Primary Grinding Complete…

Grind
/grind/
To perform repetitive actions over and over towards the completion of a goal

Today I spent the better part of the afternoon with my borrowed angle grinder and my Darth Vader safety suit attacking the trunk. Previously, I’d completed about a third of the trunk and I wanted to be done with the majority of the grinding today so as to be closer to the real end goal of getting the gas tank put in.

I started with the small section of trunk that was made more exposed after I took the rear seat out:

And spent a while pretzeled into the trunk area until it looked much better:

After that picture was taken, I hosed the area down with brake cleaner to get rid of the last of the old black seam sealer.

I then moved on to the back quarter panels and the side of the trunk I hadn’t attacked yet. It was a long, slow process but a surprisingly enjoyable one. I had been expecting to have to fight my long-standing apathy towards sanding in order to do a good job, but today I found myself going out of my way to find places that needed a little extra effort.

Nevertheless, this by no means should be read as an indication that I am interested in sanding the whole car as part of painting it :)

The first quarter panel to receive my attention was the rear drivers side:

When I was finished, the quarter panel was sporting a much nicer look:

Similarly, the passenger side quarter panel’s appearance was upgraded by the employment of the wire brush angle grinder attachment:

Before:

After:

As you might expect, much of the grime that was once attached to the trunk was now firmly attached to me. Pro-Tip: Do not perform this work without safety breathing equipment. I worked today for about three hours and this is what my breathing mask and wipe down rag looked like at the end:

The yellow rag on the right is what the dirty rag looked like earlier today. I am very glad that stuff is not making itself at home inside my lungs right now.

At this point, the primary grinding is complete. The next step is to push the Mustang out of the shop and take a pressure washer to it. There were a number of places that I couldn’t get at with the grinder that don’t have rust, but do have caked-on dirt that needs to be removed before I can seam seal and prime. The pressure washing should hopefully take care of those spots and get rid of the last of the grime-dust that’s still in the trunk. After that, I’ll touch up any areas that I may have missed.

Once I’m satisfied that the grime and rust are gone and not coming back, I’ll seal the seams in the trunk, prime the whole thing and I’ll be done with the prep work for the gas tank.

Lastly, a short programming note: For those of you just joining us, it’s unsurprisingly difficult to make an interesting blog entry about grinding rust out of a trunk.  Please stick with me. It might help to imagine this post in a way similar to  an episode in the early part of the second season of Star Trek The Next Generation. You watch it (or in this case read it) not because it’s great, but because you know it’s setting up some really good stuff for later in the year…