Saturday, June 16, 2012

POR-15: Act II, Scene I

This morning Sara started by brushing off all the loose dirt and debris from the areas we planned to paint today.


I vacuumed the areas Sara brushed off to make sure we got everything picked up and ready to paint.


Our next step was POR-Patch. We finished the passenger side interior seam where we ran out of POR-Patch last time, and then sealed the t-top channels. This took us about two hours. It was hard making sure all the pits were filled in and the seams properly sealed. We also sealed the interior lips below the channels to prevent water from ever running in there again.











Then we moved to the trunk area and wheel wells. Sara used a putty knife to loosen some of the seam sealer that had separated from the metal after the Marine Clean and Prep and Ready applications. You can see the hole that needs to be patched with PowerMesh at the bottom of the wheel well. While Sara was scraping I was starting to cover the backside of this hole with duct tape so the PowerMesh will not sag.


Then Sara used her parts brush again and brushed out the trunk area and wheel wells.


Next she followed up with the vacuum.


I removed the hatch latching mechanism while Sara taped over all the taillight mounting holes with duct tape to prevent paint drips on the outside of the car.



We spent the next four hours applying the silver POR-15 to the sail panels, wheel wells, trunk area, interior roof, t-top bar and t-top channels. We are not completely sold on the silver POR-15 at this point. It paints very differently from the black. It is much runnier and seems to be more streaky. It also does not seem to go as far. We used 2 1/2 4-oz cans to do these areas. We are a little nervous about how well the black POR-15 is going to cover the silver as the silver seems to get darker the longer it sits. We thought the silver would be much lighter than it is. The actual color is about what the POR-15 web site shows as the gray color.



Painting over our heads is definitely not fun. You can see our coverage is not as good. Hopefully the second coat will cover and will make it look better.



I cut a piece of PowerMesh large enough to cover the hole at the bottom of the wheel well on the passenger side. I painted the silver POR-15 over top. In this case, the silver POR-15 seemed to work better than the black at holding the PowerMesh in place. I intend to use PowerMesh on the exterior side of this hole as well in an effort to make it stronger.


After two failed attempts, I cannot say I recommend the daubers. I tried using them on the seat rails as well as the t-top rails. They do not fit into the holes in either place. Trying to force it through the hole just creates a mess. Therefore I was unable to treat these areas as I wanted to, which is very disappointing because there was rust present in both places. If the dauber ends were a little smaller they would be fine. In the second picture you can see the result of the paint dripping everywhere when I tried to force it in the hole. I have to say I think it was a waste of money buying the daubers. Maybe the daubers will work on the bottom of the car in some of the open frame spots or when I do the interiors of the doors. 



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