Time to turn to some body work and paint.
The paradox is the more you work on you body work, the less obvious it is.
Painting is fun, and really does change the project into a car, so to speak.

Ok, so Now's the time to turn to some body work. Here the primer has been lightly sanded and wiped down with silicon remover, and the frame, interior and engine bay have been masked off. (Ferbruary 2008)

A few coats of epoxy primer makes the body look like something has happened. Hopefully my newly acquired box with about 25 lbs of body filler will make it look smooth and nice when applied (and sanded off).

In the last fifteen days a lot (35 lbs, counting the roof done earlier) of body filler has been applied to the body and, as you can guess, most of it has been sanded off. This work made me real fed up! Also, the more you work with the bondo and sand paper, the less can be seen of the resultant work... The wife asked me the other day: "What's the use of the metal under all that bondo?" (March 2008)

A new coat of epoxy has been squirted on, some minor adjustments done with filler and sanding block, and last a coat of sanding sealer. Some light sanding to go, and then the fun begins. Paint! This pic looks a lot like the one two pics above, but if you look closely, some improvement can be spotted in the rear and quarter panel areas.

A couple nice glossy coats of an oxyd rot hue has been applied here as a base coat. The garage is red. Everything in the garage is red...

One nice coat of glossy schwarz has been added to the collection of paint layers. This is actually quite fun, seeing the Essex body in different colors.

Now comes the fun part: This body is going to be patinaed, that's why it was being painted red first. Some sanding and. Voila! Looks exactly like... A sanded car. With orange peel on the oxide red primer! Yuk!

Some thinking and planning later the whole body was then sanded down to get rid of most of that orange peel. That patina idea is hereby scrapped Admittably painting isn't always fun.

A quick trip to the paint dealer and some new black stuff was sprayed on. It even looks a tad better than the last time it was black. Knowing what I know now, I could have been at this stage nearly a week ago, when the body was red...

A lot of paper, tape and time to get this result, and yes, some Rally rot paint too. The design isn't showing that well in this pic, but it took a lot of sketches, planning and consulting friends. This is where painting is fun!

Wheels mounted and all that paper thrown in a corner, the Essex really looks different from what it did three weeks ago (first pic on this page).

Now lightly sanded the Essex is loaded onto a truck for transport to the paintshop for a coat of clear.

After the arrival to the paint shop a snap from a seldom seen before angle could be taken.

The satin clear is already dusty in this pic, and the new door handles are mounted. This lockable one is now moved to the curb side where it belongs.

Here the visor is mounted, the cowl vent is hinged, and the wiper is ready for some bad weather. (April 2008)

A pair of Ford model A rear lights has been mounted on fabricated mounts. Again, these added to the look of the rear of the Essex.

To be continued...

Go on to part sixteen