Paint it or leaave it alone? 1921 Touring

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Model T Ford Forum: Forum 2012: Paint it or leaave it alone? 1921 Touring
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By gerrit on Wednesday, September 12, 2012 - 12:52 pm:

Any thoughts on doing a total refinish on the metal of my '21 Touring. It has the kind of paint that people would stop and say, "Wow! That looks original!" I don't know enough to say one way or the other. Car is for fun, not investment, but don't want to take it to the grave with me, either. A llittle rust here and there, mostly underneath. Thanks for any thoughts.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Cameron Whitaker on Wednesday, September 12, 2012 - 01:01 pm:

Here's exactly what I said from a previous thread:

My opinion is that if it is your car, you're entitled to do whatever you want with it, regardless of what other people think, and whether you want to consider other people's opinions or not is also up to you.

At the museum I work for, I wanted to paint my T, and that started a big controversy. Some said that my T had the original paint, and I should leave it that way. However, that was not true, for sure! Others knew that, and said I should keep the original look. I wound up painting it anyway, not because I wanted to make it look nice (but that's a plus), but mostly because I wanted to protect the metal, which had almost no rust or anything on it. The paint was peeling and chipping off, and some areas were starting to rust up because of it.

So it boiled down to this: Either don't paint it and let almost perfect original metal deteriorate as the old paint deteriorates, or paint it to save the metal, possibly for a future paint job.

I only had a $100 budget, so I used spray paint, and because I'm hard-nosed sometimes, I used black lacquer! It took 20 cans, all set and done. It's not real pretty, but it actually came out pretty well.

When I was sanding off the old paint, it was clear that the paint was not original. Underneath the black, I found brown primer. Under that in some areas was white, below that was - you're not going to believe it - bright orange! Under that was what was left of the original paint, on top of bare metal.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By gerrit on Wednesday, September 12, 2012 - 01:50 pm:

thanks, Cameron--my thought was to paint it to save the metal parts that have some rust. Might even try some touch-up on just those areas. Appreciate your taking the time to comment.


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