1967 Dodge Travco Build (Polly Luna)

[TravcoJosh]

Ok, I've shown hints and clues about what is going on in the rig up to now but haven't really shown the full blown process.

As a reminder this is what it looked like the day we bought her.



Not to bad from afar, but unfortunately not to good up close. The body had some major checking, particularly along the Red stripe in the center.



I had hoped that it would sand out so we started with 80 grit and sanded the body.




Unfortunately, the cracks were not in the paint but in the fiberglass. The only way to fix the issue is to fill the cracks. I choose to use the fiberglass reinforced bondo for this process.




This was then sanded to 80grit using an orbital sander. This takes a very long time to sand bondo off of a 27' long motorhome. The following image represents about an hour's worth of work.



There was more body work to be done including glassing a piece of the driverside wheel arch.



I clamped the piece I'd saved in place and glassed from the back first.



Then finished the glassing on the front to add strength.



We finished the body off by removing the 4 black vinyl stripes that ran the length of the body and finally sanding Polly Luna's entire body to 80 grit.



In the next update we will discuss primer.

[Schmitti]

WOW 

Thomas

[pvoth1111]

That's one lucky motorhome

[TravcoJosh]

Thank you both, it's been a long summer of work but totally worth it. We had originally planned on hiring out the paint and body to give us more time to work on other things before our big trip in November. But the only place in the area that would talk to us about painting it wanted $24,000  N:(
They had 9 hours of fiberglass work, 80 hours of prep work, 90 hours to lay down 1 color of paint and another 20 hours to lay down a second color of paint. Yep that's a big NOPE. However, I've learned a lot about body work and have enjoyed my time and feel that it was well spent. Now if the rig breaks down on the way I might not feel that way. lol. When it's all said in done I think I will have around 2,000 in paint and supplies (you need a LOT of sand paper)

When we left off with the last post all of the holes had been filled, glass had been glassed and sanding had been sanded to 80 grit. Now it was time for it to leave the front yard and go to the back where it would be for the few weeks for paint. We began the painting process with tape, a lot of tape.



Then we went over the entire body with a rag and acetone to remove any dirt and build up off of the surface before paint.(We've done this before every application of paint) For the initial high build primer we used a product called Slick Sand. We bought it from Eastwood along with a sanding block kit and a 2K primer. The Slick Sand is some pretty nasty stuff. It hardens up very fast and is almost impossible to remove from the spray gun. So we purchased a very cheap ($20) siphon gun with the correct 2.0 nozzle from Harbor Freight. Even running paint thinner through the gun between every quart did not prevent it from becoming a clogged brick by the next day. We did two coats (not including the roof) and it took 2 3/4 gallons.









Then on to the sanding. I used a 17" sanding board to knock most of the Slick Sand down to 320grit. This process took somewhere between 5 and 6 hours of sanding ( I did not have any help for this day and my arms are still sore).



Here you can see the sanded door and the unsanded front end.



Of course spending all of that time up close and personal with the body work exposed areas that needed more filler. We used glazing putty on small pin holes and filler on larger stuff. Then we shot the hole thing with two coats of the 2K Urethane primer to seal the slick sand and to build up the body some more. This took about 1 3/4 gallons (again we didn't do the roof).









This was then hand sanded to 400 grit (sorry no after pictures) We used the 17" board to knock down the highs and then went over the lows with a small palm sized board to smooth out the roughness. There's really no way to take the waves out of a 50 year old fiberglass motorhome. This took another 10+ hours of sanding (spread between 3 people).

Here's what the primer looks like when wetted (I'm impressed that you can see colors)



The next installment we will get paint and start laying it on.

[Rickf1985]

WOW, That is a lot of work. There are two things you did that bother me. One just created more work for you but the other might come back to bite you. First was priming over 80 grit sanding. I never prime over more than 180. 180 provides more than enough bite and it saves a lot of sanding. On newer glass I would go to 240 but with the old glass 180 would have been good and you could have gotten away with a medium primer. Fast dry also scares me as sometimes it does not stick well if it drys too fast. The other problem I saw was the rear fender repair. You should have ground out the crack and progressively filled it with glass fibers pulled from a piece of mat. That would have been much stronger. Sorry, I am a perfectionist, it is a disease. D:oH! It looks good though, are you going to paint the roof?
When it comes time to lay paint down you might want to build some sort of scaffold, even boards between two ladders. It is best to spray long sections instead of short section like you are doing from a ladder. You will tend to get wet on dry areas that way and the finish will be splotchy. Choose your reducer to match the temperatur you will be painting in, you do not want it to dry to fast or you will get orange peel. Too slow and it can blush.

[TravcoJosh]

Thanks for the reply Rick. The Slick Sand is meant to cover 80 grit (you do not need to sand more than that). Which is one of the major factors in choosing it, I wouldn't need to sand the body more than I absolutely had too  :)rotflmao  Sanding to 180 is a waste of time and energy when using Slick Sand as it fills down to 50 grit scratches with two coats (4-6mil). It was prepared per directions (super simple pour a quart and add the pre measured hardner) Slick Sand is not a primer but a high build urethane. It is more like a sprayable body filler and it does not shrink like primer does.


I agree that the wheel well should have been ground and filled looking back at it. Unfortunately, we are running very short on time (trip is in November and still have to address brakes and tires). This should be ok, I hope. 


The roof is not being painted. I went about 14" in and purchased a white paint that is close to the current color. The white paint is already on the Travco and it is a pretty good match. You can't tell from above.


I would love to have scaffolding and even made a makeshift out of a 2x12 a 2x6 and two ladders. However, the backyard where we are painting is very very uneven which prevents this setup. I've been using the ladder, it stinks and I'm not expecting a 100% professional job. This is the first time tackling paint like this and it is a learning experience. I'm sure it will be better than it was when we are done, which is what we are going for.

[PwrWgnWalt]

Great work, Josh!  Looking good, can't wait to see the next 'episode'!   

[LJ-TJ]

WOW! Absolutely mine boggling. Can't wait to see the final product. Well done. 

[TravcoJosh]

So with this post we have finally caught up on the last 4 months of work. There's not much to say about the work done last weekend other than finding someplace that will mix and sell paint is more difficult than you'd think. After calling several places that were Jobber only, we finally located an O'Reilly Auto Parts Store in Rockford Ill (about 40minutes from us) that would mix paint. I spoke with Bonnie (a store employee) over the phone to verify that they would sell to us and they could do the paint color we were looking for.

The wife and I took a day off of work so we did not eat into our weekend project time and headed to Rockford. We spent about an hour and a half at the store with Bonnie and thoroughly enjoyed our time. She was very knowledgeable and just fun to work with. We did however clean her out of paint...I apparently forgot to mention in our phone conversation the amount of paint we would need...lol. (BTW for those keeping score at home we purchased 1 gallon of white and 2 gallons of color)

We had our colors picked out before we arrived, both period correct Chrysler colors. They are not original Travco colors, but to be honest the Travco line was pretty limited in variability and we didn't want a carbon copy of someone's rig. The main color was easy, with a little sleuthing Bonnie was able to find a match in her database. The white we had picked out was another story. There was no record of it and we couldn't find a formula, RATS! My wife is a graphic designer and is pretty good with colors, so we looked at their stock samples and picked a color that we thought was pretty close.

We've had a pretty nice summer, but when it came time to paint last Sunday there was spotty showers in the forecast for the early afternoon. Paint wasn't laid down until almost 3pm which meant that taping was delayed several hours. The paint is an acrylic enamel with a fast dry reducer and hardener. It is mixed in a 8:1:2 ratio. This basically means that for 1 quart of paint you add 4 ounces of hardener and 8 ounces of reducer.Here's the results from last weekend.









I have to readjust some of the tape lines, but I am very hopeful to have the rig in full paint come Saturday!!! Then Sunday begins reassembly and hopefully next week will bring new tires! I'm also buying a Dinette bench out of a GMC, with a little modification it should fit in the Travco and give us more seating!

[TravcoJosh]

We started early on Saturday, partly out of excitement and partly out of anxiety. We wanted to get this thing painted so we can move forward.  :)rotflmao

My brother and myself finished taping and ran acetone over everything one more time. Then it was time to hit the paint. For the main color we chose a 1950's dodge truck color called Banner Green. This shot is with about 2 of the three coats of green we put on.



I got to admit that we were a little nervous seeing all of the green at this point. But those fears were alleviated after the third coat and the reveal of the white. As my wife said in regards to removing the tape, "It's like unwrapping a present".



Here are the results of Saturday's work. (Yes I know the tires are painted, but we are getting them replaced in the next week or so). Also rims and bumpers are coming back off next year to sandblast and repaint.





It has a good reflection without any buffing or wet sanding.



Note that the lines are straight in the following picture but I moved during the panorama.



Sunday started the reassembly process and lots and lots of polishing.



All wire nuts on the rear lights were removed and the wires were soldered together for a better connection (solved my brake light turn signal issue)








And finally the door, I'm really happy how it turned out.

[Schmitti]

  very nice Work 

Thomas

[joanfenn]

  Looking great

[M & J]

 
Well Done Sir!

[Wantawinnie]

Excellent job! Congratulations it looks great.

[DaveVA78Chieftain]

Excellent job.  I wish I could learn to paint so well.

Dave

[TravcoJosh]

Dave the painting was the easy part. This was the first time I'd ever used a spray gun.

[TerryH]

First time with a spray gun? Outside? Wow. You missed your calling.

[DaveVA78Chieftain]

You did a great job.  Mine always runs.

Dave

[pvoth1111]

Wow that is awesome......now for some air ride suspension and slam that sucker to the ground that would be super cool...or I love that to.....I used to work for a band that toured the mid west in one like that...brings back some really "good" memories...much depravity much....I remember this one time.............................................................

[LJ-TJ]

WOW!

[Elandan2]

Amazing!!  Keep up the good work... and the excellent posts!!  Rick

[Rickf1985]

Coming from someone who has laid down a couple hundred paint jobs in his time, It is hard to believe that is your first time. I love those rear marker lights, would hate to have to find replacements!

[TravcoJosh]

Thank's Rick   There's some definite mistakes in it, the camera hides a bit. However there are no runs which I'm really happy about. After airing out for a week there's a little more orange peel then when these pictures were taken, but still not bad. My biggest issue is the damn tape. I'm kicking myself so hard about that it's not even funny. I am going to try a few things to make it less noticeable, but most likely I will be sanding down the white area and respray it next year.

[serenitygirl64]

I am jealous... very nice vintage home on wheels.  impressive

[TravcoJosh]

Well I had a pretty easy weekend of work after last weeks powerhouse painting session. First thing that happened since last week was getting a new Dinette! Super exited about this. It is a flex steel brand and came out of a 70's GMC Kingsley. The owner of the GMC actually delivered it to me on his way home from their big convention!!!! I'll need to do some modifications to it to work in the Travco, but it shouldn't be too bad. Cool thing is that Travco actually made the first interiors for the GMC's and the bed is very similar to what the Dodge would have had.


We had a busy day on Saturday with Girl Scouts and a birthday party. I replaced a couple of bulbs which fixed the last of my turn signal issues, I hope. I will still replace the flasher as the old thermal unit is very slow, but for now I have both turn signals back. Then I finished mounting the rear bumper. I still have to wire up the tail light and remove the crappy job one of the previous owners did when they added a trailer harness.


One of the big issues we've had is that the factory mirrors were busted up pretty bad. I would have loved to just put the old ones back on, but the mounts were held together with hose clamps and were severally pitted. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be an exact replacement available. But I did pick up some off of Amazon for $14 each that I think look GREAT!








I need to extend the passenger's side up about 4-5 inches in order for it to be useful. Not sure how I'm going to do it yet, considering finding some chrome turnbuckle type nuts.


I didn't get much else done but the mirrors, bumper and cleaning out 3 months of bodywork tools and trash. During the week I hope to take off of work to get new tires. Here are some pictures I took using my good camera instead of the iPhone.

















It feels so good to get it out of the backyard and back on pavement. I took a video of getting it out of the ruts and backing it up. [size=78%]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBsLao8s-Gg[/size]