The Snowball Saga - '68 Standard Revitalization Project by Blitz

6 minute(s) of a 767 minute read

Agreed on both counts!


So, the verdict is in: this method works well! Here's when I was all masked up and ready to spray:

And here's after the 3 coats. I went much lighter on the first 2 coats especially, and still somewhat conservative on the 3rd, while still making sure I had full coverage.

After waiting a couple hours for it to dry sufficiently, I took off all the masking devices and found I had definitely achieved soft edges. Maybe too soft, but the area was just about right so that I had room to clean it up.

Maybe the best part is that the only cleanup needed was to do a quick pass on the chrome with Nevr-Dull, which took care of the little dots of overspray and helped define the edges better.

I'll probably still use one of my little mask pieces to define the lower / outer edges better, which will probably go much easier since the paint isn't as thick as the first one. I just hope they all look consistent with each other. But I'm happy enough with the method to proceed and do the remaining 2 wheels this way. Just have to do one at a time. It's nice that these stencils are reusable, it feels like I'm saving time even though it took a while to make them.

So the goal is to finish these up in the next day or so, give them some time to cure, get the new tires mounted next week, and take some nice finished pics. I've also entered in my first "real" car show since finishing the resto, coming up on Oct. 10, so I'm looking forward to having these on the car for that.

Now I'm off to paint wheel #3

10-5-2021

Guess what arrived today!

I think they look perfect. Nice simple sidewall, stripe is the perfect width and position. Stoked to see them all mounted up and on the car. I took them to the tire shop today, and made sure the guy there knew about the "lug centric" balance needs of these old school wheels. Thanks to Rich "Sixty-EightCougar" for messaging me with a heads up about that. The first shop I went to didn't know what I was talking about or didn't have the right adapter to balance from the lugs. Anyway, they should be ready to pick up tomorrow.

Here's the last shot before these wheels & tires become one:

10-7-2021

Tires are mounted and balanced! Looking really good.

So when I got them home, naturally I thought I could just screw on the center caps and get them mounted on the car. Then, the joy of reproduction parts reared its head one more time. I should have remembered the issues with these center caps, but a couple years out of the game and you tend to forget things.

My set of Scott Drake center caps didn't come with all the necessary hardware, so that was the first problem. They only included 2 star washers, which didn't make any sense as you'd need at least 8. There were 8 screws included, so 2 per cap, even though each cap has 4 threaded holes (so you could use 16 total if you wanted to). So in my excitement to get these together I thought, well, maybe the washers are optional if they only bothered to include two.

My first attempt at installing a cap without washers resulted in (1) the screws being just long enough to gouge the black painted background and (2) simply trying to tighten them enough to stop the cap from rattling resulted in the two halves falling apart.

What followed was much inappropriate language, and I thought it was totally ruined. Once I took a moment to calm down and consider the problem, I managed to use a black paint pen to flow some paint into the gouges I had created. This actually worked very well and hid the problem enough that nobody will notice.

After this I was able to reattach the backing plate, which is held on with several weak little tabs. More on that later. I then went to the hardware store to see if I could fill in the deficiencies of what was included in the kit. Unfortunately they didn't have enough of the correct star washers, so I ended up getting regular lock washers. I think they'll provide a little extra clearance anyway, to avoid gouging the black paint again. I also thought I might try to use 4 screws per cap, so I picked up the closest thing I could find, #10 sheet metal screws. If I use these I'll have to hack off the pointy ends.

So this was going to be my proposed setup. Screw, lock washer, and blue thread locker as a little extra insurance. I proceeded to attempt to install the same cap again this way.