Undercoating

 This week was the application of the U-POL Raptor 'bedliner' as undercoating. This was sprayed using the supplied shutz gun that came with the 4-qt kit Raptor kit. 

As an experiment, I mixed a quart of 'weightless' glass microsphere powder with the first quart of Raptor to be applied to the tunnel and floors to serve as a thermal barrier. The microspheres, also sometimes called microballoons, are hollow bubbles of glass. Adding this to the Raptor makes a kind of foam out of it, in effect. I don't know if anyone has tried this before with the Raptor bedliner, so the effectiveness is uncertain. Had to add about 20% thinner to make it sprayable after the microspheres had thickened up the mix. 

The remaining 3 quarts of Raptor were applied as normal in 2 coats, except that I did find that it needed thinning a bit to achieve the texture that I wanted, The objective was to try to mimic the texture of the factory original tar-based undercoating. I think it came out a bit rougher, but still close. Some areas will be painted over in body color - the wheelhouses, firewall, etc., where the factory originally painted over the undercoating.