Welcome, from up above .
Thanks for the kind words Rolly, welcome to FTE. There are a lot of good, knowledgeable people here (and a few grumpy old men).

 

Thanks, so far that's the worst rust I've found.

 

No progress to report. Just wanted to let you guys know that, according to my "Marti Report", today is the Pumpkin's 40th birthday.
She was built on March 12, 1973 at Norfolk.

PARTY TIME!!

 

I'm glad I'm not the only person who takes note of my pickup's birthday.
I will have a beer later for you and the pumpkin!

 

Brought in a special DJ for the occasion .. Great thread BTW

 

Grasfarmr and redroad have an E-beer on me .

 

Haven't done anything noteworthy to the Pumpkin this week. One thing I did had to do with paint .
Anyone who's had their truck's doors off know Ford installed the doors before paint, same goes for the splash pan support brackets on the firewall. You take any of these off and there's a rusty outline of the hinge or bracket left.
I really didn't want this, but I didn't want to buy a gallon of paint and a gallon of clear. Then get out the spray equipment, set up, clean up etc. just to spray some hinges and brackets .
I started looking and found a company that can supply just about any stock color in aerosol cans. It's a tad on the expensive side ($19.95 for the base coat, 12 oz spray can) but for what I wanted to do it'll work fine. I figure it would also give me a better idea of how the color is going to look.
I ordered two cans of Ford L6 Kona Blue and two cans of clear.
I think I'm going to really, really like this color.
I've sprayed the support brackets and two of the hinges. I also sprayed the vent block off plate to see how the color will look. There's a little dust in the finish, I wasn't being particularly careful spraying the panel, I just wanted to see what it'll look like.
In the shade the color is almost black, but in sunlight this blue really pops!
The pictures don't do the color justice, it looks a whole lot better in person.

 

That's gonna be real purty with a wood bed.
Have you decided if you're going to go with the original graphic scheme or modify it a bit.

 

Thanks Marc.
Yeah, I'm going with the original '73 Explorer stripe. I've got an original Ford stripe kit that I'm going to use as a pattern. I'm going to paint the stripes on and they'll be under the clear coat .
The Pumpkin was originally a single color but the donor was two tone. I decided to keep the two tone rather than remove the cab molding.
The paint scheme is going to be Kona blue for the body, pure white for the cab roof, tailgate lettering and Explorer stripes.

 

You know that I HAD to paint Pop's Truck some shade of red in his memory, but blue is my favorite color and that has got to be one of the nicest shades of blue that I have seen. It is going to look great! It is a nice feeling when a hard made decision works out well, isn't it? I hope all is well.

 

Thanks Maul, I really like this blue. The pictures don't do it justice. When it's in bright sunlight the blue "pops" like you wouldn't believe.

 

Damn Mike!

That is one sexy blue colour!

 

Mike what color interior are you going with? If I end up changing the colors of my truck I am going going to go with a blue to replace the brown. That is a really nice looking blue.

 

I'm thinking for the interior, black w/ gray accents. For the upholstery, leather, something like this with the seat inserts gray.

 

I was messing around in the garage yesterday and started looking at the Pumpkin, wondering how the blue would look .
I sanded down a small area on the passenger side cowl and sprayed it with the rattle cans.
If the "real" paint job looks like this, I'll be happy .
This is after it had dried over night, the second one shows the reflection of a trouble light I was using.