Locost ''Eleanor'' Rebuild

[locost220]

Resigned to the garden at parents as dads garage as tidy as mine, bloody cold outside but managed to do some work over past couple of days sanding down some of the primed panels to see how flat they were using a guide coat of a cheap black spray paint and a blocks to use with the wet and dry paper.not shown but nose cone looking better then expected due to the trauma it has suffered requiring plenty of repairs.

[SteveRST]

Those bits are looking great Rich!

Cheers guys,
struggling with a bit of a dilemma..... At this rate I have a pristine car and no petrol to run it on.

I guess that ultimately only you can decide how much time/money you want to put in to the paint finish.
I just got round to watching the latest Project Binky today (it was posted about 10 days ago) and they were having the same dilemma as you - the balance between getting something good enough and the resources taken to do so.

Personally, I don't see these sort of cars as show cars. They are made to be used (and abused) and I'd rather see a kit that is superior mechanically rather than cosmetically.
So I'd lean towards 'good enough' as opposed to 'good as can be'.

[Weathers]

Those bits are looking great Rich!

Cheers guys,
struggling with a bit of a dilemma..... At this rate I have a pristine car and no petrol to run it on.

I guess that ultimately only you can decide how much time/money you want to put in to the paint finish.

Personally, I don't see these sort of cars as show cars. They are made to be used (and abused) and I'd rather see a kit that is superior mechanically rather than cosmetically.
So I'd lean towards 'good enough' as opposed to 'good as can be'.

Have to agree that they need to be U&A. Can’t have them as show ponies. It’s not within the spirit of the 7 which ultimately is what most of our cars are based on. They get a patina with age anyway so “perfect” is nice but not necessary. And as with most of these things it comes down to cash and time. Which most of us don’t have in an unlimited supply.

Good luck Rich. Just don’t leave yourself thinking “I wish I’d done x, y or z.” Even if it delays you by a bit.

[DJ.]

I'm rubbish at spray painting as anyone who's seen the C1 I "repaired" can attest

However, my experience of driving my Seven 42000 miles on SKCC roads is that the paint will get chipped to hell within a couple of years, so don't get too worried about the finish!

If I had my time over, I would have had the gel coat glass fibre, nose, and wings and had someone do a yellow vinyl wrap over the alloy to protect it. I don't know whether it would have lasted better than paint, but in theory, it could be re-wrapped fairly easily??

[Wingco]

I am defiantly not one to comment on paint etc but as far as I'm concerned using your car as you do will course lots of chips etc, so don't worry to much about what it looks like Rich. TBH what you have done so far, it will look good anyway.

[Tony C]

What about wrapping? After a few initial fails Mattijs and I managed a reasonable finish on his Tiger. The nose cone was an issue, but for most other panels it looked pretty good. Keep up the good work.

[Phil N]

I think you should try and make it into a show car (ha, just joking!) Whatever the result I’m sure it’ll look and be great with the time and effort you have put into this. Got to be the least ‘shop bought’ kit car in the country with the amount that you do to it yourself mate, fair play there’s not many people out there that would attempt half the jobs you have... just bloody hurry up now will ya!

[locost220]

Cheers all valid points especially, been beavering away with the wet and dry still.
I might take one small part all the way through the present process including colour till completion to see if I am happy with it.

[greenwoo]

well, you have known both mt cars Rich, and both were painted - albeit not by me! i've been pleased with the finish on both, given a clean and polish it still looks fresh/good, apart from the rear arches....
no idea what process either sprayer used to prep the surfaces....i did promise myself - and never did that i'd clear wrap the cone, as on the old car that picked up a cple of stone chips....
rear arches are always a bugger, on this one i've got the full carbon, but they dont make those for the R6 anymore, so if i ever replace i will defo use a protective film over them...

personally....
most kits are 10ft cars....and many are worse than that! you will always know wher ethe flaws are as you're the one doing the work, but if you can achieve a 5ft-10ft car ( bearing in mind you actually use it for its intended purpose) then i'd say that's a result.

[locost220]

Well been quite some time since I updated the thread, going through a tough old time at work, necessitating doing on average 3 hrs office work on the laptop at home each night, managed to injure myself helping brother and nephew tackle his rear bushes, there resulting in lack of garage time, then I have been resigned to many many hours sitting to rest my back at weekends wet and drying all the panels I have previously primed to find the imperfections , I did at one stage loose my finger prints, loads of filler primer, satin black as guide coat etc.
Massive clean up in the booth and preparing the panels and a few more coats of primer starting today.