Bumpers, Fender Mirrors and Painting

Well, not a planned update for this year... as I wrote before my passenger side fender got all banged up in the garage over the winter. Originally I was just going to leave it, didn't want to waste fun summer driving time and potentially miss any races. Well with work, family and travel schedules... a 3-4 week window appeared and I decided to let Pilo over at Pilo's Body Shop have a crack at her. 

If You Give A Mouse A Cookie...

If you don't know the story.. google it. If you know me well, thats how I live my life... while I am doing something, might as well do it right and get some other items done as well. So a quick fender paint turned into... 

Sandblasted my Shelby Libre vintage wheels (still working on refinishing them)
New rear bumper (Skillard)
Got a new Xenon front air damn from a car club member (thats Kurt!)
Fender Mirrors (Z Car Depot)
Also painted rear deck lid, so of course also got a new deck lid cover (Skillard)

Since I didn't find a new front air damn until we had nearly finished... I splurged and ordered the Skillard.com front Type 1 Air Splitter... it was originally to help off set the sagging front spoiler (from going off at the track two years ago) and gave me an excuse to splurge. I still haven't mounted that as it is fairly extensive... 

Anyhow... the paint match on the fender, deck lid and front spoiler is awesome. Not perfect, it never is on spot repair (I skipped on blending since I want to fully rep
aint the car someday), but man its so good I bet hardly anyone will be able to tell. The best part is that Pilo let me work on the car a little, I learned some painting tips and helped with the front spoiler. 

I made some good decisions on parts, and some bad ones, let's break it down. 

Fender Mirrors - I got the grey plastic ones, they were on clearance (still are if you want a set) and I figured for the savings I can paint them black quick. However, the black ones are also now on sale, and I spent more in paint, sand paper, and time than I saved. I mean it was fun sanding, and I went above and beyond and since I had to paint, I sanded off the flashing lines (plastic mold lines) so I feel like they look more high end... but I know they are cheap, and I shoulda of just bought black ones. 

Rear Bumper - they sell it in raw aluminum, or black powder coat. I am glad I went cheaper here, cause it was easy to paint, and we ended up custom cutting a notch in the bumper near my tow hook. That would of ruined the finish on the powder coat. The real mistake here though was not buying a bumper in the first place, and trying to jury rig an old bumper that was in terrible shape to the car... that was last year and now my rear fenders look like swiss cheese. Fix that another day... the new bumper looks nice and I need to adjust them a bit but looking good. 

Okay so what is next? Well I have some autocross events, a track night at Gingerman Raceway and lots of other projects around the house and garage to get done. I need to find time to finish the rims, no real priority on that, but man I can't wait to see how she looks on vintage rims to complete the look. 

August 6th Cars and Coffee, August 11th Gingerman, then September and October autocross events... maybe sneak in a Z car show and a track day with the Corvette club... who knows. Glad to have my baby back!