rockmonton wrote:
Anyone got any tips/tricks for getting the darn undercoating off?
Just put a new (well, straight rust free) floor in my cop car. There IS NO FUN WAY TO REMOVE THAT ISH! I use gas, kerosene or some such deadlyness and a wire brush to scrape as much of the big crap off and catch all the crud that falls off the car in a big metal tray. Then wire wheel and more scrubbing with brushes, sopping rags and whatever horrible things at your disposal in your well ventilated evil laboratory/chamber of horrors.
The fun way? Acid dip the car. Done. Everything that isn't metal and all moving parts must come off the car for this. The good news is that all that red "rust" sh!t and goopy undercoating sh1t goes away.
I'd just not tear into it much and goop it all with a bunch of rust gel and por-15 and drive it and see if you like it. I would never fix up an old car unless I really liked it. It is a ton of work, and volvos aren't worth a lot...you have to really like the car. I think a lot of people tear into a car without living with it for a bit, and many lose interest and lose a whole lot else besides. For a select few that possess the skills and really want to reinvent everything no matter what they start with and have a vision for the end no matter what, this can work (if they have the resources necessary). Even those people are often picky, whether originality is important or inventing a contraption completely unique to them is what they like. For most mere mortals like myself, I have to build the car and sample what I like and don't like (and I'm picky on a lot of little stuff) and live with it ugly and imperfect and would then have to build the car again and start over (take it completely apart) (like acid dip for instance) and make it all pretty once I was satisfied and had a picture in my head.
Then again, I am guilty of many times not leaving well enough alone...I spent a day on the driver door of the cop car redoing window regulator, new door handle, adjustment, rebuild existing lock, replace glass with good glass, NOS door card, new door pockets, adjust and fuss with speaker and fit to OEM grille tightly without hitting the window glass, fuss over vapor barrier/sound deadening etc. I was also going rather fast and had an original paint rust free door and was mostly replacing parts with new, nearly new (found in the wrecking yard) cleaned/brightened parts etc.
No actual major refurb was going on...for me to do a car where I wasn't mostly plugging and playing would be some measurement years to remote completion. Sometimes living with an imperfect car and tinkering on it is more fun anyway. I only fixed the floor because I LIKED the car..it was fast, semi beateriffic, and got me around without a single issue for a year (after going through it mechanically for a few days and making small adjustments), and it is a kind of cool wacky car to drive around....not bad for a car you are under $1500 all into. I wanted to pass that onto a person I care about as I get out of cars for a while. Cars come and go.