72 TA : New Project

[njsteve]

My bodyman (ENOCH) was listening. He emailed me these photos of the progress on the hood, which he and his crew stripped by hand the last few days. Luckily it is very straight and rust free. Other than a possible warpage issue from the original carb/engine bay fire it seems to have survived the ordeal relatively unscathed. We're still looking for a driver's side fender to cut up for a patch panel in case anyone has one from a 70 to 81 Firebird laying around.

[njsteve]

More progress from ENOCH's shop. He has the passenger fender, hood and door in epoxy primer as of this afternoon.

[micky69396]

I have a fender, not sure what side though. I'll let you know.

[Bill Pritchard]

Steve,

Pardon my ignorance, but why would they strip the underside of the hood by hand? That seems to me like it would be incredibly labor intensive, as compared to some form of blasting or chemical stripping.

[njsteve]

Chemical/media stripping will dissolve/destroy all the original sealer that is between the two panels. There is no way to replace that sealer. In a double panel piece of body work like a hood, the lack of support that removing the sealer creates will result in the panels vibrating against each other and eventually buckling/denting/dinging up the top painted surface.

[SuperNovaSS]

Plastic blasting will destroy the sealer that quickly?

Jason

[micky69396]

I have had several of these T/A hoods done with plastic media with no issues at all. I cant imagine the time it would take to strip that. No finger tips left either...lol.

[njsteve]

It was a really nice California hood, no rust or scale, just some charcoaled factory paint from the carb fire. ENOCH couldn't find a blaster he trusted: He gave some small parts from the car to a guy who ended up using some material a little too aggresive, so he decided to stick with the old tried and true.