Ringo’s Ready for Halloween

After last night’s tape-fest, all of Ringo’s masking is complete and he’s ready for priming and painting. Last night I made the decision I will prime and paint the doors off the car since I’m concerned about all the jambs getting completely coated. With the doors on, the hinge areas are pretty inaccessible to the spray gun. I now need a good place to orient the doors like they’ll appear on the car while I’m shooting them. I guess hanging from the rafters is as good a place as any, but I will need to remember not to bump into them. It’s gonna’ be cozy.


The car’s openings are now masked excluding the engine bay. I’ve covered the engine with a sheet and the short piece of weatherstripping with tape. I’ve also covered the trunk opening with masking paper as you can see in the photo. My plan is to shoot the portion of the body covered by the hood and engine lid in epoxy primer, lower the hood and engine lid and shoot the entire exterior; leave the hood and engine lid down while I shoot and sand the high-build primer; raise the hood and engine lid so the covered areas get a single coat of paint; close them and give the exterior at least two coats of Summit Racing’s Black Cherry Pearl; raise the hood and engine lid for a coat of clear over the covered areas; and finally close them to lay down a couple coats of clear.

Prior to working on Ringo, I replaced Heidi’s battery with the supposedly good one from Advance Auto. She started right up this morning, so, hopefully, all’s good for longer than the week or so when the warranty runs out.