New Roadmaster is coming along, slowly but surely

The new wagon is getting there; I just finished stripping and [hand] polishing the formerly woodgrain trim since it was peeling like an old Onion skin. Man, that is a tough job! I also cleaned off the old tape from, and re-attached the facotry belt moulding (never bothering with this again, I still have blisters!). So I figuired I'd take a pic of the progess. So far, the car has had the following done since I bought it:

New water pump! (only actually new thing I've bought for it so far!)
New-ish front and rear shocks
Holes in frame by rear jacking points patched (done by a pro welder and not me!)
Belt moulding re-attahced
Woodgrain trim stripped and polished
Almost completely paintless sail panels painted satin black (I'm cheap, and I'm not buying DGGM paint!!!)
DGGM painted area above rear formerlly-woodgrain trim painted satin black (was peeling)
Engine bay cleaned up nice (must have driven a hundred thousand miles on dirt roads!)
Interior cleaned of emense filth, '96 style armrest installed.
Steering wheel audio controls installed (need to get a compatible radio yet)
Turn signal cam spring replaced (never seen this broken before)

So far the most expensive things have been the welding ($100) and the trim tape ($13 a roll, needed several rolls) which I would have been better off both in cost and labor to just buy the roll of new lower profile rubber trim. I know my thumbs would have preferred it! Evrything else was mostly used...
Next up before WagonFest is rear DS quarter hole patched, new old steel wheels & hub caps, along with tires that aren't totally bald. And oh yeah, AIR CONDITIONING! (Works but leaks out!)

Here's a pic of Dave P. (95BRMW) changing the water pump for me in the parking lot next to the PO's house! Dave is a real pro at LT1 water pumps, let me tell you.

And here's a pic of it at work today:

Haha, you're polishing a turd, but I have to admit, it looks pretty darn good so far.

Nice job on the trim sir. Not an easy job, especially by hand!!! Yikes!!

Bewber wrote:

Haha, you're polishing a turd, but I have to admit, it looks pretty darn good so far.

Lol, I kept thinking the same thing to myself this whole time. Trying to keep the costs down, though.

Lynol wrote:

Bewber wrote:

Haha, you're polishing a turd, but I have to admit, it looks pretty darn good so far.

Lol, I kept thinking the same thing to myself this whole time. Trying to keep the costs down, though.

phew!! lotta work lynol,.
you gonna put in the T56,. ? be a timmay clone?

Nice! You're putting more work in it than I think you'd planned, but I get carried away too!

-Mike

That ole girl is looking good .

Lookin good. Been there done that on the woodgrain trim too - LOTS of work but it looks great once you're done, and you only have to do it once.

For pete's sake clean the darn wheels and get some Westley's Bleche-White on the whitewalls!

Joel,you beat me to it,wagons looking pretty good after all your work.Please clean those wheels and tires!

As everyone else said, clean those wheels!
You forgot to mention the "Hornet Delete" mod. I don't think I have ever seen so many yellow jacket nests in a car before!

Nice work, dude! Now clean the damn wheels and tires already!

The trim on my next woody will definately be polished. Wait. whut?

Lol, the wheels and tires are garbage, will be replaced next week with steels and used tires so I'm not going to bother cleaning them. Here's some more pics. First are before (rust holes) and after (patches) Dave put in for me when he did the rear shocks (I traded shock replacement labor on my car for fuel pump replacement on his 9C1) In an experiment at my suggestion, he cut holes in the floor to replace the shocks. The next pic is of one of the holes. He said it was much easier to access the top bolts for the shocks, but a lot of work needed to take out the interior. The other pic is of the welding on the driver side frame when it was just finished. Don't seem to have a pic of the passenger side, but the driver side was the worse of the two, that's why you see that second piece.

I guess I forgot to send you the passenger, here it is.  As far as the bolts for the shocks went, in this car's case where the heads of the bolts were no longer bolt shaped cutting the floor out was much easier.  A couple spun off with an impact gun, the others had to be ground off.  I really hope my RMW isn't that bad when it comes time for new shocks!

Got rid of the awful beat up factory alloys today, and put on some better rear tires. As an experiment, I painted some steels the color of the tan-brown paint they put under the woodgrain; found an off the shelf Rustoleum satin finish spray that matches perfectly! and indefinitely borrowed my LeSabre's wheel covers. It's the kind of wheel cover that leaves the outside 3/4" of the steel wheel exposed, so I figured what the heck, I'll try it. Very happy with the result, the poor old LeS is never getting these covers back!

Looking pretty good Lionel! Going to bring it to WF?

Tom

Oh yeah, Tom!

Going to miss WF this year. Hope you have fun guy's.

Sorry to hear that Jarrod. I hope you come next year though!

OK, so today I did this... uh... thing here... It's a bit tacky but it does the job of hiding the peeled paint under it. It's another experiment, we will see how long it lasts before peeling off or fading. This is just contact paper... The trim is a 3/4" chrome stick on bling that Pep-Boys sells.

Hard to believe its the same wagon,great job Lynol!

I like the 'wood' bug shield. Cool idea!  

Wow looking great! Should bring that up to the Badass meet lol.

Also, thanks for those pictures of the rear wheel wells. Thats my next project. Thankfully, the holes I have there aren't nearly that big.

I tell ya, wood racing striped down the hood would really complete it!
I'm glad to see some clean white walls on it lol

Laughed when I read about your wood racing stripes but the more I think about those stripes the more I like them.Sure wouldnt see that everytime another wagon drove by.You may have started something with that woodgrain bug strip!

Looking good!  I dig the wood bug shield! Wish I could check it out in NY.

You've done a lot and it really smartened up that baby. I think your bug shield is Best Mod for sure. LOL!

Looks good Lyonl! I'm not a fan of hubcaps but gotta admit they look better than crusty alloys. Curious to see how the bug shield thing lasts.

Oh I forgot an important one! This happened week before last. While the car was having it's emissions test done, I saw coolant dripping steadily out the front as I was waiting for them to finish. When I got back to work, I found this nice 3" crack. Fortunately RockAuto had a new one for about $115 shipped, and even with the standard $10 shipping it showed up 2 days later, all my fittings came off easily and now it's all back to normal, and the heater core has been flushed of it's black sludge. I took my old rad to the yard and got $10 for it, lol.

Have you made an appointment with jarrod for the paint job yet?

Looking good, Lionel. Now lower it!!!

I dig the bug shield!

For those of you who did not attend WagonFest, I got it done just in time. Last job was to patch (Bondo and chicken wire!) a rust hole about the size of my hand in the driver's rear quarter. Again, I didn't want to buy any green paint, so I painted it satin black at the same height up on the body that the satin black factory rocker trim is. First time I've worked extensively with Bondo, but I found it was very much like working with sheetrock joint compound, which I've done plenty of. I think it blends pretty well!

And of course, the finished product. For appearance stuff I had about $15 in primer/rust converter, black and tan spray paint. $5 for stripper for formerly woodgrain trim, $5 for aluminum polish for said trim, $15 for Bondo, $4 for woodgrain contact paper, $15 for chrome molding (yikes!) and goodness only knows how much for rolls upon rolls of belt molding tape! ($50 maybe??) It's been fun experimenting to see what works and what does not (or what will not in time, heh heh!).
BEFORE and AFTER:

Very impressive work and a bunch of elbow grease too!

Looks like its prayers have been answered.

Lynol has definitely got his new wagon looking good, I saw it this weekend.

Tom

Wow looks incredible never would be able to tell at Wagonfest it looked beautiful great job love the lesabre rims!