Avanti Rescue

[ErnieR]

A little bumper story...

It was about 1997 or so when I began the serious restoration on my former Avanti. My wife Cindi and I had just gotten married ( number two was the charm for me ) but she had become accustomed to the constant visits from the UPS truck and the multitude of boxes that were being stored in our basement before we tied the knot. I was never questioned about the cost of things and I always made it seem like things weren't all that expensive. After all, most times the boxes weren't very large and I do all the work myself so there were no shop invoices laying around.

So in 1997 I was able to buy a front bumper center section and a rear bumper NOS from one of the vendors. They were for an Avanti II so there was a ridge in the front bumper that didn't appear on the originals but mine was very wavey and I'm not that fussy. The pair cost me $900 plus shipping so we were a fair amount over $1,000. I was a sales manager for a Ford dealer at the time and rarely got home before 10 PM and Cindi was always the first to see the new shipments.

Since they were large and heavy, for her, she was curious as to what they were and wanted to see them. The cost never came up and I wasn't about to elaborate. Skip ahead a few months and we were visiting my parents in the Adirondacks and there happen to be a car show at a town close by so we went for a couple of hours. Lo and behold, even though there weren't more than 30 cars on display, right at the entrance is a VERY nice 1964 Avanti Gray R2.

Naturally, I was all over the car and the owner and his wife were very gracious and we spent lots of time talking Avantis. My new found friend's wife asked Cindi how she felt about the time spent at car shows and maintaining the car and Cindi said she didn't mind so much and then...Mrs. Gray Avanti says... "but how about the price of the parts? Do you know how many outfits I could have bought for the price of those bumpers?"

As my car restoration life flashed before eyes I saw a moment of clarity in Cindi's eyes. For the rest of the afternoon I waited and waited for the "discussion" but it never came. It's a good thing too because I had just ordered a full interior at almost $3,000. She still doesn't hassle me about car stuff for which I am forever grateful.

ErnieR

[SeventhSon]

Ahem - nice weather we're having, eh?

[SeventhSon]

Rust. Never. Sleeps. Tonight I got the ball rolling on getting the bumper to the re-chromer. Which means I had to spray some Kroil on the nuts holding the brackets and rubber strips on the vertical pieces. Hopefully the rust will give up the grip with the soaking of Kroil repeatedly and I won't have to tear things apart. I'm getting new rubber strips, so I guess it won't matter - assuming the rubber pieces have the studs that come through the vertical piece and hold the bracket as well. Looks to be the way things go together, anyhow. So, the threads are soaking, the sooner they come apart the sooner the pieces go to the re-chromer. I also removed the tag light (with the help of a small sledgehammer) and scraped the old Studebaker Driver's Club sticker off - just about ready to go.

I'll probably have a look at the local Home Depot and see what is available in the way of crate making materials. I can probably throw something together to ship this thing in - I'm not as worried about the bumper going as I am it coming back. Want to keep it nice once it is all shiny. Once I get that shipped off I can turn my attention to cleaning the body of the car really well so I can start sanding on it. I guess I'll wash the old girl with a good detergent, then wipe it down with a good "surface cleaner". Adhering to my "first, do no harm" deal, I will have to research the best cleaner to use that will remove grease and oil, etc. without harming the fiberglass. I must proceed carefully. Once I get it clean I can start sanding on the body. And when I get bored with that I can pull one wheel off at a time and work on cleaning and painting those. My plan is to spend the rest of the year working on the body and wheels and hopefully have her ready for paint by Christmas. 5 months? Maybe I can pull it off.

[unimogjohn]

Chris, re a box for the bumpers. You have a couple of choices. Greg made a wooden box out of 2x4s and then covered it with light weight plywood that is about 1/8 thick. Then he wrapped everything in foam and screwed everything together. The last time I sent Jerry the front bumper I just bought a cardboard carton and wrapped it in bubble wrap and sent it. You will have to send the little bumpers in their own cardboard box. Both ways worked great. I used UPS ground.

Oh, and I got the cardboard container at a local shipping store. It was only about $8 as I remember.

[ErnieR]

Not trying to spend your money but did you investigate the price of doing just the bumper vs both bumpers and other miscellaneous pieces all at the same time. There might be a discount for multiple pieces and since it takes some time to do the process you will have time to prepare the body and the wallet for the new bling.

I went as far as having the vent window frames done but it's a chore and if your windows fit ok it might not be worth the trouble unless yours are really bad. The door handles are not as intimidating as they look and they looked great re-plated. I bought what I thought was a new hood ornament and turns out it was a used one that was rechromed and wasn't as nice as mine would have been re-plated. Headlight doors and rings, "S" emblem escutcheons, front bumper, door handles, park and tailight housings and your whole car is replated. Discuss it with your chrome guy because I'll bet dinner and drinks that if you start putting old chrome on new paint no matter what your expectations are for the car's use you will send that rest of the stuff out for chroming.

IMHO, of course.

ErnieR

I wish I had jumped on board this thread before you replaced the glass rubber because the paint job looks extra nice without tape lines at the weatherstripping

[Roger Zimmermann]

I wish I had jumped on board this thread before you replaced the glass rubber because the paint job looks extra nice without tape lines at the weatherstripping

No problem, Ernie: I told him that too, but he was not yet in the mood to do some paint on the car.

[SeventhSon]

John - thanks for the tips!

Yeah, yeah - I heard all about the painting while the glass was out. However, I would have to have both windows out of the car, then while the windows were out I might as well replace the dash, then while that is out, let me have the clock and tach re-done. Since the car is half torn apart I might as well pull the seats and have them re-done. Meantime, I can't drive the car, it's taking up space in the home garage, months go by with no fun driving it and I end up discouraged. Nah, not for me - I want to be able to drive the old car around as I work on it. I'll never have a show car or "trailer queen", so I'll do the work as I go and drive it as I go. I'll have to decide on the various chrome pieces as I get to them - I have to keep in mind Ernie's very recent post about money spent on a "hobby" - gotta watch what is going out since I am on shaky economic times myself.

P.S. Unimogjohn had his Avanti painted without removing the glass and it turned out pretty darn nice. Just gotta watch how you mask it and have the guy spraying it pay attention to those areas in particular.

[ErnieR]

You are right Chris. Besides, new rubber will come out easily and go back in the same way. I've done it a couple of times on the Avanti. It is too easy for us "hanger ons" to spend someone else's money. I do know what you mean though it took me 10 years to get my Avanti cosmetically finished and money was a big factor. And your point about not driving it is well taken. Once mine was apart and not drive able I needed to have something fun to drive so I bought a 1969 GP that I swore I wouldn't put any money into. Well I'm sure you know the outcome there.

As far as the dash goes the tooling to make them is on eBay for $50,000:)

ErnieR

[SeventhSon]

Ernie - it's such a cool car that I wouldn't be able to not drive it. I'm already working over the plans in my mind on how I will be able to drive it while working on the body. I guess I'll just fire it up and take it out! It'll be like when we bought my mother's '63 Hawk and were bringing it home on the "Beltway" (basically a big race track in those days that encircled Washington, DC, but now known as a "parking lot") and an Avanti flew by and honked it's horn a couple of times. That was 1971 and the Avanti was several different colors of primer. So, they go fast in any color

So today I thought over what to send the bumper to Georgia in. Well, I already have this box that it just came from Georgia in. Looks like I already have my box. So I stopped by an office supply store at lunchtime and picked up some bubble wrap, strapping tape, and a small box (which was too big to fit in the other box). I left work a little early this afternoon and headed home to unbolt the brackets and rubber strips from the vertical pieces. Surprisingly the nuts came loose fairly easily (thanks Kroil!) and in a few minutes I had the pieces ready to box up. I wrapped each piece in bubble wrap and put them in the box I bought. Like I mentioned, that box wouldn't work so I looked around the garage and spied a Summit Racing box. Perfect! Pretty soon that box was pressed into service and the vertical pieces were ready to go. I wrapped the large bumper piece in bubble wrap and put everything in the large box. Almost ready. I taped everything together with strapping tape and other shipping tape, until I had no tape left. I guess that'll have to do!

I'll take the box to the shipping place this weekend, I hope, and send it off. So I can move on to more pressing things. Ernie posted earlier about getting some of the small pieces re-chromed as part of a bundle deal. I'm not sure if I have anything else I want to have re-plated. I know Studebaker International has most of the pieces in reproduction, but I'm not sure of the quality. The main pieces I would want to replace are the hood emblem, the "sail" emblems, the "Supercharged" fender emblems and the tail and backup light surrounds. And the "Avanti" emblem on the nose. All of mine are pretty much toasted. I know the "new" frame of thought is to have patina on the old cars and I understand that, but I also feel that the car companies built the cars to look a certain way, nice finish on the body and chrome accents all over. I want to try to reach a middle point, to have a car that is old but still has some of its original "glory". Who knows if I will be able to achieve that.

[ErnieR]

Driving it and prepping it shouldn't be too difficult. I couldn't drive mine because it was completely gutted and de-glassed. I had to push it in and out of the garage sometimes with the help of a come-along.

Some stripping ideas...My car had so much paint on it that I was able to take all the layers off (except for what was left of the original turquoise and primer )with razor blades. Then I used a stripper by POR-15 that was so gentle that I would forget to put gloves on. Unless you have a very light tough avoid electric sanders. It doesn't take much effort to scuff the fiberglass and end up with a surface with more waves than the car was built with originally. In retrospect I don't know if I really needed to go to bare fiberglass as there are some sealers out there that let you paint over most anything.

Then there's the guys out there that are putting a coat of primer on with a foam roller. What the heck, you're going to sand it anyway. Or you could get Ed from the "Wheeler Dealers" show. He seems to be able to paint whole cars with a rattle can!

On my '88 which I called my "beater Avanti" I painted the Tailight housings, headlight doors and rings with that Stainless Steel paint that I love so much.

If the car was metal than you would need to strip and prime right away but you could strip, spray some sandable primer and drive the glass Avanti.

There's always the choice of satin black primer, cleared with bright bumpers and some old school Cragers. Or, if you stick with a more generic color like the gray you originally mentioned Duplicolor has these no mix lacquers that you just pour in a gun and shoot. Not expensive either.

I'm rambling again, sorry.

Ernie

[unimogjohn]

Chris, re painting. The guys at the paint shop had the PPG rep come in and select the products for my Avanti. After taking a look at the paint (only one repaint on the car) he recommended that they take it down to the original primer as it was still holding well. So they hand sanded the entire car and they applied a coating of primer over the entire car. Sorry, I do not know what product they applied, but am sure I can find out. It was the same stuff they used on Corvettes. They then blocked sanded and painted/clear coated the car. Their initial sanding exposed a lot of spider cracks in the glass that had to be repaired as well as several big splits in the glass where it had been hit and damaged.

Eastwood has some good videos on painting that you might want to take a look at. They are on Youtube. http://www.eastwood.com/catalog-specialty-coatings

Edited July 27, 2013 by unimogjohn (see edit history)

[SeventhSon]

Ernie - ramble on, you are a wealth of information and ideas. I am intrigued by the Duplicolor idea, sounds like just what I am looking for. I must confess, I don't know how the razor blade deal works - I would be afraid that I would sink the blade into the glass a couple of hundred times. Is the paint softened before scraping with a blade?

A couple of decisions I have made early on - no electric sanding and no rattle cans. I don't have a compressor or spray gun, but I might be able to rent those. I know I can rent a gas powered compressor, not sure about a spray gun.

Thanks, John, for the info. I'll definitely be checking out the Eastwood link along with the bodywork 101 site, which I have already been looking at a little bit (hence, the no rattle can rule). One thing I have been looking at on the car is what appears to be Bondo along the top edge of the fender lines - not sure if that is normally seen in those spots or not. I know some work was done on the left front because I can see the remnants of fiberglass matting left behind. No telling what I'll find once I get into it.

[ErnieR]

The razor blades work best on thick old paint. I think I mentioned that my car had al the available Avanti colors on it except gray and white all piled on top of each other. The blades took the top layers off quickly but couldn't remove the primer. It was easier than I thought and plenty of sharp blades and scraping as close to parallel took off a lot of old paint without damage. Of course I stayed away from edges and only used the blades on the flats. Most of the scraping was on dry hard paint. It just flaked off as I scraped. I did use blades on softened paint but most of the scraping was dry paint.

The rest was done with POR Strip. From POR 15 and 3m pads. I didn't use much sandpaper and resisted using the DA.

My original intent was to paint it myself but in 1996 I went to work for a dealership that had a body shop. They worked on it in between jobs and the painter did it after hours. Still cost me $5500 including the new fender header panel and rear fender cap. Not a perfect job either but I got what I paid for.

The nice thing about the latest fad is you can have a car in prime for awhile and as long as the wheels and tires are nice the car is in acceptable cruise and show state. I personally don't get the idea of spending the same time and money to make a car look ratty as to look nice but it does give the in process cars street cred because the rest of the word thinks anything rusty or unfinished is now a rat rod!

The Duplicolor stuff is intriguing since its lacquer it can be scuffed and shot over in a relatively short time so mistakes like runs can be corrected easily. It dries quickly so any dust is in the topmost layers and can be color sanded out.

There will be spots that look like bondo because the bodies are glued together. The outer fenders are glued to inners so you would see filler all along the top if there was some finishing needed after the assembly process.

Compressors aren't terribly expensive but I would bet there's a rental company out there that has a whole paint setup available

Ive always had the intent of painting something myself but chickened out. You seem patient and detailed enough to pull it off. What's the worst that could happen?

ErnieR

Edited July 28, 2013 by ErnieR (see edit history)

[Bill Stoneberg]

.Mrs. Gray Avanti says... "but how about the price of the parts? Do you know how many outfits I could have bought for the price of those bumpers?"

Reminds me of a lady giving her husband an economic lesson in drinking beer.

How much do you spend on beer a week ?

About 20 bucks

Lets see 20 bucks a week time 52 weeks a year is over 1,000 a year. Do you know if you would have put that money in an account and let it

gain interest, in about 20 years you would have enough money for a Ferrari ?

Do you drink beer ?

No, I dont touch it.

Where is your Ferrari ?

[SeventhSon]

Hehehe - good one!

Ernie - "what's the worst that could happen?" I'm about to find out!

[ErnieR]

One thing I've noticed after going to two national Studebaker and Avanti meets is that there are more Avantis out there built and painted to drive than to show and worship.

So, since paint can be scuffed, sanded, polished, buffed and sprayed again there's very little that can go wrong. Let's face it you love the car the way it is now and if your expectations aren't too high you will love the car all one color. Besides driving by at 50 mph the rest of the world will think it looks great and if they can pick out the flaws at that speed it doesn't matter since they can't stop and point them out to you or anyone else!

I'm looking forward to reading and learning from the paint blog.

ErnieR

[SeventhSon]

Thanks Ernie, it's definitely going to be a learning experience for me. I just hope I can make the old car somewhat presentable, which I think an old classic like the Avanti deserves We'll see...

[SeventhSon]

Well, the rear bumper shipped off yesterday - now I can turn to other matters. Like going for a drive! I stopped by the storage unit today, and since it's been over a week since the old car has seen the road I decided to take her out. Fired her up and headed out on the highway - she liked the run, even if it was only 15 miles or so. I got into it a couple of times just to see if she still has get up and go. Yep! After too short of a drive I took her back and started having a look at things and what I am getting myself in for with the body work. First and foremost - a thorough cleaning of the exterior. Probably have to go over it a few times to get all the dirt and grease, etc. off.

One good thing that I won't have to deal with, at least topside - rust! In my limited experience with auto body work, rust was the number one P.I.T.A. I ever had to fool with. But, I suppose a fiberglass body has its own little issues to deal with. Ah well.... There is some rust on the body, on the door hinges, but that shouldn't be too much of a problem to get rid of. It's the big, jagged holes of lost metal that are so disheartening, oh wait, those are waiting for me underneath on the hog troughs, at least the left side. In due time I shall address those as well...

I took some pictures of the cracking paint and dirt, oxidation, etc., we even have some fiberglass showing through on the driver's door. Hopefully I can seal that over and get it smoothed out so you can't tell it had an issue. We'll see - I can't wait to start getting the old girl looking better. She deserves it. I also took a couple of pictures of the hood emblem and one of the side emblems. Studebaker International says, in their catalog, that the "S" emblems prior to serial #4879 were gold colored. Mine sure look chrome colored, and my serial number is quite a bit earlier than 4879. Could the gold color have faded away? I might even like the gold "S" on those emblems, I have seen the gold "Studebaker" and "Avanti" emblems - I don't like those, though. Too "blingy". I'll have to do a little research on the gold vs. chrome "S" and see what the deal is.

[ErnieR]

They are right about the gold and silver. The gold did fade out with age. Most of the world wouldn't know the difference just remember those side emblems can only be accessed by taking the interior panels out so whatever you pick remember changing them out is a pain.

A lot of the paint looks razor blade worthy!!

On the emblem escutheons, I bought mine already chromed and they were obviously ground to remove pits and while the chrome looked good and it held up you could see the waves. Buying them at York or the international meet coming up in south Jesey might be a better idea than through the mail this way you could inspect them before you plunk down the money.

The other thing to plan for is that under body support replacement. I know there was a two piece that was out there that could be installed without cutting into the rockers and I never looked at it closely because mine were good but I'm sure you don't want to get into paint and bodywork AFTER you did all the paint and bodywork.

ErnieR

[unimogjohn]

Chris, On my 63 Avanti, all the emblems were silver and they came from the factory that way. Good thing, I do not like the gold. I did replace my little chrome and S emblems on the sails without removing the interior panel. I had the shop drill through the emblem where the two posts are. This enabled them just to remove it and pop the tails back into the interior. Then I had them use clear epoxy and glue the new emblems in. So far so good. So if your emblems are junk (the chrome bracket and the interior plastic) just drill them out.

[SeventhSon]

John - I thought I had read on your thread that your side emblems were drilled out, and that was what I was going to try on mine. I agree about the color - it's gonna be all chrome, hood, sides, front and back. Decision made!

Ernie - I may give the razor blade a try, at least to remove the top layer of Earl Scheib paint :eek: We'll see how it goes!

On the hog troughs, Classic Enterprises has a set that they claim can be "installed without disturbing the finish of a newly painted Avanti". I think I'm going to take them up on that! They are 5 piece units that become one piece when installed. They come in steel and stainless steel - pricey, too. But worth it if I can get them installed and check that off the list. That fun will be quite a while in the future - gotta save some pennies up for that!

[Landman]

Chris, I had replaced one trough on my GT Hawk and it was done without affecting the paint. All the welding is against the floor. I don't know how much difference there is between the Hawk and the Avanti.

[SeventhSon]

Pat - I think the main difference is in the attachment to the body of the car. The torque box on the Avanti gets riveted to the floor and the existing side rail under the rocker panel (provided there is anything left of it). The tricky part is removing the bolts on the outriggers and the main body bolts at the front toeboard and rear bumper bracket. Sounds like fun!

[SeventhSon]

August one already - before you know it the chill will be in the air. Can't wait. I had to rush out to the field on short notice yesterday, so no trip to the storage unit. So today I headed there at lunch, eating a frozen something or other on the way. I picked up 4 gallons of cheap spring water, some Dawn detergent, a scrubber pad, and some steel wool pads (just in case). Since I have no running water at the storage shed I had to bring my own. Now that I bought a few gallons I have some plastic jugs I can fill up at home.

At the storage unit I got right to it - I dumped a gallon of water on the hood, put some Dawn and water in a bucket and went to town on the hood. Scrub-a-dub-dub. First soapy water the old car has seen for a few decades, I'm sure. I only got to scrub the hood and rinse it off before I had to run back to work. But, it's a start. Every time I go to the storage shed I'll take some water and clean another section of the car. When I'm done with that I'll wipe the car down with a good cleaner - I'm thinking about Goof-Off. But I would have to research that first - don't want to damage anything.

[unimogjohn]

Chris, you do not want to use anything that will leave a residue as it will get into the glass. Goof Off is for removing tar, pitch, paint spatter, etc. It will leave a film on your surfaces that when you go to paint it may lift it off from the underside. I would talk to a paint shop for sure to get the right product.

[avantey]

Chris- My friend who is a body and paint guy for 25+ years taught me years ago to use a degrease, dewax, de-everything prep at the last minute before you paint. I use PPG DP330, rubbing it on with one cloth and following with a clean cloth. Every time I am amazed at how much residue of various things it finds! He does this step with gloves on so as to not even get finger tip oil on the paint area,

I have it hung and ready and just wipe it down usually, let it dry about ten minutes and shoot epoxy primer or whatever right away. I am sure most paint lines have a final prep solution like this and it is not too expensive at around $20/gallon the last time I got it. I would talk to a painter who has done glass like a Corvette or marine guy to find a good product that won't react with the fiberglass, sink in or create some other weird problem.

Did I mention I hate doing brakes? But then again I also hate house plumbing and they are kind of related! The Avanti brakes are giving me fits- thought I had them done but could not get a good pedal last nite when bleeding them. Next thing I know I break off a front bleeder screw so tonite I go out and break an EZ out off in the screw. Now the caliper is on the bench half torn down with one end of the crossover pipe soaking since it did not want to come off! Just talked to Dave Tibo and ordered a caliper kit. The boot on the piston was all kinds of loose and wrinkled from trying to heat the broken bleed screw. I ought to just get four new SST lined cal/piston assemblies but I do not have $400 + shipping right now.

I ordered all kinds of smalls for the Model A distributor today as we are taking that to the Glidden in TN next month and I have to ready it. It is running real rough and ragged even after a carb rebuild. Starts much better now but still breaks up as you accelerate. I hope it is just bad old plugs (ordered new ones too) but I am going to rebuild the distributor anyways. Some slop in the shaft I do not like so it is getting new bushings and shaft. I need to win the lottery or something- then i would have all the time and money I need to play with cars!

I wish I was driving mine!

[SeventhSon]

Thanks John - I will forget about the Goof-Off idea.

Bill, glad to see you are still hanging in there with your Avanti - keep at those brakes and you will be driving it soon. For some reason the Avanti is a @#$&*! to bleed the brakes on - I had the guys at Alan Hime's shop do the final brake setup on mine and Alan told me they had such a time that they finally thought they had a bad master cylinder (and it was brand new!). But they finally got it done after 8 hours or something. Regarding the wax and grease remover, I want to wipe the car down before I commence sanding on it so I don't sand any grease, etc. into the base. If I start as clean as possible I might end up with a fair job in the end - not holding out too much hope for a super job, though, being inexperienced and all.

Keep on plugging away Bill - you'll be tooling around in the old Avanti before you know it!

P.S. I hear you about the lottery!

[Guest Warehousebroker]

Chris' brother here; you guys talking about Avanti brakes! So many folks got fed up with those brakes a "cottage" industry called Turner Brakes sprung up selling adapter kits to install Mustang or Vette brakes on Studebakers. I know it is sacreligious to mention those brand "X" cars in the same sentence! Even after one achieves brake bleed shag gra la they continue to frustrate errrrgh!

Edited August 3, 2013 by Warehousebroker (see edit history)

[Guest Warehousebroker]

As for the lottery why not get together a pool of old car guys and buy lottery tickets? Many past winners have been office pools! Just a thought

[SeventhSon]

Hey brother Brian. Once they got my brakes working they seem to be doing OK (knock on wood), but I have heard all the stories of the brake problems. I hope I don't experience any troubles :eek:. Every time I hear anything about Avanti brakes I remember the time your '64 needed front pads. You had to work so you left the brake job to brother Kevin and his assistant, yours truly. We needed brake pads, so we decided to head over to the parts house (I believe Riverdale Auto Parts). What car did we take? Why, the one that needed brakes! Why? Because it was fast! What followed was a harrowing blast around the Beltway, with Kevin weaving in and out of traffic at 90+ miles per hour, jamming on and pumping the brakes furiously (with worn out pads scraping metal to metal) every time some slow poke changed lanes and got in our way. Boy, what fun! Those were the days! Youth sure was great, eh? When we too full of life to be scared of anything.

The Old Car Guys Lottery Pool is hereby open. Please send your money to me and I'll buy the tickets!

[John Byrd]

Chris, listen to your brother ! Mr Turner does some of the best. I may have mentioned this story before, but our Avanti with freshly rebuilt brakes all around stopped about as well as one could I thought, but a Ford Windstar van in front of me one day had SOOOOO much better brakes.... and I was not following too close. Those little vans fit perfectly between the front fenders taking glass covers, headlights, park lights, and a good bit of fiberglass with the impact while I had the brakes on hard as I could. I had not taken the advise of a good friend with two-wrecks from bad brakes on his Avanti to change them out ! I still did not change them after my wreck, ( hard-headed/ stupid/ cheap ?) but it did change my driving habits a LOT as well as breaking my heart and our nice, restored, wanted one since they were new, car ! The speed involved in this wreck? Pulling away from a red light, and the van I was following stopping me firmly before the other side of the 4-lane intersection ! In other words, not fast, not reckless, and yes, her brake lights worked perfectly. bummer.... And to your reply to him, yes, youth was great, but boy, do we break easily as we age, as I found out several weeks ago when I just plain fell over on my Royal Enfield, ha !! John

[avantey]

Wee, my brother in law, who is an expert machinist, was able to get the broken bleeder out and save the caliper which was awesome! I then spent a good piece of yesterday driving around looking for a new bleeder screw. NONE of the modern parts stores have this type so I ended up 50 miles from home at a long time parts house in Rochester and they did not have it either. Does anyone know where to look next? I will call Dave T and Dorman Tech help tomorrow. Dorman did not list it doing an OEM part number search so I do not have a lot of hope there and they are the big dog in bleeder screws manufacture.

The problem is the base of this screw is short after the threads and flat with a small hole at the base of the threads. Most screws now have a longer body after the threads and a pointed tip. I cannot tell what the seat is at the bottom of the hole in the caliper, too dark and dirty after fifty years. Has anyone tried a pointed tip screw in the Bendix caliper?

As for the commentary on the Avanti brakes I have always had good brakes on my car. It stops firm and straight and gave me very little grief until now. Never understood why with such a small braking surface area on those pads and the weight of the car but they always worked well for me! Once again I think setting for three years is the culprit not the system. What aggravates me is that the fronts were rebuilt maybe five years ago now when I did the SST lines throughout and were very gunked up when I tore them down.

[SeventhSon]

John Byrd - I'm stuck with the brakes I got! I spent all my money on new calipers, rotors, pads, etc.!

I wasn't going to visit the Avanti this weekend, as I was doing a plumbing repair in the house on Saturday, along with some work related to my paying job. But then unimogjohn emailed that they were going to "Cars & Coffee" in my neighborhood. So I put in a request for some time off and went out early this morning and fetched the old Avanti for a trip to her very first "show", at least since I have owned her. Upon arrival I found John and Alice's Jaguar surrounded by a host of other cars. I went trolling for a spot to park the old girl - the nice weather had brought lots of cars out. After cruising a couple of aisles I spied a 1950 Studebaker "rat rod" pickup with a couple of vacant spaces next door. I decided to snag a spot next to the '50 and start our own little Studebaker section.

I was pleasantly surprised with the interest the Avanti brought - I barely had her parked when a gentleman said, "OK, let's drop the suspense, what's under the hood?". I popped the hood release and raised the hood. "Oh yeahhhh", said the man. Made me feel good that folks appreciated what I've been doing for a year and a half. Lots of people took pictures and asked questions - all in all, it was a fun time. And when I finally got to talk to the fellow with the '50 Studebaker pickup he joked that we were "raising the property values" in the neighborhood with our little Studebaker section.

I was able to get some pics of the cars - my car next to the pickup, a few shots of the pickup, a very nice '59 Cadillac convertible, and a sweet '59(?) Jaguar, more reminiscent of a Bentley than the sports cars Jaguars are known for. A couple of sweet cars that I spied but got away before I could get to them - a '59 (yep, good year) Chevrolet Impala that sounded monstrous and looked equally bad, and a '67 Chevelle big block just like the one a friend of mine had 30 years ago. A brute force machine, that '67 Chevelle was everything a muscle car was supposed to be, in my opinion, of course.

[unimogjohn]

Chris, good seeing you at the little event. Your Avanti was a hit. Lots of folks looking at it. A true survivor car. Thanks for bringing it.

[SeventhSon]

Always a pleasure to see you too, John. And thank you for reminding me that there is a pretty cool car show every Sunday morning less than a mile from my house. Geez - I gotta get my head out of the clouds!

I'm glad the old Avanti has some fans out there - makes all the work worth it. That, plus driving it around whenever I can! :cool:

[unimogjohn]

Chris, next time I will take my green Avanti and we can do a show and tell. Mine looked as bad as yours, err well almost, so folks can see what throwing thousands of dollars and a lot of elbow grease can accomplish. Remember, money is only paper, here today and gone tomorrow.

[SeventhSon]

True about the money, John, it's the tangible things that matter, I suppose. Like fast old cars and loving wives.

Yesterday, after the show and a trip out to the monied enclave of Middleburg (in the daily driver, not the Avanti, unfortunately) we stopped by Lowe's on the way home. I wanted to check out their selection of razor scrapers - I found a few I thought might work well so I picked them up. I also got a cheapo sanding block. When we arrived home my wife asked me not to sand the car. She's concerned about the fine paint and fiberglass dust particles invading my lungs (see, I told you it was good to have a loving wife). So I decided to do the Ernie method of Avanti paint removal - scrape off some paint, use paint stripper on the rest. So, no sanding, or none to speak of. There will be light sanding of hole filler and primer, but not wholesale body shop sanding.

So today, at lunch as usual, I headed to the storage unit to test out my scrapers. I have a wide one that is razor sharp, a tiny baby razor scraper, and a thicker solid blade scraper. I gave the roof a test run with the wide razor scraper. Not bad - peeled the maroon paint off pretty well. Not really surprising, since that paint is the Earl Shieb special, "I'll paint any car for ninnnety-nine dollars!" (Yep, I used to see that commercial when I was a kid, then saw it again last week on American Pickers). Some of the paint stuck pretty well, but most peeled right off. The paint underneath the maroon wasn't coming off so easily, but that is factory paint for you, I suppose.

After a while I declared the scraper test a success and proceeded to wash the front clip of the car again. Except for the nose. I didn't have enough water in my carry along jugs for that. Next time the old girl gets her nose washed. After checking back in at the office I had a look at the Eastwood website for paint stripper - yep, they have it. 70 bucks for a gallon. Yow! Hehe - it's just money, like John said. At work we have a total of 3 clients who subscribe to that line of thought. They are a pleasure to work for. Most people only care about how much it's gonna cost - not quality, not honesty, just the bottom line. Ya get what ya pay for, eh?

[unimogjohn]

Chris, great start. Remember it is an elephant, so take little bites. In a few weeks you will have it stripped of that maroon. Let the transformation begin!

[ErnieR]

POR 15 POR-STRIP GALLON PAINT STIPPER REMOVER GALLON : Amazon.com : Automotive

You can buy direct from POR 15

64 S Jefferson Rd Whippany, NJ 07981

<NOBR>(973) 887-1999

It was very convenient for me as I used to live 6 miles form there.</NOBR>

This is the stuff you want. It's very mild and takes a little longer but cleans up with water, won't hurt your new rubber and definitely does not harm the fibreglass. If you are going to be working without a hose this stuff can be sponged off. Goes on with a spray bottle. No issues with off gassing either.

ErnieR

[SeventhSon]

Yep, John, I'm excited about getting started! I hope I am as excited in 8 weeks - I'll keep in mind the little bites advice.

Thanks Erinie! I'll get some of that stripper and give it a try.