Restoration of a '92 V6 LE

[cmjohnson]

I figured I'd show my project off.

This is my daily driver. It's been in the family since brand new, I'm the second owner.

Day One: Beginning work to restore this 181,000 mile '92 V6 LE to or beyond showroom
level. Crease in fender filled and blended. Numerous small dents and dings also filled,
with glazing putty for the smallest ones, and body filler for larger ones.

Body is straight, never been wrecked.


Intent: To restore the car to showroom condition or better.


Note: Rims were redone in the past several months. Factory alloy rims, bead blasted
and powdercoated original silver, or close enough to original that you'd never know.
The powdercoat allows for very easy cleaning of brake dust and road grime.


Car will be receiving a new two-stage finish of DuPont G9900 Super Black ChromaBase.

Look at a brand new black Lexus and you will know what sort of finish I am shooting for.
It'll be gorgeous...if I don't screw it up. But I've got experience with the paints I'll be
using, and I do expect to do a great job as a result.

Hundreds of tiny fills have been done, in glazing putty.

ALL badges and trim are being removed prior to priming and painting, including window
trim, rear view mirrors, lights, lenses, bumper strips on doors, etc.

The front and rear bumpers will be removed and separately refurbished, as they have
a lot of small gouges and scratches in them.

The bumpers and any trim that is removed and will be reused will be painted separately.
For the most part, that will be just the mirrors and the door bumper strips.


I have a bag full of brand new trim pieces to install. I'll be getting more before I'm done.
Most of the exterior rubber trim is being replaced.

The door handles will even be removed prior to painting. One is being replaced anyway due
to its being broken.

The paint work will extend into seams and door jambs. I'll stop short of gutting the
interior to repaint the inside of the body, but I WILL be painting inside the trunk, lid and
trunk space both.

This will be given a full primer coat before painting, and skim sanding all over on the first
primer coat to ensure that everything is REALLY straight, as black is a very demanding
finish, as you well know.


This should be a fast project. I expect to at LEAST get the bumpers off, refurbished, and
in primer this weekend. With luck I may fully paint them this weekend, with priming of
the entire car in the following week, and painting on the weekend.


I'm shooting for a better than showroom look, but am thinking about making a few subtle
visual changes. Clear marker lamp lenses up front, for one, and shoot the center grille
in black, either flat or full gloss. I haven't decided yet but I'm toying with those ideas.


Oh, the wiper mechanisms will be refurbished and Cerrocoated black, so they'll never have
finish loss issues ever again. Cerrocoat only comes off with sandblasting.

CJ

[cmjohnson]

Clearly this isn't interesting a lot of people but I'll update anyway.


All body damage has been worked out to my satisfaction. I believe 100 percent of the
body is straight enough and smooth enough that it'll do justice to a full gloss black
paint job after a layer of primer or two, final smooth sanding, the basecoat, and a couple
coats of clear on top.


I spent almost 100 bucks on primer and today I bought the paint. color coat and clear coat,
plus a new respirator, a paint suit, and other assorted supplies. It was an expensive day,
about 450 bucks, but I do believe it'll be worth it.


Removing the bumper strips on the doors was easy enough, but removing the foam double
sided tape that holds them to the doors is a lot of work. I use a commercial paint stripper
to soften up the tape residue and wire brush it off with a steel bristle "toothbrush" type brush.

The stripper doesn't even take the gloss off of the original paint, which is a single stage,
enamel most likely.

I'm hoping to at least get the bumpers removed, prepped, filled, sanded, primed, and
painted this weekend. Ideally I'll get the whole car primed, too, but I don't know if
that's going to happen.


It's starting to look like I might be able to make use of a full professional paint booth
with all the trimmings, including a gun washer, air filtration, heaters for forced air drying, and an air
supply system. That'd be nice, because it'll keep dust and bugs from settling on
fresh paint.




CJ

[Aussie_Camry]

I find it interesting, will be great to see the finished product

[eyeball96]

Looks like ur doin it right man!

Posting pics of ur progress would be awesome to see tho

So ur restoring it to OEM. Any other plans? I suggest suspension upgrades.

It really turns Gen 3s into a fun driving automobile.

[360glitch]

Cool project, keep up the good work man.

[BlueFusion6851]

Keep us updated... I've subscribed to this thread. Restoring a gen3 V6 is something I've been curious about. Nice!

[Tuner571]

Looks like your doing a great job man, keep us updated!

[cmjohnson]

Pics coming tomorrow.

I spent the day...ALL day...working on it. All the lights are off it, and the grille, and the rear window trim, and the bumper strips on each door, and if I can figure out how to remove the window trim, it'll come off,
too. But the bumper skins look like a cast-iron nightmare to remove for rework, so the heck with it,
I don't want to spend an entire day removing them. They stay on the car, and the rear one got a near
full skim coat of claw glaze, and tomorrow the front gets the same.

My best work so far was to a dent on the near-flat back of the trunk lid, right over the V6 badge. It had
a nice little dent there that I put in myself, a while ago. That sucked! Well, I'm not all that
experienced at bodywork, but I got some lessons from a friend. And I did the repair there, and had
to "adjust" it a couple of times, but it's RIGHT. I'd say flawless. I can't feel a problem, I can't even
see it with the area wetted down and looking at the shine from any angle. I'm rather proud of that. []


The prospect of cleaning inside the wheelwells is absolutely frightening. [:/] But I'll need to do it in
order to make the work look like it's a LITTLE more than skin deep. I might have to clean them with
a wire wheel brush on a drill, at least for the first half inch of crud or so. [;D]

I'll probably spend a good two hours detailing out the engine compartment, under the hood, and under
the trunk lid. And I've got to figure out how to remove the washer jets from the hood.
I'm in absolutely no hurry but as I've taken all the lights off the car, I'm definitely committed to working
on it all I can until it's done. I can't borrow another car forever!

I'm buying a few more new parts for it. The big rear taillight assembly on the trunk lid, for one. It's not
cheap, but it's the biggest piece on the car that I can't really refurbish. Heck with it, I've got the money,
and I'll store the old one just in case someone breaks the new one some fine day.

I found that the snap-in retainers that hold the front bumper skin in place, between the frame and
the clamping bar, have all pretty much disintegrated. Of course, I can't order those until Monday,
but they're easy to install once I get them. So far, that's the ONLY part that I've found that's actually
broken due to age out of every body part I've yet touched.

I think I'll go with clear marker lenses up front. I found an ebay seller who's got 'em, but frankly I don't
really trust him much since one of the links on an auction of his triggered my anti-virus software and
reported a dangerous trojan used by phishers. I'd like to have an alternate source that doesn't come
with free trojans or viruses.


With ANY luck, the car will be ready for primer by tomorrow evening, if not actually primed. But
I'm not even considering the possibility of getting farther than that so soon. I won't rush this job,
because I want this to be gorgeous and this is as demanding ia finish as a single solid color finish
can possibly be.

The finish is DuPont G9900 Super Black, with an HB Body (European import) topcoat that I've had
some truly awesome results with every other time I've used it before. Its clarity and gloss is
incredible, and it also shoots to the best true "wet look" finish that's smooth, REALLY smooth,
without a trace of orange peel, that I've ever personally shot or seen. And it's not very expensive,
either. DuPont ChromaClear is a LOT more expensive and it's not any better.

I haven't yet decided if I'll keep the grille in its factory charcoal (in which case I'll use my brand new
grille, factory fresh from Toyota) or if I want to go full black on it. If I go black, do I want full gloss
black or do I want flat black or something else?

Decisions, decisions.


CJ

[Black95Cam]

im intrested.. but too much reading.. im lazy.. lol... but cant wait to see the final product.

[cmjohnson]

Photos by this evening, I hope.

I've learned how to take apart ALL the window trim parts. I didn't break TOO much in the process!

The key is to yank out the window gasket in its channel, first. Then all the relevant screws that hold it
together shall be revealed to you.

The door pillar trim is held in place by a screw through the upper edge of the door, with the nut on
the inside of the door. It's that fancy, plastic looking hex head nut you've seen many times on the
inside of your doors and didn't know what it was for.

Now that I can completely de-trim the doors, I have to ask myself, AM I GOING TO DO IT?

It's a fair amount of work and certainly there'd be NO paint line at the trim if I don't have to tape
around it, but damaging parts gets expensive and you've got to remember how it all goes together.

I'm removing the mirrors to paint them separately. This requires removing the inside door panels,
so I've already got a fair time investment in the doors. Should I do a little more?

I don't know what'll happen to the rear filler window if I pull the frame it's in. Will the window crash into
the door and get lodged in there, or break, or fall out and break?

Trying to do a really killer job on a car requires a lot more questions to be asked and answered.



CJ

[cmjohnson]

On the bumpers, I just said the heck with it and skim coated the entire surface with glazing putty,
and spent quite a while sanding it back. Give the large number of small chips, gouges, and other assorted
damage on the surfaces, it seemed like the thing to do. And it was, as touchups have been almost
unnecessary.

Rearview mirrors are off, the front doors are stripped to the frames. The rear doors are staying intact,
as I discovered that I'd have to pull the glass to get the rear doors stripped to the same level, and my
response to that is, "Screw that! I'll just be really careful with the masking tape!


I've learned something important about Camry doors. You should know it if your car is built in the same manner.

There's a plastic film barrier on the inside of the doors between the inside door skin and the door body,
and it's there for a very good reason. I've had to replace door handles before, (who hasn't, if they have
a gen 3 Camry? ) and wasn't careful to put that plastic barrier back the way it came and spend the
time to readhere the black adhesive tar strip where it should be. Well, I've got a little water damage
to the inside of each front door trim panel (which is a form of chipboard, covered in vinyl) and had to
make repairs to each of them, using some very badass silicone sealer/adhesive I picked up. It'll be fine,
but that damage can be avoided by taking the extra time needed to be sure that plastic barrier is put back
PROPERLY. It only takes a minute, and prevents water damage to the door panels.


CJ

[xtremeskier97]

Nice work.

Someone needs new tires!

[cmjohnson]

They're better than they look in the pictures. They're not new but they've got plenty of tread depth left on them.

I run Toyos. What else would you put on a Toyota?


CJ

[BlueFusion6851]

That is some killer work!

[ELL]

looks hard
MORE PICS!!! =D