Monday, February 3, 2014

A Day of Soundproofing!




Dateline – 02/01/2014 – I had a day off during the week to take care of some house issues and decided to run down to the paint shop that was recommended to me by my late neighbor “Bob the Cop.”  The shop is called Showcase Collision Specialists (http://www.showcasecollision.com/).  They are one of the few paint shops that still do full car paint.  I talked to a really great guy there who has seen many project cars.  He showed me a Ferrari Dino that they are restoring, a 69 Nova that just came out of the paint booth, a couple of mid 80’s vets, and a 944 that they are working on.  All great work, so I know this is the place to go.  Plus, they are only about 4 miles away from my house! 

So talking to the guy I asked him if it was better to bring the car in all together, or in pieces.  He said it was up to me, but if I want to best paint possible, bring it in with all the doors, fenders and hoods off.  That way they can paint each without needing to mask and they can get a clean shot at all the nooks and crannies.  So, I’m pulling everything off.  He also said that all the primer needs to come off the car since they are going to spray a sealer coat on before they put the blocking primer on.  Since they don’t know what the surface below the primer is like, they can’t tell how well the paint will stick.  So I need to go back over the car and get the primer off.  Shouldn’t be too bad.

So, the entire process is, 1) Sealer, 2) Blocking Primer, 3) Blocking, 4) Finish Coat 5) Baking.  Price?  Well, that depends.  Materials are around $1,000.  If I decide to let them do all the work, it will be about $8,000 for the entire car.  However, he recommended that, after the blocking primer is spayed, I take the car back and block it myself.  That will take about 60 – 80 hours of labor out of the equation and will bring the cost down to around $3,500 - $4,000.  So, I will need to have to car towed four times, but that is going to be a lot less than the $5,000 difference!  And I get to have my hands in the work too, which is also nice.  So, definitely moving forward there!

On Saturday, I really didn’t feel up to sanding so I decided to put in the sound proofing.  So I took all the doors off the car and removed the seats:

Doors and fenders off!

Next I vacuumed and washed down all the interior surfaces and after they dried, I started putting in the soundproofing that I bought from Eastwood a couple of years ago. (http://www.eastwood.com/eastwood-thermocoustic-material.html).  This stuff is amazing, but it is no pleasure to install!  You have to cut each piece to fit, than press it into place trying to get all the air bubbles out.  Considering that there is really no flat surface inside the car (even the floorboards have ridges in them), it is a lot of work and in eight hours I was only able to get one half of the car done!  The driver’s side should be a little easier since there are not as many curves, and I’ve got more experience working with the material.  It really does deaden the noise in the car, and with padding and carpets on top, it should be really quite inside!

Here are pictures of the inside that I got done:
Passenger side looking forward through back window

Front Passenger floorboard

Rear Passenger Floorboard