Aug 2012
To get ready for painting, I have to remove all the trim pieces, rear and side lights, front lights, wipers and windshield.

Still have some work to do on the boot lid to make it smooth.
	Ran into a problem removing the wiper wheel boxes. The nuts are frozen tight. They have been soaking for three days in PB Blaster, but that hasn't helped. I tried heating them with a blow torch, but still couldn't budge them. Now I have them soaking in automatic transmission fluid. I'll try heat one more time before resorting to cutting them off! No luck, I had to cut all three nuts off using my dremel tool!
	The new top arrived from Robert Kirk and I must say the Haartz vinyl is really nice. I might have to get one of these for my Midget!
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Removed the headlight buckets, parking lights and side lights

Removing silicone that is around headlight opening.	Side marker light needs cleaning up.

The windshield came off easily. I didn't. even have to remove the dash.	Next, I removed both doors.

Both doors ready for the next step.	All the trim must be removed before painting.

Door trim is off. Also removed the vent windows.	Removed the door handle. I'll tape around the lock.

Started sanding around the wiper holes.	Used a pressure washer to clean the inside of the boot.

Spent the afternoon degreasing and washing everything!	Then used the orbital sander on the entire body. I went through 14 sanding discs!
	I visited two body shops today - Joe's Country Auto and Nick's NL Body Shop. I brought along the boot lid so they could see the existing paint. Both recommended sanding as much off as possible. They both thought the Slick sand primer was good, but I will still have to apply another primer/sealer over it before paint can be applied, something I did not budget for. Lots more sanding to do this weekend!
UPDATE 8/29/2012: I went to Albany Auto Body Supply yesterday and had a long conversation with the paint experts there. They confirmed that the car has lacquer paint on it and that means you cannot put modern urethane paint over it as it will just bubble up and crinkle. Just as I suspected, the car needs to be stripped to bare metal for proper adhesion of the new paint! Sooooo... I bought 100 razor blades, a gallon of paint stripper, lacquer thinner, and 100 sandpaper discs and called in reinforcements! Using razor blades, Rich and I stripped off the top coat of yellow paint.

That still left several coats of primer and other paints, so we laid down a drop cloth and started applying paint stripper. We liberally applied stripper, then waited 20 minutes for it to start bubbling up and lifting the paint. Then we attacked it with the razor blade scrappers. It took several applications to get to bare metal.
The passenger fender has extra coats of paint, lots of body fill and even a coat of red! It must have been replaced at some point. This is going to take a lot of work to strip.

We worked most of the day and got about 80% of the paint off. There is still a lot to do around the headlights and grill, as well as the doors, all the edges, the rocker panel, and undersides of the bonnet and boot lid.
	That's enough for one day!
Thursday, August 30, 2012; The stripping continues! First, the doors. There is some old body fill on the lower edges, but the doors are not too bad. While Rich worked on the doors I worked on the front of the car, stripping around the headlight openings.

Stripping the front of the car is the most difficult as there are lots of nooks and crannies, especially under the bonnet.
	The bottom edge of the nose will need a coat of fill to smooth it out. .

After stripping the passenger fender using chemical stripper and lots of sanding, we applied a coat of Rage body fill. There were lots of bumps and imperfections, which is why it had a skim coat of fill on it in the first place!	It has to be block sanded by hand to get it smooth and straight.
	Sanding around the wheel well and rear quarter panel, trying to remove all the rust before filling the holes. Sanding creates a lot of dust that you don't want to breathe, so it's important to use proper protection.
Friday, 8/31	First, I went to work stripping the inside of the cockpit surround. It came out pretty clean.


Next I attacked the groove around the bonnet. This is a labor intensive job using stripper, hand scrappers, wire brushes and even a chisel.	The corner is a mess.
That's better!	Same procedure on the groove around the boot. Now it's nice and clean.

We worked on the doors, applying a thin coat of filler where needed. We will sand it tomorrow.
	We removed the bonnet to get to the groove around the engine bay. Rich worked on sanding the edges while it was off. He also applied a thin coat of filler to the rocker panels and the passenger fender.

	Meanwhile I spent a lot of time stripping the area just under the bonnet. It's almost ready for primer.

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