Right, I've been down to the painters today and the long and the short of it is they can do the standard of work I want at the price I want.
The painter's eyes near fell out of his head when he saw the car. He looked at me with wild eyes and I half expected him to say "is this thing a car is it mate?". I had to battle through the usual 'Aren't they interested/Aren't they paying attention/or are they just naturally like that' conversation vacuum that you get with everyone in the motor trade under the age of 40 (or is that just Liverpool??), but when I explained that I'd be supplying the panels in bare metal in three batches, and the only thing I needed him to worry about was putting etch prime, high build primer, 4x coats of red and 3x clear coats (which I'd also be supplying as well) on every panel, he brightened up and seemed fine about the whole thing.
I got a lot more mileage out of the shop owner and panel beater, who were both into their 50s. The place specialises in insurance standard body repairs, but the panel beater has a 30 year long career building and prepping every classic you care to name for concours standard resprays, the bulk of which were exported to monied clients in Japan in the 80s. The pair of them went over the car and pointed out every ding and sub-surface blister of rust they could find, which they advised against repairing if good rust-free panels are available. So I'm now in no doubt as to which panels need replacing - pretty well all of them!
Pricewise, it sits midway between my upper and lower limits. The bonnet, roof, doors, etc would be in the guestimated region of £120 each to finish to the standard outlined above, with less for the smaller panels. Apparently (so says the panel beater) the painter is a relentless perfectionist which can drive them up the wall! That's a quality I want.... speed isn't necessarily of the essence.
They can't give me a proper quote until I actually have some panels to bring to them, and as that will be in three batches the quote will vary for each. But that said, if the doors are going as well, I might well get everything done together.
Will start collecting panels and take it from there.
So... anybody got a hoard of quality steel panels anywhere nearby? Paint finish unimportant.
Speaking of which...
redrover said:
PS: Will post up some pictures of what it looks like now as 'before shots'. The picture in my signature below isn't really a true reflection. I have a knack of being able to catch it in the right light with a quality camera and it looks pretty good. Anybody who saw it on the stand at the NEC will confirm that it's cosmetically seriously below par. Certainly not a patch on what it looks like under the bonnet or inside - those pictures are a true reflection. The 1980s Ford red 2 pack paint is on top of original Cameron green. Original paint wasn't rubbed down properly, so where it hasn't chipped off, it's reacted and gone pink. Rubbing it with a chamois is like dragging a tack cloth across emery paper!
