damnit looks so good I'm pissed cause now I gotta work to make mine look even a fraction as good as this one

 

Seen this up again with old pics and gotta say nice job!!!! (again) really looks crisp and clean. The only thing I might suggest is to blacken area behind cowl. I'm not being critical just noticed when I seen pics of mine (but I went as far to rework cowl to even out vent holes) so probably just me. Also way to set car apart from others will know thats yours when I see it!!!!!

 

I was hoping for a little more specifics than that... like how much he had to take out of the engine bay, how far down he painted it. I can also see that he repainted the radiator support, hood latch, everything. Just wanted to see how far he had to go to make it look like that.

 

he mentioned getting overspray on the lid and frc so i suppose he didnt remove much of anything.

he probably just covered everything and taped off what he needed
as for prep work, id assume he degreased everything, then ran some sand paper over it to get it ruffed up. from the quality, he probably wet sanded it after he was finished as well

 

sometimes at night, when im laying in my bed and I cant sleep. I still think to myself "**** thieves, crimsonbird's car was a masterpiece"

 

What ever happened to the "new project"?

 

Damn I completely forgot to ever come back and update this thread with some of the pictures taken during the process. Gonna go through the old pics tomorrow and try to post some up for the people wondering how much was taken apart for painting.

I'm getting pretty damn close to be able to share a build thread and posting some pics. Got a teaser pic/vid on Instagram (j_larieau), but other than that I'm waiting till it's drive-able (hopefully within the next few days). Just got it finally running this past week. Now I'm trying to get loose ends tied up... The main thing to get done is replacing the master cylinder which was leaking.. Which means I have to re-customize the replacement unit and re-run new custom bent lines.. I'm not happy about having to redo all of that.

 

I am a follower!

 

Your new project is looking clean as always James. Keep up the awesome work and can't wait to see your build thread!

 

....Crimson how about the pics during the process

 

thanks tino. working on the build thread now.. so many pics.. so much info
better late than never? lots of pics, so I uploaded them kind of small.


going through these pics and looking back at the work done I definitely saw some things I'm not too proud of.. but hey, we all gotta start somewhere! I'd give the work overall a solid C-. luckily all of those lessons learned helped me with the new build.. which I'd like give a B+ or so.


all started with the extra 3M CF vinyl I had lying around. started out with simple covers that had been in the engine bay for years.. battery cover, pcm cover, brake fluid reservoir cover






didn't like the idea of doing the entire power steering reservoir, so I chose to do only the top.. gotta measure it right and make a good template. once it was installed I cut the excess from the circle




upped the difficulty level a bit with the radiator core support top





new decals and paint for the fuse box covers





as you can see there, with the new covers, the rest of the box looks really bad in comparison, as well as the positive battery AUX cover, so those too would then be removed and painted. also did the coolant overflow reservoir, and the oil and trans dipsticks





painted the bolts as a temporary thing, since I planned to buy the package from specialized stainless/ yofab. (with my new build I just went to Ace Hardware and purchased all new bolts for everything in the engine bay.. much nicer, and pretty damn cheap)




fuel rail covers had been hacked like crazy out of frustration (plus improper tools) years earlier trying to get them to fit.. they looked a mess. still didn;t have the best tools for the job, but was able to clean the cuts up a bit. I painted silver over the letters and all first, then taped off the letters and lines, then painted black for the recessed areas. (DO NOT WASTE YOUR TIME DOING THIS. a seller on ebay sells vinyl decals to go over the lines and letters.)

 

slp lid. maf painted gloss black




revisited the battery cover to add the new decals.. measure very well and be precise. Even with all of my measuring I still screwed up the first time (these pics), it was off very slightly, with the decals sloping down to the right, off by about 1mm. luckily he sent me an extra set so I was able to redo it.






the subtlety is what I love about this combo of vinyl/decals, from certain angles you couldn't even really notice the graphics, and from other directions they stood out well.





installed, along with the pass. side wire tuck... left a LOT to be desired. so I set out to clean up the fenders. (side note: for all of the black pieces at the front of the engine bay.. the brackets and windshield wiper bottle and all, I had disassembled and removed all of that stuff and painted it gloss black. did that stuff earlier on and don't have pics of it)



sent the air hose through the fender just like the passenger side.






Didn't get a pick of the holes welded up, but that's pretty self explanatory. I also filled/smoothed all of these dimples, there are about 6 on each fender iirc



the body work.. I used basic bondo for this, along with the spot putty as a final filler for the smaller imperfections afterwards.

 

taping and masking off, then onto primer. as you can see I just unbolted the brake fluid reservoir and master cylinder and tied them off the the side







removed the first layer of masking, did some more sanding/prep work, then went in with LOTS of foil, tape and newspaper to get everything covered. the foil works very well. I removed or set aside only the things in the immediate area, leaving most of the engine bay intact... of course this means that you'll probably get over spray in places where you don't want it, and you won't be able to do as thorough of a job.. so If you don't plan on dropping the motor just to clean up the engine bay a bit, these are the downsides you can expect. Luckily with my new build I was able to do EVERYTHING thouroughly before assembly.

















the over spray does look worse than it was though, most of that was just dust that wiped away with a rag. the only real over spray issues I had were from the primer.

and after all of that..

http://www.flickr.com/photos/la-rue/7916090230/


new engine bay thread coming soon

 

Awesome! Thanks for the pics, I got a couple new ideas. I revamped my engine bay too but I used an old bed sheet when I painted the wheel wells. The sheet worked out pretty good and I got no over-spray or dust anywhere, just another tip for anybody trying this out.

 

Thanks for the pics James, did you use the Dupli-color factory red spray can paint? I need to file some holes also and could use a touch up. Thanks

 

Thanks for the pictures! Was very informative and can't wait to see the new build thread.

 

I think I missed something here. Are you redoing your stolen TA or is this a different TA? Either way, it looks awesome.

 

He posted detailed pics of his old stolen TA. It's not a new one.

Thanks for posting those James.

 

This is my old Trans am. Just jow finally posting the pics I took while working with the engine bay. I've got a second gen im working with now.

 

Excellent work, sorry that car was stolen, hope those rotten ******* burn! I have to ask; what camera do you shot your pics with? they look outstanding! Cant wait to see the new ride bro!