American Iron Javelin – Getting ready for paint

After the test day in January (2014) it was time to get the car ready for paint. I was not looking forward to that bill so I wanted to do as much as I could on my own before bringing it back to Maaco. I had a long list of things to do:

1. make/weld in a block off panel between cockpit/trunk area
2. fix/install rear spoiler
3. weld up little rust pin holes in the quarter panels
4. sand surface rust off the new roll cage bars and prime them
5. cut out some rust from the inside trunk panel
6. remove all the interior items since the inside is getting painted (seat, belts, rollbar padding, fuel line, etc…)
7. put on my old wheels so the new ones don’t get messed up while in the paint shop

For the block off panel I wanted to do something different than I had last time. On the original build I left part of the package tray intact and then built an aluminum panel that hung off the shelf. It didn’t really seal very well as my shape around the wheel tubs was not that tight. This time I decided I would completely remove the package tray and just weld in a sheet steel panel. I didn’t have a big enough piece to do it as one piece. So I used every inch of the piece I had to create 2 side panels with a strip down the middle to finish it off. This took a LOT of fiddling but I got it reasonably close and was able to weld up all the seams.

At the test in January I didn’t run the rear spoiler. Most of the mounting bolts had broken off when I wrecked the car and since the car under-steered I thought I might as well try it with no rear spoiler. But now that the test was done I, of course, wanted the spoiler back on. trying to restore the stock mounting studs (and drilling the stock mounting holes in the correct locations) seemed like it was going to be hard. So, I came up with a different solution. I got rid of all the stock studs and bent up 4 pieces of flat stock and fiberglassed them in. I put bolts into the flat stock. Now I had 4 mounting studs in a fairly straight line. I took some measurements and drilled holes in the trunk. Pretty happy with how it turned out. I also fiberglassed a couple of big chunks that had been knocked out of the spoiler.

So with all that done, I need to figure out a time to get it over to Maaco. Pics below: