Rebuilding a '73

[Joe the Harley guy]

Yes, I'm an amateur restorer myself. I've painted a few vehicles, mostly base/clear and my latest, an 82 FXR, is a 99-point restoration. I wanted to try gelcoat for an original finish, but unfortunately there is no place local that will tint gelcoat. So I am going with single stage paint. It'll look more period correct than base/clear and I can still cut and buff it. I spent the past few nicely warm days filling what I can see, and today sprayed the first coat of high-build primer! I have to get more, plus the paint this week. I found the code for HD Birch White, and if that fails, Ford Wimbledon White is very close. Here are the latest pictures:





There are a few spots that need more work, but overall it came out pretty good!





I didn't know how translucent it is, the light spot is where I filled a hole with fiberglass.

[Joe the Harley guy]

Here's the paint scheme that I have planned:



The paint shop will match the orange in the seats.

[Joe the Harley guy]

$400 later and I have all the primer and paint that I need to finish. Today's progress was filling and sanding what the primer showed needing work. I marked the areas with masking tape so I could find them easier. Most of them were just little imperfections, but I did find quite a few round corners that had a lot of flat spots.



After that I sprayed another two coats of high-build primer and called it a night. It looks 100% better than before all the touch-up. Tomorrow I'll go over everything one more time, then get it ready for paint!

[Joe the Harley guy]

Woo Hoo! Today was the day! I think it came out great! The paint was amazing, it flowed out so nice. Color is perfect. Two coats of PPG Delfleet ESSS Single Stage Polyurethane Enamel. I also got the same in black and orange for the stripes.



First coat looked great, I was tempted to stop.



I thought all the bugs were gone for the season, but one found it's way to my fender



These new paints are amazing. I picked it out with a dental pick and sprayed two more coats:



Here's the final product. I'll spray the black and orange in a few weeks.