Bumper Work

This weekend I cleaned up the bumpers. I bought these bumpers about a year ago from Parker Tyler in Maine. They are straight for the most part with only a few dings and dents - that's to be expect with 40 year bumpers, right? I removed the old deco strips and rubber inserts carfull not to damage the old aluminum strips. They should be in good shape and only need minimal polishing when we are ready to reinstall them. The rubber of course will need to be replaced.

I sprayed the bumpers down with aircaft stripper only to find that the stripper only lifted the top coat of paint. It appears that these bumper have had a couple coats of paint over the years. I then had to buff them down by hand to the bare metal.

Once cleaned, I spent a couple hours with a hammer and dolley trying to straighten out the dents. For the most part, they looked pretty good.

I've spent hours on the website Auto Body Store which has a great teaching area and discussion threads. After hours online, I had the confidence to move forward with filler. I chose to use Evercoat's Metal Glaze. This material spread smoothly and was easy to sand down. None of my filled in areas were more than a few mil deep and an inch in diameter. I used 80 grit paper before I applied the first layer to make sure it adheared strongly to the bare metal and then used 80 grit again to finish it. Once I start priming, I will use a high build primer on the bumers to get the final later.

After I was satisfied with the work, I spread onto the bumper Ospho to prevent further rusting. It may be several weeks before I start to prime everything and with the humid salt air where we live I risk rust forming quickly.