Sealing the body filler

 Sprayed one coat of dark gray epoxy this morning. There were already a couple coats of light gray on the car over the bare metal, but I ended up sanding through to the metal in several places when I was blocking out the bondo. So, those spots had to get recoated with epoxy for corrosion protection and proper adhesion of the polyester filling primer that is to soon follow.

I decided on dark gray because... the paint store is closed weekends! I had just enough light gray in one can and and black in left in another can to mix together enough to make 1 quart combined. That was enough to cover the bare spots and to complete one overall thin coat.

But this color will work out pretty well for me. The next coats will be the Feather Fill G2 polyester 'primer' in the 'Buff' color. When I block sand that this dark gray base will make it easy to spot the moment that I get close to breaking through and can go no further. 

You can see the numerous spots where the epoxy covered bondo by the dull patches. Some of that is sanding scratches and some of it is because the bondo is porous and sucks up the paint. All sealed and non-porous now though.

Time to level the bodywork

 With the body back on the bodycart and all reassembled, it was time to begin the process of leveling all the metalwork and adjusting and improving the shut line gaps. Fixing the gaps involved not only adjustment of hinges and attachment position, but also some metal hammering and bending. I got it to a point where the metal was close as I could get it. Then filler would be used to refine the fit and flatness further.  

   

 

The filler I'm using is Evercoat Gold. Goes on smooth and sands easily. 90% of this got sanded back off, as the thickness was less than a mm in most places where applied. A 16" flexible sanding bar was used with 80 grit sandpaper to get it leveled down to the point where filler only remains in the low spots.