My 86 Bullnose - "Blackie"

Nice! I like it black also.

Mine just needed something as it was to much red

So I went with white

But just not any white letters ...... reflective as I drive it a lot in the dark

They make a red reflective but I don't know if it would match the red pin stripe?
Dave ----

I really like the idea of red.
While you've done an amazing job that I wouldn't even attempt (in black) there's nothing like a Bullnose that REPRESENTS!

Thank you, gentlemen! Dave the white lettering on you truck is perfect! Where would one acquire the red reflective letters? May see about a sample.

There are plenty of people with a vinyl cutter and the proper files on eBay or the web, but you'll commonly see them advertised as DORF or such to avoid Ford perusing their IP rights.

My later '87 styleside tailgate letters were under $20 delivered, though retroreflective material will cost more.

Machspeed wrote

Thank you, gentlemen! Dave the white lettering on you truck is perfect! Where would one acquire the red reflective letters? May see about a sample.

IIRC I got mine off Ebay.
I think I did a search for FORD reflective in white.
I cant remember if I seen red reflective now when I was searching for mine as I was only looking for white.

What I was thinking of doing if I could not find any on line was buy a set of normal letters and have a local shop copy them in the reflective.

I checked with 1 local shop to do them from scratch and install. Good thing they could not take the truck in right then, 2 to 3 weeks was the wait time.
I then asked the price and they said just to bring it in the door was $100 then up so I may have been looking at $150 to $200 they said. Again form scratch and they would do everything and I drive out with letters on the gate.

I cant remember what I paid for mine, Maybe $50 shipped? Where I think the others were $30 shipped so the reflective is more money. It also came with papers on how to install them using soapy spray water.

If you cant find it in red but can in white you might want to reach out to them and see if they can do them in red. I would think once they have the pattern all they would need to do is switch the decal color.
Dave ----

So my latest venture has been the repair of the rusted roof rails on my truck. As I said in another post here, monitor the sealant in your roof rails. If it's cracked, water is seeping in and things are rusting.

As I'm learning autobody and paint in preparation to paint my Mustang, I can say there is a lot of work involved in doing things right, not to mention the learning curve. With rust, old rusted metal needs to be cut out (it's cancer), all rust removed, metal patches made, epoxy primer, filler, sanding, more epoxy primer, 2k primer, sanding, basecoat, and finally clearcoat. All this and I've left out a bunch of other things.













There is some trash in the paint, which will always happen, even in a booth. However, in my case I did a stupid, making things worse by loading my gun up with clear, getting in the bed of the truck to spay and realizing I should wipe down before spraying. Too lazy to disconnect my gun and get back out of the truck to get a cloth to wipe down, I just shot the clear. Three coats flowed nicely and with the exception of the the trash looks great. I still have to cut and buff and after, one won't even notice the trash. Still, much learned here!  

Dust or no, that's an incredible transformation, John!  

Well done!

Nice work! Paint and body work is something I tend to avoid.

Yes, wonderful job!  Well done!  

As said nice job.
Did you wet the floor down? It would also keep the dust & dirt down.
I also covered everything in my garage with sheets of plastic from about 8 feet up the walls to the floor as I had a work bench down 1 wall that I cleaned the best I could but knew it still held a lot of dirt.
The other wall had 3 stacks of tires & wheels and a bunch of other stuff I had no place to put.
Dave ----

Hey thanks for the Kudos, fellas! I'm pretty pleased with it. Still have to cut and buff it. Would hate to have paid someone else to do this for me too! Quality autobody work is expensive.

Dave, it being up so high, really didn't need to wet the floor down. I actually blew off the ceiling and everything up high though. Crap just floats in the air. I regret not wiping it down one last time before shooting the clear, but it will buff out nicely.

I covered everything in my shop except my compressor. The primers and basecoat are never a problem, it's the clear that gets on everything. It is a mess! When I go to paint the Mustang, I will be building me a makeshift paint booth. Still figuring out how I'm gonna do that, as I need incoming and outgoing air.    

Love that truck man.    I want a roll bar like you had on the back for Brutus.

Thank you, brother! And to think I almost sold it too. I can tell you now, I would have regretted it and had I seen it out and about, it would have hurt. Weird, I know.  

I pulled the roll bar and all the chrome stuff as it was cheap, rusting, and looked tacky in its rusting state. And, as I've grown older, I like it better without all that stuff.

Can you believe I had huge propane tank back there too. Sat right between that roll bar. When I was in the Air Force, stationed in Altus Oklahoma, propane at that time was dirt cheap. Gas was going up and with propane at 39 cents per gallon from the local Co-Op, it was a no brainer. I could fill that tank up and drive my truck for a month. Moreover, it idled sooooo smooth and the oil during oil changes looked incredibly clean.  

This past weekend, I cut and buffed the roof on my truck. As usual, I'm not one hundred percent happy with it. I made a couple of lazy stupid mistakes that cost me, mistakes I won't make again. For the most part, it looks pretty good, but it could have been near prefect. As the rear window was removed, I also cleaned up, sanded, sealed, and painted the pinch weld and, for lack of proper nomenclature, the glass channel.


 

John - That looks awesome!!!  I am impressed!