Dirk Diggler rides again! ?77 Corvette, full wet sand and buff by Rasky?s Auto Detail

[bbquer]

just in case i polish through the clear coat.

[BradE]

There is really no way to measure clearcoat thickness at home. You must take the car to a pro and have the clearcoat measured with an electronic thickness gauge.



Make sure the shop has one of the gauges before you go, not all places have them because they are pretty expensive.

[Lemonxxs]

The paint thickness measuring devices measure total paint thickness not just the clear. Do not remove more than .3 mill and you should be ok if none has been removed so far.

[BradE]

Guess is correct an electronic thickness gauge will read the total film build. That is E-Coat + Surface Primer + Base Coat + Clearcoat= Total Film Build.

[picorrect]

When you see yellow on the applicator......STOP

[imported_RaskyR1]

For those of you who may be wondering who Dirk Diggler is, I strongly recommend renting the movie ?Boogie Nights?

This 1977 Corvette belongs to the mother of my roommate. The car has been in the family for over 20 years now, but unfortunately it has not been driven in years. Since his mother can no longer drive the car they decided to get it running so they could try and sell it. As most of you already know, cars are meant to be driven, and when they are left to sit for long periods of time things start to go bad. Since my roommate is very mechanically inclined he offered to fix the parts that needed to be replaced prior to sale and also asked me if I?d help him restore the finish. Obviously I couldn?t say no to working on Dirk?s car!

It had been over 10 years since the car was repainted and there was noticeable shrink in the paint as well as many washed induced swirls from over the years. Having talked with the painter we learned that there was at least 3 coats of clear used when it was painted and the car had only been lightly sanded after the initial repaint?which meant we should have a safe amount of paint to work with.

Here is the car prior to correction. As you can see there is heavy marring and light oxidation in the paint.

















Here you can see the rough distorted texture of the paint as a result of the shrinking over the last 10 years.





We first did a few test panels using various grit paper to determine which route we wanted to go with.





The deciding sanding process was to use the following:

• 3M 1500 grit on the PCXP
• Mirka Abralon 2000 grit on the PCXP
• Mirka Abralon 4000 grit on the PCXP

Initially I had planned to remove the sanding scratches with the PCXP and Surbuf pads as it worked effortlessly in my test panel. I also felt it was a tool my roommate could handle. However, once I started looking at all the sharp edges it was clear that the rotary would be the better option as it allows me to buff off/away from the edges, which is necessary when trying to remove sanding scratches close to the edge.

Sanded pics





Testing out the Surbuf pads on the door





The deciding polishing process for the sanding scratch removal was as follows:

• M105 via rotary with Meguiars Solo wool pad (finished out very nice too)
• Menzerna Power Finish via PCXP and Cyan LC pad (roommate helped with this step)
• Menzerna 106fa via rotary and Crimson LC pad

Our choice for LSP was Blackfire Wet-Diamond, tires were clean with Optimum Power Clean and dressed with Meguiars Hyper Dressing. All chrome trim was polished with Optimum Metal Polish.

Keep in mind this job was really under the gun, which limited the amount of pics I was able to take. The work on this car took place over 3 evenings after we both finished with our regular jobs. The idea was to get the car done by Friday so that he could drive it home for a family wedding to show his mom and family. A total of 15hrs were spent on this job, which is far less than I would normally spend as I like to take my time and hate being rushed. I did have the help of my roommate though, and he handled all the fine detailing and even helped with the 2nd polishing step. We finally finished late Thursday night and I came back on my lunch break Friday afternoon to take some sun pics before he left town. I decided to do a quick wipe down with some Z8 to remove any light dust which ended up streaking the paint a little and I really didn?t have time to deal with it before taking the pics?I?m sure you can see it in a few of them?

[imported_RaskyR1]

After pics






























As always, thank you for taking the time to view my work.

Rasky

[imported_Flash Gordon]

Very nice work Chad. She looks like she just rolled out of the paintbooth yesterday. Very nice work indeed @-)

On a side note. I burned through the LF fender on a vette that was very similar to this one over 20 years ago. I will never forgive myself for that one

[bmw5541]

Hey Chad,

You have a roomate? Didn`t you just get married? Does your wife know about said roomate?:devil:

It is hard to see from the pictures that there are any flaws on the car, but there is one thing that I was able to see. The car looked a million times better then it did before.:clap:

Very nice work as always Chad!!:thumbup:

[imported_Luster]

Hey Rasky... there`s living proof that you CAN bring an ole beater Corvette back to life! Nice work... the Vette looks great!ancing Dot:

[imported_RaskyR1]

Very nice work Chad. She looks like she just rolled out of the paintbooth yesterday. Very nice work indeed @-)

On a side note. I burned through the LF fender on a vette that was very similar to this one over 20 years ago. I will never forgive myself for that one

Thanks Flash!

It definitely doesn`t take much to burn through one of those edges that`s for sure. That 1/8 and 1/4 3M tape is perfect for those areas....expensive stuff though!

Hey Chad,

You have a roomate? Didn`t you just get married? Does your wife know about said roomate?:devil:

It is hard to see from the pictures that there are any flaws on the car, but there is one thing that I was able to see. The car looked a million times better then it did before.:clap:

Very nice work as always Chad!!:thumbup:

LOL! Thanks Barry!

I guess I should call them renters now instead of roommates, though they have lived with me for 7 years now. I still have my home but have moved in with the wife. She sends me back over there when I`m bad!

Hey Rasky... there`s living proof that you CAN bring an ole beater Corvette back to life! Nice work... the Vette looks great!ancing Dot:

Thanks Bill! I figured you`d like this one being similar to your baby and all.






I should add one other funny bit to this story....

My roommate purchased his cell phone many years ago and at the time his best friend work at the Sprint store. I **** you not, his mail came to my house addressed as "Dirk Diggler" and even caller ID came up that way! I know his mail changed now to his real name but I think caller ID still comes up as Dirk! Made for some hilarious phone calls back in the day when we ordered Pizza!


Rasky

[Street Dreams]

Outstanding work on a great car!

And boogie nights is an awesome movie!

[EclecTech]

....A total of 15hrs were spent on this job

15 Hours! I couldn`t have done that in 15 days.

That was quite an after hours undertaking - nice work. :clap:

Jack

[imported_RaskyR1]

Outstanding work on a great car!

And boogie nights is an awesome movie!

Thanks Dave!

Awesome movie indeed! :thumbup:

15 Hours! I couldn`t have done that in 15 days.

That was quite an after hours undertaking - nice work. :clap:

Jack

Thanks Jack! I did have help too don`t forget.

[imported_glfahlc]

i have this affinity for red vettes and you made that one look like new paint... great job... has she sold it yet and for how much