Na, it's a reminder that it is currently empty.

A big chunk of blue painters tape would work well too. However, before you fill it, you might fill it with True Trac first. I mean, since you've already gone this far and all...

Oh, you are bad. Maybe later - I need to get the shiny side shiny sooner rather than later.

especially with the reduced ground clearance (?) of your WINTER "beater" you should really consider extra traction like matt said.

Might as well poke the bear to see what he'll do...

He filled the diff

It's been a few days...and I've been going like crazy trying to get this car done. Needless to say, it's been fighting back and occasionally winning. I've been sanding so much that the ends of my fingers hurt, but the effort is starting to pay off. At the start of the week, I still had a lot of cleaning ahead of me. Here's the start point after several hours of cleaning.
Lots of goo still to clean here.

Plenty of nasty left here.

Don't even get me started about over here.

This one sort of sums it up.


All got hospital cleaned.

Then I decided to strip the flat hood as I wasn't happy with all the various layers of paint (no less than 3 complete paints).

Here it is stripped and almost ready to epoxy.


This is what an invisible stone chip looks like at the metal. Bad. Glad I stripped it.


First thing this AM - almost ready for epoxy.


By lunch it looked like this.


That's a little better.


You can't leave a panel bare for long...done.


Who knew that '75 fenders were different from '81 fenders...I found out the hard way that they just don't fit right. A little modification to the A-piller mount and they will fit right in. Took about 2 hours off the ever ticking clock.

Another long day at the alter of the 242. I got the fenders fit (did require some work with a big hammer and a 2X4 to get them to fit correctly), they also got new sealant so they should be good for another 20 years. It took a lot of work to get the earlier fenders to fit right, but with a quick test fit of the hood, everything lined up and was just fine. Small victories are important.

First thing this morning I actually got some colour on the car. The trunk was terrible to paint as I couldn't see it most of the time. I'm very pleased with the finish, but it is difficult to take a picture of this area in the garage.

More, more, more...

Pretty undecided about this color, but is the blue as 'dark' as it looks in the bootlid photos?

Wait 'till you see the colour outside...

Matt's right, you have to see it outside - as I was saying, it is difficult to take a good picture of just about anything in my garage, with the pearls in this paint it really changes colour. It goes from dark to medium dark blue very fast (and picks up a hint of magenta when darker). Everyone that has seen it on the trunk thinks it's pretty hot. It is very rich. Just wait, under hood is getting done today (base only) - then clear either Sunday or Monday. I may try some shots with the door open, but that lets the cold in right now.

I saw a test fender in person awhile back, no indecision I guarantee it.

Made some more progress today...need sleep in the worst way, but managed another 4 hours of wet sanding and cleaning then on with the base. I had just enough for two medium coats. I've got to get a third coat on it to fix a few little spots that are not quite fully covered.


A few issues with the corners of the engine bay. I'm going to load up my detail gun and see if I can reach them that way. There are always problems when you change colours.


Little stuff turned out great - here are the hood hinges and the rad support. The rad support back side is getting painted off the car as it would make putting the engine in a pain if it were installed and I'll have to figure out what to do with the bolts etc on the top side of the rad support when I get it installed. I'm thinking some new bolts would probably be in order.


Tomorrow I'll get the touch ups done on the base then let it sit for a while, nib it and clear it on Tuesday. In the mean time, I've got to get the engine cleaned up and ready to put back in this week.

Looks great!

One question, though: "nib" it?