Becky,
Sorry to hear about the paint job. Hopefully your body man did a
better job on that work than he did on the paint ( although from the
sounds of it, that may be doughtful).
From your notes on the list I've seen over the last few weeks ( I'm
rather new here) it seems you do a lot of the work on the 'B' yourself.
When it comes time to tackle the paint again ( or when you get
frustrated with the job the last guy did) you might want to consider the
addage 'when you want it done right, do it yourself'.
I found out years ago that to get a 'good' paint job, a good way to go
is :
1. Have someone who knows what they're doing to the body work.
2. Do all the prep work yourself. That everything apart that comes
apart, clean it , prime it , and re-assemble to the point where
you
want to start painting ( sans interior, lights, chrome, accents,
etc.)
3. Go ahead and paint it yourself using a good acrylic lacquer.
(The lacquer is MUCH easier to deal with than enamel, especially
if you didn't take everything down to bare metal.) Use several
coats with a drying period and sanding in between. You'll find
that after the first abortive attemps with the spray gun, that its
not as hard as it sounds, just read a good book on techniques
before you start.
4. Polish everything out, and re-assemble.
This is what I did a few years ago with a TR6 I had. I painted it a
light blue metalic, with dark blue metal flake fogging, and it came out
beautiful ( a final coat of clear also gives a deep look to the paint).
You'll find that a lot of the expense in a paint job is all the grunt
work that goes on before the color. If you can do it yourself, and if
you have the space, the tools needed and the paint are "cheap", and
your labor probably is free.
Of course the down side is you probably won't get it back in a week,
and if it isn't the way you want it there's nobody to complain to...
Just a thought...
Harlan.
'70 B-GT in need of Pale Primrose paint, ...to replace the garbage
the PO had "professionally painted" with.
'72 B needing some minor fender rust spots sorted out, and the
PO's green 'raceing strip' delt with.
-----Original Message-----
From: Becky Mahoney <bmahoney@home.com>
To: Ben Ruset <bruset@home.com>
Cc: mgs@autox.team.net <mgs@autox.team.net>
Date: Tuesday, June 30, 1998 10:14 PM
Subject: Re: Frustrations
>Well Ben...I definately understand your frustrations!!! You have me
>literally beat by a mile....smile, the miles will come!!!
>
>I think you are right to be concerned with the area that was welded.
>The guy that did my body work filled that area in when he was doing some
>patching and it is already cracking :~( He said that there was nothing
>he could do about it. Unfortunately, this is just one of the many
>things I have found wrong with a paint job that was promised to be
>perfect. If you do a color change (don't flame me please) wouldn't it
>be expected to completely remove the doors...and if you removed the
>doors, how could you miss a large portion of the door where it meets the
>body??? If you remove the old color..how could you still have areas
>that are the original color???? This list goes on and on. I am still
>trying to decide whether to demand my money back (which would probably
>wind us up in small claims court), adjust the value of the paint job and
>demand partial monies back, or forget it and chalk it up to a bad
>experience and when the car needs to be repainted...be a better
>consumer. Any advice on this would be appreciated.
>
>Becky
>69 MGB roadster with 0 miles in last 2 years
>
>Ben Ruset wrote:
>>
>> Well, the car is back from the body shop. Unfortunately, the tow truck
>> driver who brought it over scratched the hell out of the front driver's
>> fender. Consequently, it will be back at the body shop getting the fender
>> resprayed.
>>
>> I also found out that the resivoir that holds my brake fluid was leaking,
>> due to a large crack in it. Hence, no brakes. A trip down to Doug's MG
Shop
>> found me buying one for $5. This is about the only good thing that has
>> happened with this car these past several weeks. My mechanic was unable
to
>> install it today - so "maybe" tomorrow it will go on. Great -- I can have
>> the car when I'm supposed to be working.
>>
>> Anyway, the fact that the vertical seam under the doors (78 MGB, by the
>> way) are welded is really starting to get me worried. Does the car flex
>> there? If so, will I start to see my metal bending soon? The fact that
it's
>> not right makes me worried that I've killed any value the car has and
that
>> I will be laughed out of any show I go to as well.
>>
>> All I can say is so far, the "MGB experience" for me has been fairly
>> traumatic - at least over the past two weeks.
>>
>> I do wish that I was able to attend the convention in MD - unfortunately,
>> responsibilities up here beckon, and while my girlfriend's parents are in
>> Bermuda, I get to drive them to the pier in New York City that Sunday. We
>> (my girlfriend and I) may take the rest of the day and roam around Long
>> Island or something. I was thinking of a trip to Montauk or something...
>>
>> *sigh* I've only put ONE MILE on the car since last October. =(
>>
>> BEN RUSET - http://members.home.com/bruset
>> The MGB Haven & MG Cars Webring - http://members.home.com/mgbhaven
>>
>>
>
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