Fuel Tank Dents

I had booked in some painting time for this past Saturday and nothing was going to stop me, not even the rain that started early Saturday morning and continued for the better part of my scheduled 5 hours.

My poor wife must have thought I finally cracked it with all my pacing up and down the stairs, inside and outside the house, checking weather apps, and commenting on drizzle vs rain all while contemplating throwing plastic drop sheets over the clothes line so that I can paint under cover. Oh the hillarity of it all. I can picture pockets of water collecting above me and my wife standing on the balcony shaking her head while guessing which pocket of water will end up collapsing the sheet first.

Fortunately she had better things to do than supervising me and the rain stopped with barely enough time for me to start painting. The race was on as I drew my gun and took my first shot! You know how the story ends though, the protagonist wins after a tense journey and not without some scars; or paint stains as it were and in some unusual places. I have no idea how I managed the ones all over my stomach… Our green clothes line is also slowly turning black with every paint session.

With a small supply of the KBS Coatings Rust Seal paint left, the plan was to do the prop and half shafts only but since I was using the spray gun I decided to throw the fuel tank in the mix to save myself some time down the road. I decided this on Thursday night which gave me a couple of hours to try and smooth out some dents in the tank first. I used a metal filler to bulk out the dents and did a fair job of it but ran out of time on Friday night to properly smooth it out with the spray putty. While not perfect it looks much better now and considering this is under the car… let’s just call it a win.

The shafts turned out well and I’m currently destroying the finish by fitting the uni joints. Good times. More on them later…