1963 Mercury Comet station wagon

I'm finally close to doing my first rolled on paint job, and the subject will be a great little project, my new 1963 Comet wagon. It doesn't look hot in the few pictures I have, but it's a very solid car with only minor blemishes to the body. The 200 ci six cylinder sounds pretty good too, but I have to sort out some brake issues and get some decent tires on it before I do much driving. As you can see, the seller started to "prime" it, and he also shot some red to "see what it looked like". So, I get to clean red off the headlight and grill along with the other prep work.

The biggest issue I've been dealing with is the tailgate. The original one was all rusted out, so I had to hunt down some nice sheetmetal inner and outer tailgate panels. I've got those pieces now. They're from a Falcon, but the sheet metal is the same. I'll have to deal with the holes where the FALCON letters used to be, and where the falcon emblem was above the key hole, but for now I'm just anxious to get the tailgate painted, put together and back on the car so I can drive it around and enjoy it some as I work on it. This weekend I had some time to sand and prime them.

Next step is to use Rustoleum Canvas White to do the outer tailgate panel. I figure it's a good way to get the feel for painting like this and the panel is pretty small, so the work should go pretty fast. Anyway, here are some before pictures. The Comet is tucked under my carport and I can't get any better side or rear photos, but I"ll post some more once the tailgate is done and I'm ready to move on.

Hi Nitcat. Thats a real neat car you have there. I would really like to have a round body Falcon. I love most of the early 60s cars tho. That 200 ci engine is a good one and I would replace the fruit jar master cylinder for the brakes with a newer one with two partitions (its a safety thing). I forget which one but if you go to any falcon forum. they will know because, as you know, comets and falcons are the same under the skin. Lacquer thinner will take that red paint right off.
If you have any questions, just ask. There is a lot of knowledge here and we like to help. Oh, and one other thing, we love pictures . I know I will be watching this one .
Mike

SWEET CAR! I love it when an old car like this comes out of retirement! My uncle had a `65 Comet Caliente and took my mom, her cousin, and a 5-year-old me on a ride through the country. We rolled over at least 3 times and I was found under the dash. Despite the fact I almost died in one of these cars, I love them fiercely!

I am waiting on your project with eagerness.

Thanks fellas.

retired plumber, that's a good suggestion and one I'm already working on for the brakes - I have a new 70 Maverick master cylinder and associated lines etc. to install once I have enough sunshine outside to install and bleed brakes. Eventually I want to upgrade brakes but I want to do it for low bucks, so I'm biding my time on which direction to go with discs. There are kits etc., I'm continuing research.

Coconut Eater, glad you didn't let a little thing like near death keep you from liking Comets. That's one scary story.

Great car. I have the 200CI/C4 in my 63 Falcon. I also went with the dual master cylinder for safety reasons. Keep the progress pictures coming.

Well, I'm still doing my prep work. I want this to be a driver, not a show car, but the more time I spend the more stuff I decide to deal with before I start rolling paint. Because the interior needs paint, I figured I'd do better to deal with the red interior and get it done, then move on to rolling the exterior with Canvas White Gloss Rustoleum. It's a close match to the original off white of the car.

I have the interior gutted, it's going to stay red, but I'm going with a brighter color of red, Rustoleum of course! I'm using the rattle cans of Sunrise Red on much of the trim (metal, none of that plastic trim in 1963!) and it's looking good. I've hit the interior tailgate panel and the back seat frame with several coats of the spray can stuff. Have not yet tried wet sanding it, but I intend to go with probably 1000 grit wet sanding of the trim pieces initially to see what kind of results I get. If I don't like the results on the tailgate and seat frame, I'll step up to rolling those.

Today I got nearly all the trim and removable stuff off of the red metal dash (no original dash pad either, but I may add one later on). Got the dash area taped off and primed this evening and hit the primer with 1000 grit wet sanding. I'll clean that up tomorrow and rattle can the dash next. Then I need to finish stripping the insides of the doors and do them in red too, which they were originally.

Here are some pics, I have more but haven't gotten them off the camera yet.

The car's pretty straight, but not perfect. I'm not going to sweat every little ding, but I do want to make it a decent 10 footer, so I'm filling and sanding to get it acceptable for what I want.



This shot is the rear area that I cleaned, primed and painted with the Rustoleum Sunrise Red rattle cans. Since it will get scuffed with use, and it will get used, I'm aiming for good color coverage and I want to get enough coats of paint on there to hopefully hold up to occasional use. (The floor is the only red area back there that I've painted so far, so the other red you see below the glass is the original slightly faded darker red.)

I'll probably end up making some kind of vinyl or carpeted cover for the back area that's removable.


[img][/img]

And here's a BEFORE shot of the dash

Here's a before shot of the driver's door. The red had been "reapplied" with a brush and it was thick in places, scratched in places and the shade would not match the Sunrise Red I'm using.



The vinyl door panels cover the door below the red area, but the red area itself is exposed, so I need to prep that for paint. At some point this car was repainted, and I'm trying to figure out how much of the inside of the door was red. It looks like the inside frame around the window was red, and that should mean the inside edge of the door where the hinges connect should be red, but I'm confused by what I'm finding under the white I'm stripping off -- it looks like red underneath, but I can't tell if the red underneath was paint or just primer. Anyway, I need to decide what to do with the insides of the doors, and that's going to be one of my biggest issues in getting this project looking decent again.

Here's the door after scraping off more of the orange stripper I'm using, I still need to sand it smooth and remove the remainder of the black glue that held the weatherstripping around the edges of the doors. Lotsa prep work here.

Removed the Comet's hood and cleaned, smoothed, primed and painted the underside with Rustoleum Canvas White spray cans. I'm going to install hood insulation pads so the only areas I was mainly concerned about looking decent were the edges and the high areas of the structural ribs. Here are before and after pics (color is off, that is canvas white on the second image). I also started smoothing and patching the top side of the hood, have another hour or two of prep and then I will FINALLY start rolling some paint on the hood off the car.

Thanks for the update. I know exactually what you mean about fixing this and that and that and that and............I did a '50 merc, lead sled style, like that. Worked on it for a year and a half and 4 partial paint jobs plus upolestry, etc. Finally I said "self, enough is enough. This is NOT a show car. Thats good enough. Finish it". Wish I still had it.
Mike

Hood looks really good. Keep the pics coming. What kind of primer did you use?

>What kind of primer did you use?

Rustoleum White Primer (I really need to buy stock in that company). It was brighter than the canvas white, which helped me see where the canvas spray was covering well and where I had thin spots. I wanted a primer that would not contrast with the canvas white if the underside of the hood got a big scratch.

I'm probably going to spray canvas white along the edges of the top of the hood before I start to roll it with the canvas white because I'm concerned with this first attempt at getting decent coverage along the hood's edges.

Thought I would mention there's a rustoleum rolled paint thread on a popular Falcon forum http://tffn.net/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=19356&start=15

First I had seen someone talk about a different approach to applying the final coats

Quoting one of the posters on that thread
<"One thing you might want to try when you get down to the last coats is do a very light wet sanding with 1200 and then thin some paint a lot so it’s like water then wipe it on. I’ve even poured it on a flat surface like the hood a spread it around like a liquid wax. Do this with a clean folded piece of cloth or paper towel. Do it quickly finishing with long even strokes and let dry. Within two or three hours you can do it again. The result will be a pretty smooth finish that that buffs out well. This is how I was showed how the finish furniture (but with urethane) and I figured what the heck maybe it would work on the car."

Has anyone tried this? I may give it a try with this hood...

Nicat,
I'm on TFFN also under the same user name. I have been following that post also.
I like your idea of spraying the edges first. When I have sprayed cars I always did all the edges first before making my long passes.
Thanks for the tips.
Bob

Doing edges first is always a good idea and then hit them again in the process of doing the regular coat. For some reason the paint tends to migrate away from edges and corners so it becomes thinner there and can become a problem when buffing (burn through).
Mike

what compounds are you using? foam pads or wool?

I have a wool pad for the initial (coarse) cut and have foam for the finer cuts. 3M and Meguires are good brand names. There are others. I am out of stuff now so I can't look at names but they each have 3 levels or so of compound. They say on the container which to use in what order. I get mine at any big auto parts store and they are cheaper there then a paint store usually. Same for the pads.
Mike

With the pollen gone I decided to try rolling the top of the hood outside. Immediately I had tree crap and bugs sticking to the wet paint. Everything has wet sanded out. I'm on coat #5 with the hood and #3 with the tailgate. I'm pretty happy with the results so far. I had to turn out the overhead fluorescent lights to get the color closer to the canvas white tone, so these are a little dark. I plan to give these pieces the recommended 8 coats, but I'll wait until the car is done and cut/buff everything at once.


[img][/img]





Next I'm tackling the front fenders, they don't need much straightening, just a little stripping and sanding before they'll be ready too paint. I pulled them off the car because it's the only way to get all of the trim off, and most of it was pitted or worn so that I got better replacement pieces to put on.

Very nice finish, when I get to the painting portion of my saab I will pull the fenders as well. Think it makes for a cleaner finish.

Can't wait to see more pics! What is your formula, thinner, mix ratio etc.?

I"m mixing the rustoleum paint/odorless mineral spirits 50-50 to skim milk consistency. Since I'm doing body panels I'm just using a plastic mixing cup I found in Home Depot paint area with ounce/milliliter markings and I'm only mixing about 3 or 4 ounces at a time. If any is left over I pour it into an empty peanut butter jar with screw on lid, so I'm not wasting very much. I'm putting the roller into a large ziplock bag and so far I have not had to change rollers for the hood/tailgate I've done.

Nitcat...that looks really good, can't wait to see it all complete.

Still plugging away every chance I get. The hood is pretty much done, so I'll set it aside to keep it safe until I have it ready to put back on the car. The tailgate is pretty much done too, both got 8 coats. I had to roll two more coats on the ridge of the hood because the paint for whatever reason has not been as thick there, so when I wet sanded even though I was careful I was getting some spots without full coverage.

I'm going to put the tailgate back together and if all goes well get it mounted on the car. It's a power tailgate, so fingers are crossed that the window will go up/down with the switches on the dash and on the tailgate. Window has to be down to open the tailgate.

Started on the passenger fender this week. It's off the car, and the only downside to that is it's harder to apply the paint and not have it run.

We've had so much rain this spring, seems to rain or T-storm every evening and most of my work has to happen outside, so work is only happening on weekends lately. I'm nearing the end of the body work on the Comet. This weekend I got the roof ready for paint. I used Duplicolor high-build spray primer and then wet sanded the whole roof with 220, 320, and 400. These show the roof after two rolled coats and foam brushing along the edges. I'm hoping I can finish the roof by the end of next weekend.





Still working on the fenders off the car. Before I can put them back on I have to finish patching the cowl area to hopefully cut down on rain getting in behind the dash (areas needing patching are under/behind the fenders when they're on the car). I also have to attach at least some of the trim and emblem pieces before the fenders can go back on since there's no way to get in behind the fenders to attach the stuff. All of this slows things down but should give me a better looking and usable car when done.

While this car is pretty simple and easy to work on, some things are hard, like removing the outside door handles. I finally got the passenger side handles off, but I sure don't look forward to putting the handles back on.

I took a lot longer than I expected to "finish" painting the Comet, but I'm finally done. I learned a lot, mainly that any flaws in the body work are not hidden by the paint And that the roller really needs to be only lightly covered with paint or it will run and cause problems. Anyway, here are a couple of shots of the results, I'm not showing the driver's side because I didn't do a good job on the driver's door with my prep work, so in the Spring I will likely re-do that door. I still have to sort out the brakes, get the darn tailgate window to go up, and fix a bad exhaust leak before I get it on the road.

Ooba dooba that looks good! I love that body style.