS Filler Primer is the best. Otherwise you can use the normal grey primer and not thin it out too much. About 4 coats should do the trick.

Arno, yes I did clean the tank on the inside. I noticed a few rusty sections so I took the advice from a friend.
You take small stones (crusherdust) normally used to tar roads and ad it int the tank. Add a bit of sunlight liquid and water and then the shaking begins. Continue to shake the tank up and down, left and right.
Throw out all the contents and repeat until you have achieved the adequite result.
Simply rinse out the tank with a high pressure hose to make sure that you have gotten rid of any residue, dust or flaking.
Leave the tank outside to dry out properly then add a little bit of petrol only to prevent any rust from building up on the inside.
Re-assemble and voila, you're done!

Good luck to both of you.

Kind regards

Louis

[arnocill]

Thanks Louis i will give it a try, my tank have more than a few rust spots. It had been standing dry for a couple of years, so i'll be lucky if there's a few clean spots.

[JamesD]

We did the same thing with a 1946 Willys Jeep fuel tank! more rust came out than stones, but it never broke down again there after! We could finally drive it without having to clean the fuel system every 2 km, was awsome.

Jolas, try a finer sandpaper. Use 1500 grit if need be.

[rouxlouis]

Hi JamesD
Hahahaha, good laugh! The stone trick really works! Hope you finally got the remaining stones out!!!
@ Arno' you just have to continue shaking that tank and hit that rust where it hurts the most! Don't give up and never say it's hopeless.
Those little stones really do their job!

[jolas]

Thanks guys, I think I'm not getting the air and paint settings right on the spray gun - I'm using a marine type primer which I usually have good results with, however the primer seems to settle in a "granular or powdery" manner, looks and feels like sand in places on the tank

For cleaning inside I tried with stones first, but then used 2 pieces of chain, I also used a high pressure jet inside to get the crud out, after that I used parrafin with the chains, kept shaking and leaving the tank in various positions for a week - unbelievable the stuff that came out

[JamesD]

If you careful you can also buy concrete cleaner and pout that in, the acid will take the rust out and leave it all shiney...

[rouxlouis]

Hi Pauly!

Are you using a gravity feed gun? If so, set your compressor on 2 Bar and spray your MS primer on really thick. If you sanded down to bare metal, make sure you finished bare on 220 grit. Prime and flat with 800grit water paper. Basecoat and then clear. Be certain not to throw your basecoat on too thick or too fast. Allow enough time to flash-off between coats. Throwing too many coats too fast causes texturising and cracking. Also make sure that you spray in temperatures above 23 degrees celsius. Patience is a virtue in this game, less is more!

[jolas]

Gravity gun yes - thanks will adjust the pressure on the compressor, I think this is the problem, I'm not too worried about the finish of the tank, must just not rust again and look ok inside the engine compartment - thanks Louis and all