While mechanically I’d like to sort out a fresh timing belt and front brakes, the biggest bug bear for me is the cosmetic condition. It is covered in dents, car parking dings, scratches and worst of all blisters of rust around the rear arches.
Some before pics:
A few weeks ago I decided to tackle some of the repairs myself. Armed with some colour matched paint, some etch primer I figured now was the best time to start touching up the paintwork.
I started with the rear tailgate boot lid. This had discoloured and appeared to be scratched all over. I sanded it down using 180, 250 and 300 grit paper before alcohol wiping and spray painting; two coats primer and two coats of its “pulsar silver” paint. Finally I covered in a couple of coats of lacquer. After a couple of days to cure I rubbed down with some fine grade wet and dry before machine polishing.
While it’s not a picture perfect finish (and the less said about the blending in the better) it has indeed come out surprisingly well! Lessons learnt too for the next paint job.
This one was what I was looking forward to the most - the bottom of the rear passenger drivers side door. Unlike the rest of the car the bottom of this was not finished in tempest grey - adding to the “banger” look to the car. This was due to the fact a replacement door was fitted at some point in this rovers life - a door which would likely have come off a later model or lower spec car. It had also begun to rust at the bottom end. Since I wanted to return J731MDO to some semblance of respectability I could no longer leave it as it was.
A fresh early start on a warm spring day saw me key back the original paint. I then coated all areas of rust with some “kurust” rust converter. I then started the process of priming and spraying once again! After a good machine polish I have to say I’m quite happy with the finish.
While waiting for it to dry , and since I had all of my materials to hand I managed to tidy up the repair section of the rear wings by the door shuts on the drivers side. I have recreated the line in tempest grey - next to re-paint the pulsar silver area to hide the previous stone chip that was applied. Of course there is always still more to do and I am planning on re-working some of the repairs on the passenger side to tidy up the look.
Finally - buoyed on by my success and still armed with plenty of paint I decided it was high time to restore the black window surrounds on the passenger side. These were blighted by peeling paint and various scratches and marks. All of which made the car look worn out. Unfortunately I didn’t take any photos of this doh!
This took plenty of masking and a little bit of keying up. Once wiped clean I added three coats of all in one satin black. I am pleased with the result and has tidied up the rover no end! I finished off the day by repainting the plastic rear numberplate panel - which had once again started to peel after my last repaint in December. This time I made sure to etch prime and coat with better quality paint and seal with some lacquer. I am generally pretty happy with the end result.
like all paint jobs these were all pretty simple tasks - with the majority of the effort going into masking and preparing the surface for the paint. I ended up using copious amounts of old classic car weeklys and masking tape!
Next up? Repaint the drivers side black window surrounds, finish off the drivers side rear door shut paint lines and repeat on the passenger side also. After this there’s also the roof to do as well! Good job I still have plenty of paint to spare ! The end result is to have a Rover that looks just a little bit tidier than before. Let’s hope it makes it to the NEC for next years show!
