Alright it's showtime! Job is 95% complete as I am waiting for my new bulbs for the fog lights.
It took about three days to paint the middle section of the bull bar with roll bar and chasis paint but boy it was worth it. I sprayed the middle section quite generously in hopes that it won't start to rust again for another 17 years. The shroud took three coats (2 really light and one generous coat) with Krylon Fusion Satin Black. No runs!! I impressed myself. Here is a view of what they looked like before re-assembly:
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After removing the bull bar I decided that you can't just paint the shroud without painting the fins in the lower grill too. Not being one to do things the easy way, I slid hundreds of tiny pieces of paper into the grill between the metal mesh and the fins and taped around it. It took about an hour and a half and upon completion I realized that removing the whole bumper would have probably taken way less time. Oh well, next time. I also masked and painted the rear step as well - turned out quite nice.
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With that done I painted two really light coats and a third coat that was fairly generous again and then removed all the tape very shortly after as I learned from Rick on American Restoration that you want to do it sooner rather than later to avoid dropping flakes of paint off the tape. Once it had a day to dry, I got out the Meguires Deep Crystal Paint Cleaner and did the whole front bumper. It helped alot, but the real helper was Meguires Cleaner Wax. When I finished my wife came out and said "Did you repaint the bumper?" Always nice to have a confidence booster in the house.
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Then with alot of glee and the help of a friend we reassembled the whole thing and put it back on with only minimal scratching of a fin on the bumper. Couldn't have put it on without him because I had to be extra carefull. I had noticed some notches in the one fin as I took everything off - and I found out why when putting it back in! Overall I am very happy with the job. Looks awesome and almost like a new rig again. Really easy to do and would have taken me less time if I wasn't working during my little ones nap times. So now I need my PIAA H3 bulbs to put back intot the lamps and I will remount them and put in another picture. Hope this inspires some of you to do the job too as like I said it was easy and really takes the age off our vans.
Craig
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