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My dream of one day getting my car back on the road is finally coming true. I put her in storage in Houston starting in 1993, and then on and off for a few years, and then forever until 2015 thinking I was ready. She then sat my Austin garage for another 3.5 years. Then more life obstacles got in the way, and it wasn't until this spring of 2019 when I really started getting her back to life. Fired her up this spring, and the injectors went out. So essentially took top half of engine out, and put new valve seals while in there. Most everything else has been lots and lots of cleaning.
Haven't really started on the restoration part yet, except for the usual items that break, headliner, headlights, hatch motor, antenna and now radio. Which by the way, wasn't needed when I put her into storage. Time just takes its toll on things.
Also converted a/c to r134 which is working way better than I expected. The next plan is to go full SLP shorties/TOTL exhaust, 3.43 J65 rear end, 1LE factory spindles, disks up front, aluminum drive shaft. Everything will be factory/period correct. But that is a way off yet. I'm pretty tired from all this cleaning!
Been cleaning the seats with a Bissen, amazing how much dirt is in there after 30 years! They are springing back to life very nicely. You can compare with the parts that never say the light of day.
Some motor shots, will be tucking an Edlebrock intake under this at some point, along with SLP shortie exhaust and heads unknown. Anyone have a spare set of SLP heads they are not using?
Thanks for the info, today I ordered the budge cover as well. Went with the 5 layer even though it will be garaged in the winter. Has that nice fleece looking material inside. Looks like it will be a quality item.
I'm sure it can be done if it is not too far gone, the biggest obstacle would be retaining the exact original form - otherwise what is the point. bumpers get repaired all day long, creating that type of material should not be an issue. just doing it so the original form is retained could be hard to do. For the price of a fiberglass spoiler and shipping costs, there is a pretty large budget to work with.
My original thought was to remove as much of the loose degraded material as I could from the splines ( The wing itself is in pretty good shape ) and use a two part foam (if it’s a lot of material) or light weight epoxy filler if it’s less.
My main concern is how it will expand/contract with the original material.
My original thought was to remove as much of the loose degraded material as I could from the splines ( The wing itself is in pretty good shape ) and use a two part foam (if it’s a lot of material) or light weight epoxy filler if it’s less.
My main concern is how it will expand/contract with the original material.
I don't understand exactly where the metal is located in the spoiler and what part rusts. Seems like you could weld in new metal, then recover with a polyurethane sheet and then perform traditional urethane bumper repair. You could re-cover the new metal with something like this: (maybe we should start a separate thread on this and get some more input from others)
Thanks! Was only able to do accessories and intake up. Would love to pull the motor and do the heads down. I'm currently working on cleaning factory under-coating. I tried to take a photo, but it was dusk when I took these photos so it didn't turn out very well, too dark. i'll tell ya, to clean that up is a job. need a soft brush(s) of different lengths, sizes and lots of all purpose cleaner and a hose. having a lift helps a lot too. I'm spending about 4 hours per wheel well, if not more. You can't go fast, or risk tearing it up and you get soaking wet in the process. Afterwards I've been applying some Meguires Hyper-dressing to protect it and waxing the exposed underbody. Funny, that stuff smells like a porto-potty, they really need to change the aroma.
My car was dealer undercoated as well when new.. Probably because it was an Illinois car.. Never ended up getting driven in winter and the second owner said he never got it wet.. Not sure what the point of getting the undercoating was.. I can see the paint color through the undercoating in certain areas..
If you can get rid of yours successfully, definitely put up pics and let me know how you did it!
I'm pretty certain this is factory undercoating. its only located in wheel wells and spare tire. the rest of the underbody is just gray primer/paint over-spray.
Oh, that’s better than what I have... The original owner of my IROC got the dealer undercoating so I can see the flame red overspray on the primer, but then there’s a spray of undercoating from 1988 on top of that..
There’s absolutely no rust under there and it’s pretty clean.. Even the front end parts, control arms, rear end, etc.. no rust even on the bolts under there.. Just have that pesky undercoating..
I don't understand exactly where the metal is located in the spoiler and what part rusts. Seems like you could weld in new metal, then recover with a polyurethane sheet and then perform traditional urethane bumper repair. You could re-cover the new metal with something like this: (maybe we should start a separate thread on this and get some more input from others)
A new thread sounds like a plan. Hopefully, will touch in to some of the knowledge on this board.
I do have my old spoiler on a big table in my basement. It’s a perfect place to do a little surgery and see if we can nail down the construction method.
