You guys going to do before and after photos of your restoration?

Not really documenting much besides saving receipts, but we just finished power washing last night, so I can take a few before starting with the undercarriage painting to illustrate what that does for it.

We got the idea to hook up the water supply line for the pressure washer to the hot water supply to the washing machine in the house. I keep my water heater set really hot, so that seemed to help. Last night was the final go-around, and it really seems a lot cleaner, at least as far as I could see at 5 this morning with a flashlight.

Picked up 5 cans of flat black to act as primer and I will start spraying that tonight; Jorge will take over with the semi gloss on Thursday, since he's busy tonight and I'm not so good with anything other than flat paint. Going to pull the headlights out and get the front parts, too.

John B.

since the front end is apart, might i suggest the use of this stuff to paint the grill? made mine look brand new. I also use this stuff for the faded side trim on the gen 1 SWB. Seems to hold up better than other paints for an often touched area, without leaving hand marks or finger prints.

There are a few different bumper and trim paints out there. Haven't seen or tried that one yet, but the newest specialty paints do a great job.

John B.

We ended up using 7 full cans of flat, plus whatever back-stock that was laying around, probably a couple more. Then Jorge got loose with the gloss and sprayed every drop of the five cans and a couple half fulls. I'll get him a few more today during work so he can hit whatever he sees fit later today. What a difference. Those frame rails seem like they just absorb paint, like drywall or something. Too bad I detest the photo posting process on here...

Maybe tonight I'll see if the thing still runs after all the power washing.

Oh yeah, ordered up a set of four Wagner Xenon headlights for it at $10 each from RockAuto (another magnet, coming up). That means there's some painting of the headlight trim rings that needs to be done. The bumper ends and the grill also have their turn today, too.

Now if only HoseB would volunteer to polish the exterior, but I'm not holding my breath on that.

John B.

You may want to look into POR-15.. I know we do not have rust here in AZ ... But the stuff will cover and it is strong..

At $1 per can, the spray paint deal is the most cost-effective answer for this truck! If you saw the interior, you'd know it's no show vehicle...

John B.

I'm sure it will be super nice inside when you guys are done with it. If you guys do new carpet and headliner let me know so i can do mine at the same time, we can have a carpet fest.

Apparently HoseB knows a guy that does headliners, so we'll see about that. I wish Jorge would order carpet, but I don't know how high on his list that is right now.

Finally took the truck off the jack stands today. I put the LT235/75-15 tires that are mounted on Montero steelies on it and the color of the wheels almost exactly matches the paint color of the truck, a complete accident since Jorge painted them with some wheel paint he picked up last year. I put the Gen 2 wheels with the BFG A/T 31" tires on his blue '86.

Now the battery on the '83 is on the charger, since I think I left the key in the ACC position for about a week so I could turn the wheels. Hopefully it'll start here in a bit. I really need to power wash the driveway as it's kinda greezy.

I'll text Adam some pictures and make him post them up since I can't stand doing it here any more. Just have to wait for the grill to dry before I put it back on.

John B.

Apparently, you have to take your paperwork from a previous failed emissions test when you go to retest, even if you are paying for the test because it's the third try. I got turned away this evening. Stupid.

John B.