A single shade
Matt finally gets some colour on his Minor Convertible
Finally, after months of hard work, the end of this project seems to be in sight. OK, so I’ve still got to sort the the panels which will require months of hard work and probably constitute more than double the surface area of the shell. However, in my mind the project feels closer to the end than the beginning. It’s amazing what a difference a day makes.
Anyone who has painted a car will tell you that if you put the time spent on the bodywork into a pie chart, less than one per cent of the circle is actually applying the paint. The rest is arduously applying filler, primer, guide coats, stopper, sanding, more sanding, checking, re-doing and so on. It’s a necessary evil as far as I’m concerned, but one I was keen to do myself, for reasons of satisfaction as well as finance. Having built up a decent coating of high build primer, finished it off with guide coat and finally flatted it back with a DA sander and by hand with a block, it was time for some colour. £40 secured me a 3x4m gazebo that I erected in the corner of the PC workshop to keep dust to a minimum. With my makeshift booth complete, I prized open the tin and started mixing. If you are to paint your car yourself, serious safety considerations need to be made. I’d chosen to use HMG’S
direct gloss cellulose for a number of reasons. Firstly, Cellulose is far less toxic than two-pack and can be sprayed using a cartridge respirator. It’s vital that the instructions on the mask are followed to the letter. The clock is ticking on them from the moment the packet is opened, so you need to be aware of this. Having said cellulose is safe, I must add that while it’s less likely to poison you than two-pack, it is incredibly volatile and as such there is a risk of explosion.
Another reason for choosing this paint system is that it’s easier to repair, should I get a stone chip, than a lacquered finish. It can be flatted back easily to give a superb shine. It’s also the same brand of paint that we used to paint the Ruby Lowlight Morris Minor last year, and I was impressed with the quality. The disadvantage of cellulose, as I was to discover, was that it has a habit of sinking to fill any scratches that a relative novice like myself has left from inadequate prep.
In-tents experience
The size of my gazebo-cum-spraybooth, plus the fact that the car is currently without its doors, meant that only half the shell needed to be in the firing line of the spray gun at any one time. This minimised ‘dry spots’ from overspray landing on wet paint, but also allowed more focus on each end at a time. Six progressively thinner coats applied, with time to flash off between each, the shine is great.
If I’m being super-critical, there were a few scratch marks showing. I want this car to be right, so they had to go. No matter, I had been planning to wet-sand the first colour anyway and apply another few coats of colour for an extra deep shine. It just meant that I would be taking slightly more paint off than intended in order to remove these offending marks. Meanwhile, the engine went across to Derby to engine-wizard and MMOC member Alan Scott, who had offered to give my handiwork a once-over. He also replaced the 1098cc head with a 12G940 1275cc cylinder head that’s been correctly skimmed to complement the Metro cam. The proof will be in the driving, and that’s something I’m getting ever closer to doing.
The painted shell needed to be left to settle before flatting back and repainting. There was plenty to do, and it needed to be rolling and ready to be displayed in the Skillshack Workshop Theatre at the Practical Classics Classic Car and Restoration Show. If you went, then you’ll have seen how far it got. ■ matt.tomkins@practicalclassics.co.uk