Removing surface rust from front end - who knew it’d form in a massive workshop on top of the world!? Grit blasting for the impossible to reach bits even without skin on my knuckles! Degreased ready for the stuff that turns rust black (is that better @Baysearcher?) it took a lot longer than I thought. Not sure there’s any grease in my beams just on everything else! Exciting stuff to be ready to get some protective coating on! Some of us *really* do enjoy working on these old things And finally the stuff that can not be mentioned starts working its magic! Didn’t get to do the middle section today as I moved the working light and found more underseal, waxoyl and rust lurking. Grrrr. Next time! Now to get rid of the rust tan and grub eyeliner
Great progress! The last pic looks very impressive! Does the "the stuff with no name" turn the rust black like Kurust does? PS love the bandana....
It does, it also turns bare steel black too. Not sure what it’ll do over paint as I had to go before it had fully cured. I now have the odious arrogant bono in my head now and it’s all your fault!
Health & safety tip No. 3562 When using an air line to blow out all the rubbish from inside a crossmember, don’t stand in front of the hole the rubbish will come speeding out of. Oops.
You’re a talking ear? There are others among us? There’s a certain time of a weekend when this place gets very surreal!
I’m trying to muster up the energy to moisturise after showering, not sure partying is in the cards. Maybe a beer or two. It occurred to me that rust removal is a two part process; First remove rust from camper, then remove rust from self. Possibly three part if you include cleaning the shower.
No evenings in the workshop this week so far so thought i'd do a bit of a review type thing on some of the stuff i've used... Rust removal; Amtech twist Know Wire Wheel Does a good job on surface rust but as there's so many sticky out bits on the underside it catches and kicks back A LOT! Not great for getting into small areas nor behind wiring (must remember to take tape for wiring loom). Strip & Clean discs bloody brilliant for digging out pitted rust where wire wheels fail. BUT, they're expensive and catch them on an edge of steel and they get smaller very quickly. Perfect for large flat panels (i used them on the bodywork all those years ago) Air belt sander finger file Brilliant for those hard to reach areas and corners but any wax or underseal picked up will clog the sanding belt up before you can blink . Grit blaster (as in pics) used very fine black grit (not sure what it's called) for this. I was expecting to be able to blast all those parts i couldn't get to and once the dust had settles it would've revealed a nice shiny steel surface with no rust whatsoever - it didn't . I suspect i was expecting too much from the little thing, miracles maybe? It clearly took off the surface rust, which is all that's needed for the H80 to work and the closer you can get, the better it is but on a smaller area - inverse square law etc
Next came the degreasing - how happy was i at this point?! OK so i was only doing the front end but still... I'd already called Jim at Bilt-Hamber about this as i wanted to get the process right and he advised Surfex HD followed by thinners to get rid of any residue . This confused me as i thought that that was what degreaser did? anyhooo... The S-HD is water-based and can be diluted to suit, i didn't want anything stopping the rust converter working so I used it neat from a spray bottle. I liked the idea of water-based, particularly after my thinners trip the other night, and proceeded to liberally squirt it all around the front end. Note: Even water-based stuff stings when you get it in your eyes, I did get a bit carried away and didn't put goggles on -what you spray up has a tendency to come down. I gave it all a bit of a scrub with a scotch pad and a final wipe with a soft cloth after more squirts. As it's not too greasy that end, i didn't really notice much of a difference, but it did work well on the beam where i suspect there was more axle grease on than in! - someone remind me to grease it once it's all painted, please. On the thick greasy, gunky bits i left it to soak in and attacked a few times - i was definitely impressed it worked on years of muck stuck on grease. I was also not wearing gloves - i know, PPE goes out of the window when i'm playing with new and exciting things! and it didn't sting my hands but was a little drying *adds hand cream to the workshop list* Next a spray with thinners - yuk. Mick did that, it makes me feel sick and then onto the H80 wooohoooooo! Pete or was it Jim at B-H said it could be sprayed on and as i wanted to get it into all the chassis ends and behind all the wiring and mechanical gubbins i'd spend ages cleaning, this felt like the best way. I had a go at spraying but I'm certainly not the most proficient nor quickest which resulted in lots of H80 on the workshop floor, so Mick did it - mist coat tacky followed by two full coats at a 30 min interval. This took 1 litre of H80, probably due to my lack of spraying skills, from deformation panel to the chassis rail before cargo floor, including spraying inside the box sections. Before leaving it was already going deep black and looked like a good coverage - it's going to be fun painting it white
