[njsteve]

Glad to be of assistance. This website has been of great help to me too, when it comes to getting obscure questions answered.

Posting all my progress photos here sure beats having to buy photo album after photo album to stuff all the pictures in!

[njsteve]

I kept thinking about the heated fluid idea so I stopped by the local PetsMart on my way home from work and picked up a submersible aquarium heater for about $25 (the ones for reptile tanks that can be fully underwater and not hanging on the side of the tank). Well it turns out that is the trick. Just heat up the fluid and it improves the chemical reaction immensely. Here is a spot by the front leaf spring hanger. I aimed the sprayer and let it go for about two minutes to check the aim while I got the camera ready and in that time it already converted most of the surface rust to clean metal.

[njsteve]

I have the aquarium heater running full tilt. The temp is about 65 degrees now and you can actually see the rust dissolve away.

here is the same spring perch area after 2 hours:

[njsteve]

And here's the rocker panel area before:

[njsteve]

And after about 45 minutes:

[njsteve]

Passenger side before and after:

[njsteve]

And here is the rear bulkhead area above the rear differential. It had a lot of darkened, rusty areas that cleaned up rather nicely in about an hour. It was a mess to do this area, though. I had to place a kiddy pool under the bucket to catch all the dripping fluid so it wouldn't go to waste (at $25 a gallon it's pretty valuable).

[njsteve]

Here's how the stuff works on hard metal parts. this is the jack base from my car. Before and after soaking for 2 days:

[njsteve]

People have been asking about the original primer under my car and what paints may be out there that are close to replicating it. I bought a can of the OEM Paints #42030 "Undercarriage Paint Factory Red Oxide Low Sheen" sold by Classic Industies (1-800 854-1280) at $17.95 a can. I sprayed a couple coats on a piece of white cardboard (so it ended up a little bit lighter than it would be over metal) It is pretty darn close to the original stuff under my 12A-built 1972 T/A. It was hard to get a good photo of the comparison because the flash tends to meter off of the card instead of the car itself. Anyway, here it is. It seems to have the correct sheen/gloass as my car has. It should be noted that it was very hard to find a spot on the underside of this car that did not have original white overspray on it, but I managed to find a spot where a hunk of the original undercoating fell off.

Looks like this stuff is the ticket for replicating the original e-coat. Now if we can all chip in and buy about 10,000 gallons, we can dip our cars in it just like the factory did!

[cdoggy81]

Holy $$$ hit, $17.95 a can is a little steep for spray paint!?!?!?!?! I can't believe anyone would pay that much for what, like 12 oz???
On a side note, my 2 cans will be arriving in 5 to 7 business days...
Good info & thanks for the post.

[njsteve]

You think that's expensive? - you should see what they charge for the Honeycomb wheel paint: $39.95 a can!!! But they are the only people reproducing the original formula(s). And their products go a long way, they are mixed as a very heavy paint, not the thin junk that most spray paints are mixed as.

By the way, Classic Industries just sent me an email announcing their 15% off holiday sale. You have to use the secret email code to get the discount. Here it is, feel free to use it: HC1157. Happy Holidays!

[weranc55]

Steve,

That stuff looks good. I'm going to try it. 17 a can is not that bad.

[Larry Navarro]

the price of these resto paints is peanuts when you compare the value of these cars after the work has been done.
If it's the right paint, I wouldn't care about the cost.

[njsteve]

Originally Posted by weranc55

Steve,

That stuff looks good. I'm going to try it. 17 a can is not that bad.

It looks like they raised the price since I last checked. It's now $31.95 a can. Ouch!

[RicksGTO]

Has anyone tried the Eastwood's Rust Encapsulator in Red? I am about to paint the interior floors on mine and found that it had some red oxide primer to begin with. I may try a can and see how it looks, as it's not too critical if the color of the floors under the carpet are off a shade. Here's a pic from their site, it runs about $18 a can for the spray, or $27 a quart for the cans. Rick

[njsteve]

How this for the final result on color matching: After doing the usual search of the unsual places (every autoparts store in a 20 mile radius) I found the exact color for the 70 and up GM jack bases and jack mechanisms: judge for yourself:

It's Duplicolor DE 1609 Chevrolet Blue Engine Enamel

[njsteve]

I've been playing around with the derusting liquid again. Here is a 71 and a 72 spark control solenoid that I let soak in the fluid for two days.

Here's the before and after photos:

[cdoggy81]

Wow, they look great. BTW, what the he!! is a spark control solenoid??? :-l

[blue71ta]

TCS solenoid: Thermostatically-Controlled Spark. I believe it does not allow full vacuum advance to the distributor until the engine is warmed up/reaches a certain temperature.

[njsteve]

They are one of those dumb little emission-related parts that everyone threw away five miniutes after getting their car home when they bought it new. Now they are in big demand for restoration purposes. I put mine back on my car but creatively routed the vaccuum hoses so it doesn't effect the performance of the distributer's vacuum advance. There is also an accompanying switch attached to the M22 transmission to restrict vacuum advance to fourth gear only after a certain temperature is reached. These were high-tech smog era "engineering advancements" for their day. These were extras I had and I'll probably throw them up on ebay eventually.