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69 Roadrunner under carriage

Coyote with a roadrunner

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I am a long way from painting, but am starting to talk to the guy who will be painting. He has done a lot of work and is known for his quality, but has never done a RR or Mopar. He is thinking about putting 514 (rust sealant) on the undercarriage thus the entire thing would be black. I know this is not factory correct, but this will not be a show room car. I will be driving it. Is this a concern to anyone? Also, what color are the outer wheel wells? I admit I am a rookie, and just want to try to do this right. Thanks for the help.
 
I use two different products on the cars that I restore when they don't have to be factory correct. I spray the entire underside with Raptor bedliner. You can get either black or a version that is tintable using your basecoat color. I then use a premium rubberized undercoating in the wheelwell areas. The bedliner is easy to keep clean but would chip in the wheelwell areas and the rubberized undercoating would not look good on the entire underside. The best thing about undercoating is that it serves as a sound deadener and a heat deflector. We have used the water based Lizard skin before, but it's extremely expensive.
Keep us posted on your progress.

runnerinbooth.jpg
 
I'm sure a resto specialist can elaborate on the subject, but as evidenced on my own 68 RR and other MoPars I have seen, the prep was done something like this:

The bare body shell was dipped up to about the middle of the door posts in some charcoal gray colored rust preventative stuff. After that everything was sprayed with zinc chromate primer - green for my 68 and red oxide on my 69 (maybe because the 69 is a red car?). The cars were painted with all the panels installed and aligned, which is why all the bolts and hinges get painted, then the engine with the suspension in installed from the bottom.

I have seen the entire bottom of cars painted body color, and while it looks nice, it is not correct. Only overspray in a line of sight pattern was deposited on the undercarriage. Again, looking at my 68, I see the charcoal gray primer is smooth in texture and somewhat resembles the old washing machine drum color but without the large white speckles.

I believe the wheel wells were heavily oversprayed with body color and later covered up with undercoating - though not very well - so the body color was visible in some spots. The guy that painted my 69 knows squat about MoPars and I had to give pointers and there are still things I would have done differently - like not paint the car with the K frame and suspension installed. This resulted in me painting the engine compartment after the fact, and though it turned out good, it would have been much easier and more correct to do it all at once. I will do the 68 myself in the way I just described.

One interesting fact told to me by my painter, who had a buddy that worked as a painter at the Ford plant in Milpitas, CA (DSO 72 San Jose plant and currently the great mall). It was said that painters were paired up for technique and spray patterns with one on one side of the car and one on the other and they had a minute and a half to paint a car, all while the car was moving. The guns didn't have cups; just hoses with valves to switch the color. If they were painting red cars and suddenly a green one was called out, they would just switch the valve and spray in the corner until it came out green.

Anyway, hope this helps.
 
You could make it look pretty much factory correct, and still have a durable finish. You can do a base/clear on the bottom using a primer like color, and then lay mat finish clear on top. Do this first, then shoot the body color so it oversprays around the edges. The wheelwells would have been poorly shot body color, and then hit with undercote. The inside of the quarters would have had the sound deadener/undercote on first, then shot body color.

10Under_f.jpg
 
Hey Runner, that gray looks much lighter than what I see on my 68, unless there was no set rule for color. My car is an LA car so maybe they had a different color in the CA dip tank? Only the Shadow knows!

The only thing about doing the two stage paint on the pan is the satin clear is expensive. I may go with the PPG epoxy primer DP 40 or 50 (I think 74 is red) and mix the black and gray until it matches to what's on the car now. Either that or go with paint, but use a single stage with some flattening agent.

The pan is looking very sano! I see a vapor return line...440 car?
 
Yeah...that's the underside of my (ex) Six Pack Challenger R/T. Was a 12,000 mile car when I got it. We color matched the gray to the primer found above the gas tank. But it was a Hamtramnk car (and a 70), so there is a possibility the primer is a different color. The beauty of doing this was it was easy to clean. I actually DROVE this car 40 miles IN THE RAIN to put it in a big indoor show in Dallas. Drove it over on Thursday, started cleaning Friday morning, and had lights and mirrors under it by opening that evening. (cleaned it by myself). Took third behind horribly over restored cars on giant lazy susan displays, and outscored other cars NOT driven over in the rain.
 
Yeah...that's the underside of my (ex) Six Pack Challenger R/T. Was a 12,000 mile car when I got it. We color matched the gray to the primer found above the gas tank. But it was a Hamtramnk car (and a 70), so there is a possibility the primer is a different color. The beauty of doing this was it was easy to clean. I actually DROVE this car 40 miles IN THE RAIN to put it in a big indoor show in Dallas. Drove it over on Thursday, started cleaning Friday morning, and had lights and mirrors under it by opening that evening. (cleaned it by myself). Took third behind horribly over restored cars on giant lazy susan displays, and outscored other cars NOT driven over in the rain.

I hate those "I used to have a ___ stories" I have a few of my own:banghead: Wish we could keep 'em all!

Congrats on the third place effort:balloons:
 
Thanks. That was after it won the D Restored class at the big indoor show in Ft. Worth. (no rain) The class was so big they split it and gave 8 awards. It scored the highest of them all. Even beat a gold Shelby that is never driven, and had won several years running.
 
Couple of things to note, once you spray a bedliner material on the underside, she's pretty much there forever. It is a very durable material and will accomplish what hotrod98 said.
Be careful how your body guy preps the underside for any material. If it is not completely clean and thoroughly sanded the material will peel/delaminate. The only way to be 100% sure is to have the underbody sand/media blasted then epoxy primed. This is a sound foundation that any material will adhere to (wet on wet or dry scuffed). The epoxy contains corrosion resistant rust inhibitors (zinc) and the most durable resin we can spray on our vehicles...epoxy. It also has the ability to go direct to metal which not many materials can claim to do.
There are no shortcut products out there...trust me.
 
I sometimes use body rock guard on undersides. The stuff is tough as rock but must be applied over a good primer. Doesnt hold color in the sun though and can be painted or clear coated to fix that problem. Also fills in rough pitted metal well with a few coats. Very easy to spray with their gun which just screws on the can. Reasonably priced, can buy enough to do a car underside for about 40.00 and the gun is about 23.00. Anyone can spray this stuff like a pro in 5 minutes of practice.
 
I went with DP40 Epoxy primer on the bottom which is close to the gray I found on the car and its pretty durable and cleans pretty well also. I think the primer colors varied because the factory would add to the tank what ever showed up, mostly gray, oh look we got some black today.
 

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Hey Runner, that gray looks much lighter than what I see on my 68, unless there was no set rule for color. My car is an LA car so maybe they had a different color in the CA dip tank? Only the Shadow knows!

The only thing about doing the two stage paint on the pan is the satin clear is expensive. I may go with the PPG epoxy primer DP 40 or 50 (I think 74 is red) and mix the black and gray until it matches to what's on the car now. Either that or go with paint, but use a single stage with some flattening agent.

The pan is looking very sano! I see a vapor return line...440 car?

I have seen a lot of LA cars with dark charcoal colored dip. My 66 Hemi car is a St. Louis car and it has a darker than usual dip on it that I was able to duplicate with a cast iron type mock colored paint that was a match. Below is the under side of it.

As noted below also I have seen varying colors of dip in other plants as well. I don't think anyone can "call" you on an exact color on any particular car from any plant. Just reproduce what you can see as factory left over on your car regarding color.
 

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painting it black doesn't look bad i just plan on some truck bed liner or undercoating when finished
 

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