1980 Pontiac LeMans Station Wagon
08-03-2014, 09:16 PM
#81
Here you can see the difference in the holes for the delay wiper motor vs. the two speed unit. I purposely knocked out the outermost upper nut to make room for a larger nut/bolt combo. Reason being that the early cars use smaller bolts, and that just didn't sit right with me - the bottommost bolt remains to ease installation; however, I believe this small bolt/nut could be retained if so desired.
08-13-2014, 08:34 AM
#83
Rather than spend $400+ dollars on another used dash, and since there are no aftermarket dash caps available, I dove head first into a shallow pond and decided to repair ours. If you are familiar with these dashes you'll notice how much expanding foam has been removed from the backside of the dash, and the whole dash has been trimmed back to make room for any repairs and for general clean up (again very dirty/dusty back there).
The gashes and warps were ground down, picked and beveled out, small holes drilled out around the perimeter of the gash to make for fingers to allow the fibreglass/filler (50/50 mix of short strand and plastic body filler) to hold it together, and finally a coat of straight filler. There is also a small piece of MDF added to strengthen a very well shrunken/swollen section of the middle dash.
The speaker holes are filled to be drilled out with a hole saw to fit the new taller coaxial Polk 3.5" speakers; there are some screens on order from China to hide them. This will be done after the top of the dash is done being capped with fibreglass sheet (currently curing) to prevent future splitting.
And then more filler... I hate doing body work.
It will be finished with Duplicolor Truckbed coating and some Duplicolor black vinyl paint.
The gashes and warps were ground down, picked and beveled out, small holes drilled out around the perimeter of the gash to make for fingers to allow the fibreglass/filler (50/50 mix of short strand and plastic body filler) to hold it together, and finally a coat of straight filler. There is also a small piece of MDF added to strengthen a very well shrunken/swollen section of the middle dash.
The speaker holes are filled to be drilled out with a hole saw to fit the new taller coaxial Polk 3.5" speakers; there are some screens on order from China to hide them. This will be done after the top of the dash is done being capped with fibreglass sheet (currently curing) to prevent future splitting.
And then more filler... I hate doing body work.
It will be finished with Duplicolor Truckbed coating and some Duplicolor black vinyl paint.
08-13-2014, 09:28 PM
#84
Yeah... so... about all that work you did yesterday? You need to start over.
So I peeled it all off, which is alarming how easy it was to do; but, in retrospect it was a blessing.
Then I drilled a billion 1/16" holes to promote mechanical adhesion so that the cap shouldn't lift, shift, and/or warp. Also, failure of the first attempt can also be attributed to trying to do it with a single sheet of fibreglass sheet, this time it was put together with about a dozen pieces; and I reduced the amount of activator/hardener I used in the epoxy to increase my working time from 15 minutes to about 30 minutes (a big stress reducer).
Let's hope it works out tomorrow upon review.
So I peeled it all off, which is alarming how easy it was to do; but, in retrospect it was a blessing.
Then I drilled a billion 1/16" holes to promote mechanical adhesion so that the cap shouldn't lift, shift, and/or warp. Also, failure of the first attempt can also be attributed to trying to do it with a single sheet of fibreglass sheet, this time it was put together with about a dozen pieces; and I reduced the amount of activator/hardener I used in the epoxy to increase my working time from 15 minutes to about 30 minutes (a big stress reducer).
Let's hope it works out tomorrow upon review.
08-14-2014, 12:48 PM
#85
Staging Lane
Join Date: May 2014
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LeMans Nice thread! I think it's great that you are working on LeMans. My first car was a 79 LeMans Coupe. I miss that car even 20 years later. I still find myself looking for one to build up. Good luck with your build!
08-16-2014, 11:51 AM
#88
Wet sanded it all last night with 220 grit before heading to bed... had a bitch of a time falling asleep due to the anticipation of spraying it (in my younger years I would work for days straight without sleep to complete a project (think Friday afternoon to Sunday night because I had to drive a car to work on Monday morning)).
I pre-heated the coating in hot water for about half an hour to get the flow rate up (same theory as Plastidip) due to the high solids in the can. The stuff sprayed well but would start to sputter around the 1/4 to 1/2 can mark, which created a few small globs of coating - I poked at them with a dental pick to try and break them up. Hopefully they settle down some more as the solvents flash off. Also, the can say explicitly not to use on a humid day, but doesn't offer a range on the RH%; it is raining here and has been all week humidity is showing 75% outside. The garage is also around 21-22*C and feels very dry inside. We'll just have to wait and see...
I pre-heated the coating in hot water for about half an hour to get the flow rate up (same theory as Plastidip) due to the high solids in the can. The stuff sprayed well but would start to sputter around the 1/4 to 1/2 can mark, which created a few small globs of coating - I poked at them with a dental pick to try and break them up. Hopefully they settle down some more as the solvents flash off. Also, the can say explicitly not to use on a humid day, but doesn't offer a range on the RH%; it is raining here and has been all week humidity is showing 75% outside. The garage is also around 21-22*C and feels very dry inside. We'll just have to wait and see...
11-16-2014, 02:18 PM
#98
Finally got the shifter mounted painted (about 2 months ago), all assembled and mounted up, and installed yesterday. Wired up the WB02 too (the loose yellow wire is the lead from the gauge to the HP Tuners interface for datalogging/tuning). I am pretty pleased with the way this project turned out. Our 19 month-old daughter was having a blast slapping the shifter between gears: 1-2-1-2-1-2-1... heh.
