oh man, I can't wait to see it painted

 

Yeah me too! Few more steps and I might be able to call it done. Hope I can have it done within the 1 year that I have had it.

 

That would be pretty good. That won't happen with mine and I want to get all the mods done on it that I want to before I go for paint

 

Can't believe it's already been a year! Seems like only a little while ago you dragged her out from under that tree.

 

Dude I know! Crazy how time flies. My wife reminds me all the time about it LOL.

 

Love the job so far. I also have a Z28 vert, a 1991. Black with grey interior; the seats are actually grey and red out of a 97 Camaro. I also love the cleaning tips; I'll keep them in mind, I think I'm gonna take a break this year and let someone else clean and wax mine up LOL.

Just one quick question; you mentioned you got a new tonneau cover release switch? Where from? I noticed it looks just like mine, yellow and all, only mine goes in the console. Been looking for one for a long time so I can also replace the window switches with some that have the pictures still on them.

 

Thanks man. Its been fun.

I got lucky and I found it on ebay brand new and I didn't pay a millions dollars for it.

 

Love this thread. Awesome work man. I do have a question that maybe you can answer... my Dad has a '92 Z28, Z03 car that we picked up last year that had just been repainted the factory white. We are wanting to paint the heritage stripes on instead of the decal, do you know what the correct factory red color is for the hood blisters? I'm not sure if it was the same color "red" as the factory painted red cars or not, but I want it to be the factory correct shade of red if I'm going to the trouble to do it. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

 

I assume its the same color red, and the same color red as the full red body color cars. I think I posted what color I used or I asked the question somewhere in this thread... I'll have to look when I get a chance.

Glad your enjoying and appreciate the work I have been putting into the old girl. This being my first "build" thread I have been having fun posting up almost everything I have been doing with it.

 

2 more weeks... Getting excited to see it. Not excited to pay for it, but such is life.

 

Well body shop jail is what it is... JAIL! It's 3 weeks after it was supposed to be done, and it gonna be another 2 weeks, which probably means another 3 weeks on top of that. Getting a little frustrated now.

 

Is paint going to cost you an Arm and a Leg? My car is going in for paint after I get back from deployment/overseas. I already paid for it, but I want to hold off until I pull the engine and get it finished so I don't worry about scratching it.

 

Unfortunately thats how it always seems to happen with bodywork and paint, my buddys going through the same thing on the truck hes restoring. That is the main reason why I did it myself in my garage! Good luck!

 

Paint prison - mine served some time too.

 

No its not. Its a HS buddy of mine, and he paints all my stuff, and I reffer anyone that asks his way, so kinda getting a kick back price. But I have been waiting to get in there since November. It's really hard to complain much when he is throwing me a bone on the price.

I have always had very fast turn around from his shop, so this is out of the norm, but I can't paint good enough to want to try to improve my skills on this one, so I'm stuck.

Guess they all do at one point or another

 

I was hoping to see her all bright and painted by this time.

Guess we'll just have wait until the "sentence" is up.

 

Your telling me! I have had a pile of cash hiding in my closet burning a hole. On a positive note I have been able to flip 3 different cars since my car was supposed to have been done, and made enough extra money to pay for some fun stuff on the 91

 

Must. See. Black. And. Red. Paint.

 

Just started reading this thread and appreciated the instant gratification on the progress by catching up on a thread. So this part is killing me. If paint is taking this long I bet the black is going to look like glass. Can't wait to see it. Any thought of showing off the finished product to the previous owner to rub it in or maybe to get him to dig deep in his pocket to take it back from you?

 

I hope it looks like glass. I told him my expectations and told him it needs to be better than my 91 if it was gonna take this long... he laughed. He does a lot of the paint work for Pinkee's Rod shop Riddler winning shop, so I know he has the skill to do it.

Thanks for reading up on it all. I have been bummed with my lack of things to post about it.

I guess as an update... I got new brake pedal pad, mint dash pad, new emblems, and Z28 embroidered floor mats for it waiting to be installed. I'm really pushing to have both my cars ready to show at the Denver Super Chevy show, and try to take both the stock and modified classes. Last time I showed I won first in modified with my 91.

 

I get it back today!!!!

I cannot wait to take pics and share with all you guys! I haven't seen one pic of it. I'm nervous, but really have no reason to lol

 

Unfortunately I have seen it. Orange peel, uneven base coat, and over spray that's horrible. Jk!

 

I hate you! Just mean lol. Its raining so he is waiting to bring it back this afternoon so it won't need a wash when he delivers.

 

ohh i wanna see pics

 

 

Well here it is...

Got a few little flaws that I was a little bummed to see, but guess when your getting the buddy discount its hard to really complain too hard... even though I want too.






I need to wash and detail it better. Still has polishing dust on the wheels, and the top is dull with dust/dirt, so I'm gonna be playing for a while tonight. I'll post more pics as I put the new emblems on and finish up the exterior

 

Nice! What are some of the flaws? :/ It looks nice in the pictures tho! lol

 

Looks good! Are they some dirt nibs in the clear? If so those can be easily sanded out

 

There is a sag in the paint under the drivers mirror, and two spots where the fine line tape lifted allowing the pinstripe edge to be soft on the rear spoiler, and a couple spots where he could have done a better job sanding/polishing.

He did mess up the piping on my drivers seat where he rubbed it getting in and out and I'm very pissed about it and he is getting a phone call in the morning about it.

Overall I got some small defects in a paint job that didn't cost me nearly as much as it should have. Hard to whine about too much, other than the seat!

Thanks man! I'm happy with it all and all. I just wanna stay up all night putting on emblems and such.

 

Happy to be able to start adding pics again

 

Hmm..yea even though you didnt pay much, thats still all kinda unacceptable. He should know what the car means to you, and that he should take great care of it. Id be whining too. lol Hopefully you can fix any of the imperfections and make it right the way you want it

 

Wow. Looks good in the pictures. Highly envious of the trunk lid.... Mostly because the clear coat is coming off mine and it looks like crap. Sorry about the seat... Guess if I learned anything from your experience it's redo the seats AFTER paint....

 

Even though it has some little problems in it, it still is a huge improvement over what you started with.

And yeah, just because you got the buddy discount doesn't really mean he gets a free pass to do a less-than-satisfactory job. Especially to the seat.

 

Yeah the more I thought about the flaws in the paint work the more irritated I became, and with a knot in my stomach I called him this morning.... Its going back to him in a couple hours.

Yeah the pics do look good. It doesn't look bad in person, but could have been better. Yeah I'm gonna message Princess and see if she can just whip me up a seat back cover. I have never provided him with a seat cover, cause in his shop he has always used them and my car came back better than it went in. This one he did at his home shop in his home spray booth, and I think this is where he failed to follow the same quality control procedures that he has used in the past at his actual shop. Disappointment for sure on that.

I agree about the huge improvement! I'm still very excited to get the top off and drive this shiny beaaach. I agree on the free pass, and as I said above I called him this morning and I am taking it back at lunch for him to repair the flaws, and we are gonna talk about the seat when he see it.

I used to recommend all my friends and people I met to him, and his shop, and honestly I'm not going to after this. I run a very sucessful auto repair shop, but we don't do body work, and all the body work was reffered to him. His choice to provide marginal quality will come back to him with reduced refferals.

 

Here are some more pics I snapped after I rinsed it off and scrubbed the top to get all dust out of it.

 

Is it me.. or those stripes DON'T look right?

 

Might be the shine playing tricks? The car is back in his shop, but the shape matches very close to the heritage stripes on my 91, and he laid the new stripes over the top of the old ones...

What part looks off to you? If there is something I'm missing I better find it while its back in his shop!

 

The bottom contours of the heritage stripes. The stripe on the left (from driver's pont of view) looks spot on, the right side does not match the other side... the curved outside edge appears to be "elongated" and has a slightly different radius?

 

Man you might be right... I'm having a hard time telling from the pics. I might have to make a visit to the his shop today.

 

I have a bout of OCD. Otherwise the car is looking REALLY good!

 

I noticed the same thing after you said that. Hmm? This is all getting very interesting lol

 

are the headlight pockets suppose to be satin?? something doesnt look factory to me either. i think the red stripes are just a little crooked, look at them at the hood edge, distance from bottom of stripe to hood edge

 

You're right the stripes aren't the same, good eyes

 

Yes guys! Good eyes!!! I missed it. Among all the other stuff that drove me crazy about this, I missed that. I called him to let him know I'm coming over and he sent me a pick saying he already found it, and is re-doing the stripes on the hood and spoiler.

The headlight pockets would be satin on any other body color, except black vehicles. Black ones they did not paint them satin from factory.

This has been way too stressful for what should have been a super happy time.

 

All good brother... you'll get it sorted, and you'll be even happier yet!

 

Its very good that hes working with you, and realizes some of the stuff and isnt fighting it with you. Thats what friends are for

 

Aren't you guys being just a bit picky? The car looks great to me. I can see the things you're talking about and if I paid a premium price for a paint job, I would expect a premium job. But when a friend does it for a discounted price, I'd cut him a little slack. I've seen brand new cars with minor paint/graphics defects sitting on a showroom floor. Sure, sags and such should be taken care of but do you really think that the majority of people are ever going to notice that the stripes are a little crooked? If you not willing to cut some him slack, you should have gone with a high dollar paint job.
As far as not refering people to him because of a few minor issues, I would think that the fact he's willing to work with you on them is a definite plus. The bottom line to me is that a friendship is worth more than a paint job. Especially one that looks as good as yours does.

Sorry, your car and just my opinion. It does look good though!

 

Yeah I will, and I'm sure it will all turn out better than it was before.

I'm very happy he is making it right for me. Just sucks that for 3 months he had this car he never once noticed some of the problem area's until after he hands the keys back and takes my pile of cash.


I hear what your saying, but I don't agree in this situation. Picky yeah kinda... This is the same guy that has painted 3 of my vehicle with custom paint including my 91 with heritage stripes. All of which were done with exacting meticulous attention to detail. So when I contact him to schedule and estimate the job last summer, we discuss what I need/want done. He says late Oct, or Nov... fine. He has some stuff happen in his life that pushes it out to May 1st in his hands. We again discuss work, and that I expect it to come out as nice as my 91. "No problem, you know me man" So great. Keep in touch with him. Supply him with the pieces he ask for, that need replacement. We talk that we are still on track with price, and he says no, that it took more time than he figured and to get it the way I want it we would need almost another 1K... OK! I want it to look correct. I supplied him with additional measurements on the stripes front and rear to duplicate the OE vinyl look in paint...

Giving someone a break on the price of a service doesn't mean that you decrease the quality of the work supplied. Especially when the quality of the work has been discussed, and price increased to ensure that the quality I wanted was done.

If someone said "Hey I can give you a discount... I'll do X for 1/2 price, but I'm gonna do it 1/2 price" Nobody would every take a discount of any sort buddy or not.

I will not likely continue to reffer work to him, as I have a reputation to up hold in town. Will we still drink beers at the race track or a car show... Yeah.

 

Given past history, it makes perfect sense for you to expect the same quality you had received in the past. So all of that being said, it sounds like he was trying to get one over on you. Under those circumstances, I guess I'd be a little picky too.

I still think your paint job looks great though.

 

I think it did too, but enough of the small stuff and the torn seat to really sour the situation. Then you start looking a little harder at other areas.

OH WELL Getting fixed