'95 Civic EX 2Dr - rust repair repaint project

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PostPosted: Mon Jul 25, 2022 10:12 am
'68 Coronet R/T wrote:Are we having fun yet? :wink:


Yes and as a side benefit I weigh a lot less these days too!! Also couple more cars in the pipeline after this one too....

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PostPosted: Mon Jul 25, 2022 10:31 am
Laid down thin coat of epoxy primer and thin coat of surfacer and sanded to 320 grit. Test fit bumper on car:

Bumper primed 1.jpg

Bumper primed 2.jpg

Bumper primed 3.jpg

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PostPosted: Mon Jul 25, 2022 10:41 am
Sanded and sprayed three coats of epoxy primer on gas door, panels below tail lights, and trunk license plate frame.

Snall parts 3.jpg

Snall parts 2.jpg


Prior to primer I soaked gas door in Crud Cutter and it removed decades of grime and left original paint on back side of gas door in good condition:

Snall parts 1.jpg

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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2022 8:54 pm
My son came over and pulled out the 1/4 windows using guitar string to cut the window sealant bond. I scraped off window sealant and then sanded window channel down flat. Will epoxy prime the channel when I prep prime the roof.

Quarter window channel sanded 1.jpg


Quarter window channel sanded 2.jpg

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PostPosted: Thu Jul 28, 2022 9:23 am
Hopefully you plan to keep this car. You will never sell it for enough to compensate all your work and materials.

Once people see your work, you will have a line of prospective customers.

I have them sign a contract, stating the cost as "time and materials." It states my labor rate and the original plan of action on the vehicle. That I will bill them monthly, they can pay the bill and I continue or they can pay the bill and take their car somewhere else if they are not happy.

I have never had an unhappy customer doing it this way. Quoting a job is always risky because you often don't know how bad things are until you get into it. Also price increases in materials and parts are pretty frequent now days.

Another thing I suggest is that you keep a spread sheet.
I use Microsoft Excel and have a page for labor, where I keep log in and log out times, with hours totaled for the month and total job . A page for materials used (I bill paint, reducer, thinners, etc. by the ounce. Sandpaper by the inch, cut off discs, etc.) and parts ordered, with totals for each month plus a grand total. A page to track billing and payments. Some guys over pay when they can afford to and this tracks the use of those payments and the invoices they are applied to.

When done, you will know exactly how many hours you have in the project, how much the materials cost and hence a total cost of the job. This will help you see just how high you would have needed to quote the job and it will be much higher than your thought.
1968 Coronet R/T


ACTS 16:31

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PostPosted: Mon Aug 01, 2022 10:44 pm
'68 Coronet R/T wrote:Hopefully you plan to keep this car. You will never sell it for enough to compensate all your work and materials.

Once people see your work, you will have a line of prospective customers.

I have them sign a contract, stating the cost as "time and materials." It states my labor rate and the original plan of action on the vehicle. That I will bill them monthly, they can pay the bill and I continue or they can pay the bill and take their car somewhere else if they are not happy.

I have never had an unhappy customer doing it this way. Quoting a job is always risky because you often don't know how bad things are until you get into it. Also price increases in materials and parts are pretty frequent now days.

Another thing I suggest is that you keep a spread sheet.
I use Microsoft Excel and have a page for labor, where I keep log in and log out times, with hours totaled for the month and total job . A page for materials used (I bill paint, reducer, thinners, etc. by the ounce. Sandpaper by the inch, cut off discs, etc.) and parts ordered, with totals for each month plus a grand total. A page to track billing and payments. Some guys over pay when they can afford to and this tracks the use of those payments and the invoices they are applied to.

When done, you will know exactly how many hours you have in the project, how much the materials cost and hence a total cost of the job. This will help you see just how high you would have needed to quote the job and it will be much higher than your thought.


All excellent points. This Civic is my adult son's car and he will never sell it. And yes no way to know scope until you dig in. This one sort of surprised us with level of rust behind rear wheels ect.

My next car in line is my son in laws '87 Mustang GT. Its a sun roof car and the roof is totally rotted out. We already have another roof. But its a Virginia car so other then the roof its rot free.

I just purchased full AMD 1/4 panels for my '69 Barracuda. So that one comes in after the '87 mustang. Will be doing full floor pan replacement too. So will be a big project. So I am booked for many years to come....

PXL_20220717_191651532.jpg

PXL_20220717_190121878.jpg

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PostPosted: Wed Aug 03, 2022 9:50 pm
My son came over and pulled head liner and removed entire power moon roof assembly (moon roof will be disassembled, degreased, cleaned, lubed up, reassembled, and bench tested at later time).

Prepped roof: scraped windshield sealant out of front windshield channel (getting new windshield later), sanded roof gutters to metal with 80 grit, and sprayed three coats of epoxy primer.

roof Prepped 1.jpg

roof Prepped 2.jpg

roof Prepped 3.jpg

Roof Epoxy Primed.jpg

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PostPosted: Sun Aug 14, 2022 9:56 pm
Finished priming blocking roof and around 1/4 windows.

Roof primed 1.jpg

Roof primed 2.jpg

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PostPosted: Sun Aug 21, 2022 9:04 pm
Sprayed two coats of white epoxy primer in gas door pocket and reinstalled the gas door

Gas Door 1.jpg

Gas Door 2.jpg

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PostPosted: Sun Aug 21, 2022 9:08 pm
My son came over today and pull the engine out of the car and stripped the engine compartment. We are going to weld a lot of holes shut and then repaint eng comp body color:

Eng Removed 1.jpg

Eng Removed 2.jpg
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