rapair and respray

some of you guys may already know ( mainly those at the southend cruise a while back ) that i had a little accident on the way to it. unfortunatly the damage to the front bumper couldnt be repaired which is a shame as its a genuine TOM's body kit. so after much hunting around for a decent priced bumper i picked up a BLITZ front bumper which will go well with the rest of the TOM's kit.

this write up is just to show the progress of the work which my next door neighbour and i are doing together in his workshop out back.

Mon 4th -

me and my girlfriend started to strip the car of the bits that needed spraying ect, so removed door cards, (for the mirrors that needed spraying, spoiler side bits (technical term)

and damaged front bumper (which is being replaced).

then but it into next doors garage ready for work the following day.

Tue 5th -

striped the console which is also being sprayed to match the car and started to prep it (remove scratches ect)

next door neighbour welded up to cracks in the metal work on the wings that had rust problems and then took the paint of and brought it back.

end of the day (didnt seem like we had made much progress but had faith in it still specialy when i need the car for work next monday.

Wed 6th -

started really late today. my next door neighbour had filled in some blemishes the evening before so it was time to rub it down and smooth it off, whiles i preped the mirrors and spoiler side bits. then it was time to offer the new front bumper up to it.

fitted pretty well apart from we agreed it needed some extra mounting points so custome built some to be fibre glassed on. installed the lights to make sure the lines were all correct.

then we took the front bumper paint back a bit to get rid of some of the stress cracks on a couple of areas.

that was it for today and thats it so far. its amazing how much iv learnt about sanding and bodywork from working on it with my neighour who has had loads of experiances in doing this before.

ill post up the next following days aswell and hopefully should be finnished by sunday.

Thurs 7th -

today we focused on geting the stone chips out and re-inforcing the bumper. this was done by the next door neighbour whiles i farted around with removing the charcoal cannister and cutting the mesh to the right size. this was when the custome brackets went on aswell.

sanding back the stone chips

fitting the brackets (though you cant see them)

re-inforcing the bumper

more still to come though i doubt ill be doing it as i dont trust myself spraying

Fri 8th -

i knda forgot to take some pics today but we finnished of smoothing the stone chips, cleaned and masked off the areas ready for spraying, whiles i cut the mesh to the right shape.

Sat 9th -

i woke up to find the car had already had a couple of coats of primer by the time i was up. the trimwas hanging around drying off. the pics are quite self explanatorie (think thats spelt right)

Getting there

Looking good buddy!

It's coming together fella, I remember your little shunt that nite.

kinda forgot o update this. the cars now on the road. without the spoiler as im waiting till saturday to have it all mopped down. this will be when the mesh goes in as well.

Sun 10th -

well when i got up this morning i found the car had its paint and lacour (dont know if thats right). i thought it looked good but the neighbour was un happy with it. so it was left to dry and then pulled back abit and have it done again. i didnt see a point of taking any pics this time.

Mon 11th -

new paint and lacour was drying nicely so took some pics today

looking good!

Tues -

time to put the car back together again, next doors sorted out the wheel arch liners, wheels, bumper and new clear indicators whiles i worked on the interior trim and headlights.

andtime to bring it out of the garage. think its suiting the rest of the kit well

left the spoiler off though so it would be easyer to mop down on saturday.

so come saturday there will be the final update of work.

well done, its coming along. looks much better imo than the toms front. I didn't think the damaged one could be repaired when i saw the damage done.

looking good fella!

Looks good.

Have you done much spray work before? and is that a dust free workshop? what kind of a finish are you getting?

iv kept well away from the spraying side of things. the workshop is just a very well built workshop with vapour proof spray hop lights and a huge compressor. it isnt dust free but alot of prevention is in place to reduce dust. to be honest it is quite difficult to tell its been resprayed until your up close to it but that will be sorted once its been mopped down this weekend to give it that smooth finnish. the colour is a near perfect match. i know in future hes looking into putting in exstactors ect but that wount be for a while. this is the third car to be done. his first was a 300zx which had a full respray and came out in a stunning matalic blue, then theres his own fto which is currently still ongoing in the rx8 red.

Looks nice . So where is your original TOM's bumper now then?

in the loft. with some nasty cracks in it

Sat 16th -

the next door neighbour rubbed and moped down the re-sprayed body work. then i spent the rest of the day wrestling the mesh and trying to fit that. my arms now look like i self harm. spoiler was put back on the new carbon end caps where fixed in place.

so there we have it. apart from clear side repeaters the body and exterior is finnished.

thanks to broomie who sold me this front bumper. and all those who came back for me when i had the crash and buggered the TOM's front bumper. hope you like.

looks good mate

Nice!

Sorry, not digging that kit.