Fantastic Saturday

The weather here was awesome today. Upper 70s with a stout breeze. I had a furniture delivery around lunchtime so I used the morning to sweep out the garage and pull the car out on the driveway. I haven't had it out of the garage since Christmas!

Last night I took the driver-side headliner off. These cars are known for their "cave-paintings" --> writings and drawings on hidden areas of the car's stainless undersides. I found "Bay City Rollers" written on mine, which apparently were a Scottish pop band from the 70s & 80s.

Front Fascia Completed

I'm finally getting around to posting some pics of the most recent work I've done on the car (since my last post).

 

This was after I sanded and prepped the front fascia for paint and put on 2-3 coats of filler primer.  I had used 80-grit sandpaper and was expecting the filler primer to hide the coarse sanding scratches. Unfortunately it didn't work as well as I'd hoped and there are several spots were you can see sub-painted surface scratches. 

 

This was after I put the headlamps back in last night. I still need to adjust the headlamps. It illustrates the overall success of the eyebrow fix and the 6-7 new coats of metallic silver/gray paint that I put on it. I'm not 100% pleased with the paint but its much better than it was before and it will do for now. I may redo this at some point down the road for perfection. 

 

These 2 pics were taken after I installed new hood and door struts. The old hood (trunk area) struts were completely worn out and wouldn't hold the hood open. The door struts were on their last leg, especially the driver side. I noticed when I removed the old ones that they had been replaced in 2004. I guess 10 yrs is about all the seals can take. The doors weigh 80 pounds you really notice this when changing the door struts. The set I bought also came w/ struts for the rear louvre. I haven't installed those yet as I'm still working on that part. 

Speaking of the rear louvre; I have made additional progress on that. Still more prep work to complete before paint. I never thought that damned thing would take so long. Between Shaun and myself, we probably have 20-30 hours combined in that part alone. 

I hope to make more progress this weekend, provided I can find the time.

Trim Painting

While I was working on the front fascia eyebrow repair today, I prepped and painted 4 total pieces of trim (the 2 grill inserts just behind each door, and the 2 air-intake grills near the rear fascia.

Here is what the grill inserts looked like before I started.

Notice how the sun faded the fiberglass and made it look more grey than black. The air-intake grills were in similar condition.

I researched the best approach to refinishing these pieces. All DeLorean sources said to paint these trim pieces on the car. My other option was to remove both quarter panels and break the retaining clips that hold these on, order replacements and reverse procedure for installation. So I opted for trying out painting them on the car. First I sanded with 150 grit, then 300, then some fine steel wool. Then I used the alcohol-based paint prep liquid on a towel and wiped down all the surfaces. Then 2 coats of primer followed by 2-3 coats of flat black trim paint. I think it turned out pretty nice for a DIY garage job.

This was a productive Sunday.

Front Fascia Eyebrow Repair

Today I tackled the repair of the "eyebrows" on the front fascia. Just a heads-up --> this thread is going to be photo intensive.

The first pic was taken by the PO when the car was still in Phoenix. The next two photos I took today before I started the repairs. Notice the eyebrow warping caused by the sun. This is a common problem with DeLoreans that have spent any significant time in direct sunlight. 

 

I used a PDF "how-to" created by another DeLorean owner that I found on the dmctalk forum as a guideline to this task. 

Here I have the driver-side reformation in progress. Using a heat gun, and a little patience, I was able to reform the contour back to within 90% of how it would have looked from the factory.

I repeated the process for the passenger-side and then, using a longer & skinnier board, clamped down both sides. Just prior to doing this I used 2 aluminum strips cut to 15" long, 3/4" wide, and 1/8" thick along with some 3M heavy duty windshield glue to reinforce the reformed fascia lip on both sides.

I'm going to leave this as is overnight to allow the windshield glue to dry and cure. I'll update with more pics after I put the headlamps back in for a true before & after comparison.

The entire process took about 5 hours. 

Marker Lights Part II

As a follow-up to one of my previous posts (Marker Lights Part I on October 13, 2012), I replaced 3 lenses, bulbs, and sockets --> both front amber lights + the driver-side rear. This picture doesn't do it much justice.

Also - the car started right up after sitting for several hours since replacing the fuel accumulator earlier today. I still need to install and connect the passenger door switch to get those door lights working too.

Fuel Accumulator

Since I've had the car, it has had a hot start problem. You would have to crank on it pretty hard for a long time to get it started only when it had been run up to temp from anywhere between 5 mins and 5 hours.

It seemed to get worse last fall so I finally called the guys down at DMCH. James told me 90% of the time the hot start problem is caused by a failing fuel accumulator. The accumulator is part of the Bosch K-Jet fuel injection system. It holds the "rest pressure" so that the car can start w/o much fuss after the motor has been recently run. It sits between the fuel pump and the fuel filter, which is right behind the fuel injection manifold.

It is in the middle of the frame in a little cutout section for access. In order to get to it, you either need a lift or jack up the car and put it as high as you can get using jack stands. Since I did this job in my garage, the latter was my only option. The entire replacement job took maybe 2 hours. After I replaced it I started the car to check for leaks. I had a significant dripping leak so I crawled back underneath the car and tightened the offending fuel line. Then I started the car again and checked to make sure there were no more leaks.

After that I got the engine up to temperature and then shut it off. I waited 5 minutes and started it again without and trouble. Then I waited about an hour and tried it again. It fired right up. I'll continue to monitor it but I think the issue has been resolved.

Here's a picture of the replacement and the original. The original looks to be significantly larger than the replacement, but it all connected just fine without issue. The kit came with 2 hoses and 4 hose clamps. I replaced them too in the process.

Lights & Switches

I was down in Houston again last weekend and stopped by DMC to pick up a few parts on my list. I'm in need of a fuel accumilator in hopes it will resolve a hot-start issue I'm experiencing. Unfortunately that part is on backorder. So I picked up a handful of parts.

• 3 marker light lenses. (2 amber for the front and 1 red for the left rear)
• 3 marker light sockets
• 3 door switches
• Hardware for 3 door switches (nuts, washers, machine screws)
• Accelerator pedal pad

Here's a few pics:

Couple More Pics From Yesterday...

Night Lights

Forgot to post these pics I took over Thanksgiving. Thought the night lighting looked cool. Will look even better when I get the door lights reconnected.

Sunday Drive

Took the car out with a good buddy and got some light neighborhood driving in. It was another 70 degree December afternoon here in Dallas.

Funny post

http://dallas.craigslist.org/dal/spo/3441662253.html

Cool Pic