Instead of patching just the holes like I did on the driver side floorboards, I covered the entire passenger side with glass mat and poured the resin on.
Since there were only a few small holes in the driver side, I felt the patching method was justified. while the passenger side was by no means really bad, I decided since there were so many little holes spread around the whole area that a complete covering would be better.
Fiberglass provides a strong and nearly moisture proof fix for that area provided you apply it to a clean surface and make sure there is no air between the glass and metal. You do this by working the resin-soaked mat with a small brush, pushing the air bubbles out and making sure that it has good contact with the metal. I did that for about 45 minutes until the glass was starting to set up. I then put a small space heater under the car and allowed it to heat the floorbaords up a bit from underneath. Not too hot, just warm enough to aid the curing process of the resin. It was a bit chilly tonight (around the low-60's) so I felt that the additional warmth would help.
Much later on in the evening after the fiberglass had enough time to cure completely, I put down the first layer of spray-on truck bed liner. Tommorow i'll apply a second coat and let that dry thoroughly and then I'll finish stripping out the transmission tunnel and the rest of the footwells. I'll apply truck bed liner to those as well.
After I have all of the cockpit finished with the truck bed liner, I'll roll on a coat or two of urethane sealer and finish it off with a layer of primer and two layers of paint.
Spray on truck bed liner is great stuff. It is durable, tough as nails and really protects the metal. However, it is also not great at preventing the transfer of moisture at the molecular level so an additional step is needed to be sure the steel is prtected from rusting. That is what the urethane is for. The primer and paint layers add an additional barrier to moisture as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment