Yes. The Nightmare. You read that right.
But first? Assembly!
Tail end assembled!
Just look at dat ass.
nom nom nom
Just look at that!!!! The joy! There are no words. All the stripes. All the parts.
Love.
Front assembly.
The Dark Side.
So happy.
And that’s about 4 hours of my labor. I put everything back together myself. Jerry helped a bit. Ken painted another Miata. I wrenched. It was fantastic.
And then…
Hosed down.
Look at that blue.
Like a dream.
Sharka got a quick washies. I was so happy. The parts were pretty dirty from shop dust and assembly. I snapped pix.
Ken sprays Sharka down.
This is Ken. He’s been in a few shots. He owns the shop and painted Sharka. Ken is a very kind man. I’m extremely happy to have him working on my beloved Roadster.
He is also very evil.
The nightmare.
After spraying down the car, the sanding tools came out. I had no problem with this.
“Grab that chamois over in the cart and dry your car” said Ken. I again had no problem. I dried Sharka.
“Here. Grab a sanding block and sand your car.”
I was a deer in the headlights.
Me. Sanding my precious new paint right off.
“But. But. I’ll fuck it up.”
“No you won’t. It’s just wet sanding. And we can fix anything even if you do.”
“But. But.”
“Shush. You’ll do fine.”
I was shown what to do. I watched and then I sanded. And I sanded. And I sanded.
And I sanded.
Sharka’s shiny paint got sanded at my inexperienced hands.
Sanded.
Flattened out.
And in the end? I now feel extremely confident color sanding a car. I know how the orange peel feels, how it feels when it goes away, what to do, and what not to do.
This is knowledge I never wanted to have nor expected to get when I woke up.
Thank you, Ken. You, sir, are awesome. I never dreamed I’d be this involved in the repaint. It’s seriously more than I ever hoped.
Next episode: Polishing and final assembly.
I would have taken a hostage and shots would have been fired… I can’t even… Cannot wait to see the final product. So awesome that you found a shop that allowed you to have so much exposure to the process and even on that put you to work!
The amount I’ve done and the amount I’ve learned… I think I could fill a few typed pages. It’s been amazing.
As Bryan said in a comment, even if the result is just okay, I more than got my money’s worth.
I can SEE the “deer in the headlights” look!
I hope your heart rate is back to normal now.
What an amazing gift to be able to be part of the process; most shops would never consider allowing that no matter how much you begged.
Nothing but envy here!.
I came back to read through my whole paint blog. And when I saw the sanding photos? The heart rate did indeed shoot up! hahaha
Still can’t believe how much I got to do.
This is the sort of thing that, yeah, it sucks when you have to do it, but in 5 years when your paint still looks great? You’ll be glad you did it. =)
I had a very tiny scratch on the bumper. No idea how it happened, just a scratch about the width of a pencil going in a straight line up and down. Like someone had maybe nudged Sharka in a parking lot (I’ve driven like 20 miles so far.)
Instead of being in tears, I whipped out my grandfather’s non-orbital polisher and quickly took care of the mark. No drama. No excess paint removal. Just a quick buff with some fine cut cleaner and a polish.
I didn’t have those skills two months ago. I got so much more out of this experience than just a (beautifully) painted car…