Matte Black Spray Paint Only $20 A Can!

Yesterday as soon as I got home from work I hit the garage running. I wanted to get as much done on the wheel wells this weekend as we could. The first thing I needed to do was clear out underneath KITT, which meant putting KARR's summer tires away.

Sara bought me these seasonal tire totes and felt protectors.

The felts go on the wheel side of the tire to protect it from scratches and I used the shipping cardboard that came with the snow tires to make a cover for the backs of the wheels.

Once the tires are in the totes, they are very easy to carry with the built-in handles.

My dad came over to help just as I was covering the last tire. We hauled the tires upstairs to the storage closet, and then removed KITT's fenders.

Next we removed all four wheels from KITT.

We swept out underneath KITT so the creepers would roll smoothly and we could get underneath to mark all the spots that need to be touched up with POR-15.

This is the driver side rear wheel well.

These next three shots highlight where I stripped off/cleaned all the way through the POR-15 in attempt to remove the primer. I need to reapply POR-15 to these spots. I plan to cover the black patch you can see in this picture with POR-15.

This is the passenger side rear wheel well.

Mario must have used some kind of a floor jack under the cross member to move KITT around. It ended up eating through some of the POR-15. I need to repaint these areas with POR-15.

These are chips on the A-arm. I think Troy and I did this damage when we were trying to put the springs in. I will reapply POR-15 to these areas.

My dad and I were both on creepers underneath KITT looking for areas that need to be touched up. This is a spot on the underbody right along a seam where I noticed some surface rust. We must have missed this area when we were painting.

This is another area that is missing coverage, again along a seam.

This is the drain plug for the differential. Troy had to use a torch to get the old plug out, and after the prolonged exposure to the heat it removed the POR-15. This needs to be repainted.

Another seam/pinch weld we missed. My dad and I tagged all these areas with blue tape so I can find them again to repaint.

The next two pictures are of the mount points for the Panhard/track bar. Just a few areas that did not quite get the coverage they need.

Another seam spot we missed.

Sara brought home dinner for us, and then we all went back out to the garage to start cleaning the wheel wells and wheel well inserts. Sara cleaned the passenger side wheel wells with POR-15 Cleaner Degreaser.

My dad cleaned the driver side rear wheel well and the wheel well inserts.

I cleaned the driver side front wheel well, and then started taping.

We masked off all the areas we did not want undercoating sprayed on.

My dad shook the POR-15 Rubberized Under Coating for several minutes to make sure it was sufficiently agitated. Then I started to apply it to the driver side front wheel well. My first reaction was that there was something wrong with it. It was hardly spraying at all, almost as if there was no propellant left in the can. I did a coat on about 1/4 of the wheel well and then stopped.

It looked like matte black paint, and nothing like the textured covering indicated on the can.

Thinking that we might have gotten a dud can, we switched to the second can. We shook this one for about five minutes and then I started spraying the entire wheel well. It still did not have the texture we were expecting.

Dad held the light wand to make sure I had sufficient light to see that I was covering everything.

The overall look was nothing like what we wanted so we decided to test it on a small spot on the gray primer in the rear wheel well. 

The gray primer allowed us to see how it was spraying. You can see in this picture that it is spraying like textured paint, but what you cannot see is that this is literally like spray paint, and it has no rubbery feeling or thickness to it at all. We decided there has to be something wrong with the two cans of POR-15 Rubberized Under Coating. It probably has something to do with the fact that they froze in shipment. I am going to call POR-15 on Monday and ask for a refund.

In the meantime, we decided to continue taping and masking off the wheel wells.

My dad said the wheel wells are wrapped up like Christmas presents. :)

Here is the driver side rear wheel well.

Here is the passenger side front wheel well.