Frustration.
Yeah, that seems to be the right word.
After spending...what?, A solid week on the hood,.......gooping, sanding, sweating, getting the thing straight enough to even consider spraying some primer on it, I take the thing out, set it on my trash can and level it, and back away from it far enough to get an eyeball on it.
Something is off. ( This is starting to sound like a freakin broken record, I know)
How I keep doing this to myself is beyond me. You'd think I'd have been anal meticulous after having to redo the one scoop in the first place, but evidently, I prefer to do stuff over and over...........and over.
I discounted the wonkiness when the scoops were unfinished, believing that body work would even things out. That was not to be. There still is an angle difference between the two scoops that makes one look "up" more, where the other appears more level.
I discovered this reality over the Labor day weekend, when on Saturday, ready to blow the thing off for its final blow,..I actually stepped away from the thing more than 5'. One scoop didn't match the other still.
I had to put the thing back in the garage, because the solution as to how to fix it was way more than I wanted to even consider.
On Sunday,..........at 5PM,.....I dealt with that.
I cut the wonky scoop back off the hood. Tomorrow, I'll cut the other one off as well. ( Kinda like a radical double scoop-ectomy)
The reason that the other has to go as well is because the hole left in the hood is now too large to re-attach the scoop back to. I'll have to add filler panels down the sides to widen it. If I'm gonna widen one,...I'll have to widen the other or else they won't match............... again. If there was a Fairmont hood to start over with, I'd throw the whole hood away, and start over, but I have the G vents cut into the back, one side now blocked so water wont drain onto the turbo system, and the entire bottom of which is completely stripped to bare metal.
Considering what has to be done to the hood, made todays action way more easy to swallow.
Off to soda blasting. I'm so freakin' sick of sanding,..I'll gladly pay the 375.00 to get the trunk, doors, and fenders returned to me bare metal.
Getting the doors stripped to make sure I got them completely clean wasn't without it's own drama,....as the getting the window out of the doors turned out to be a giant pain in the ass. The rubber window run channel had petrified into bakelite, as did the inside and outside dew wipes. Trying to get anything past that was a waste of time. Realizing that I was being stopped by the raggedy ass hardened crap I changed course, and dug out the crystalized window run channel one inch at a time, followed by prying the two crispy dew wipes out of the doors, then grinding off the rivets that hold the plastic mount to the door glass, and sliding just the glass out of the door.
While I was at it, the green-gold wheels got added to the tally.
I don't know how much additionally he'll charge me to blast the green goblin off of the wheels, but again, I ain't sandin another damn inch on something if I don't have to.
As a sidenote,.......if the trunk deck is on top of that pile,...you'd have to figure I did more than what I'm talking about here, considering that the trunk deck was literally sealed shut w/ bondo. You'd be right to think that,..but it's not done. It's close, but it's not done.
That leaves a few days w/o sheet metal w/ the exception of the freakin hood, the unfinished rear quarter/ deck area, and/or sitting around and doing nothing.
Let me seeeee..........
If you've been keeping count then this is just another of the " can't get it right the first time" scenarios that have played out so far w/ this car. If you haven't, the amount of extra work is mind boggling:
Engine compartment: painted twice.
Head gasket: Twice.
Serpentine belt system: Twice. Had to modify belt path to allow for more belt wrap on the crank pulley.
Front oil cooler shroud: modified to eliminate the twist that occurred from heat distortion.
Dash console: Changed integrated console into stand alone console.
Door bars: Twice.
Wiper motor/mount. Welded wrong mount on new motor. Had to redo.
HVAC panel: Twice. Too stupid to properly mask the thing prior to painting.
Gas tank/ fuel system: Twice. Pump relocated to its third mounting point.
Gila gills: Took 4 attempts to get final version.
Axles: measured too short, had to buy additional set.
Tail lights: originally slotted for Fox mustang lights, they were replaced by sectioned steel thingy, that was replaced by current flat panel, that has eventually morphed into current iteration.
Hood: Going on round 3 of " How not to build a hood scoop".
Wheels: Second set of fronts, as originally purchased 17 x 9's were too wide. The new set of four Currently green, getting blasted so I can paint them again.
Gila hole: Three versions. Could not get long version to set right.
And to think........all of this, and I still got hundreds of hours of "doing it right" still in front of me to get the car done. Who knows how long it'll actually take?