Josh's 1985 CJ7 Restoration

Am I crazy...?

Okay getting back onto Jeep topics...

I need some input from the Jeep Forum guys/ gals... I'm undecided and need some input before I regret my gut decision.

With my body being down to bare metal, I have the option to leave it and fill in the needed areas with filler and leave other areas (spot welds and natural waves) alone. Or I can skim coat the whole body and block sand it to a near perfect flat surface to have the "show quality" paint job.

What I am doing now is just filling in areas where there were dents and areas where I have had to do some welding, which is only one spot. The dents were no bigger than a "door ding", probably done on a trail or maybe from a door. My plan was to not mess with any other areas, which means you will see the natural waves from the stamping process and the original spot welds.

CJs were never perfect from the factory and you saw these imperfections. But you express your thoughts and someone jumps all over you and tells you what needs to be done... More people tell me that I need to make it as straight as possible or I will never be happy with the results.

I want it to look as it rolled off the assembly line and never been messed with, but I also don't want it to look like bad. So my question is, am I making a mistake by not skim coating these areas and giving a better appearance? I would like to know what some of you think.

Thanks!

I plan on leaving the OEM ripples or waves, and spot welds visible on mine when I repaint it. I’ll fix the rust and dents, or any damage since it was manufactured, but I will not perfect the flaws from the factory. Back when I had my new 1986 CJ-7, I beat the crap out of it for four years when I was stationed at Port Angeles WA. At the end of that tour, in 1990, I pulled my Jeep into the paint booth, fixed the bent fender, and scuff sanded it before taping it off. I repainted the exterior with the top & steel doors installed, and it turned out real nice. It looked like it was new again, no more scratched paint from running tight trails. It even had an extra ripple & dented windshield frame on one side from the time I rolled it onto its side when it was about four months old.

I say leave the imperfections and wheel it, you can always repaint it or buff out the scratches, down the road if you want it to look good again.

I’ll post a couple pictures from 1987.

Axhammer said:

I plan on leaving the OEM ripples or waves, and spot welds visible on mine when I repaint it. I say leave the imperfections and wheel it.

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bob4703 said:

The flat sided CJ body is one conducive to the hammer and dolly method of removing dents. That's what I'd do and follow up with spot filler. Get rid of the obvious and ignore the not so obvious defects. A Jeep should be driven and not admired.

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Hoover7 said:

IMHO, I like the seeing the small irregularities that came from the factory. The spot metal welds, the slight waves in the sheet metal - they just look authentic, and easy to differentiate from what might be a glass tub. ... either way you decide to go, this is your rig, and any decision you make shouldn't have to be defended or second guessed! It's going to be eye-candy once done regardless

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Thanks guys! This makes me feel I'm not so crazy about my gut decision being to leave the waves, ripples, or factory imperfections. @bob4703, I have done most of the hammer and dolly stuff to closest of my ability and I really only have a 4 or 5 bondo spots the rest is scuffed bare metal.
@Axhammer, I would say the only wheeling its gonna do is around the farm AVOIDING MUD HOLES... I've learned with the girlfriends Jeep with mud holes lol
@Hoover7 - You're right, It's my rig and I shouldn't have to defend myself for what I want. I just wanted to make sure my head was on straight and some reassurance that I'm keeping true to what "factory authentic" is supposed to look right.

I could have waited longer for responses but I thought, if three members shared the same opinion, I can see what others will say on here. That's reason #2,598 why I like this site better than facebook groups. Y'all know better!

I mean, lets face it, It's a Jeep... If it was a 1969 AMX, you're damn right it would be laser straight and I wouldn't fret about it. Yes, I want an AMX someday but I dont have deep pockets at the moment :crying:

NEED SOME HELP

Hey all, I flipped the tub over yesterday to spray the braces and structural members under the tub and I found a potential problems and I need some of the experts to chime in.

In the picture below you are looking at the drivers side front (toe board) body mount. There is some cracking that I am addressing but I noticed it looks bent... can anyone show me or tell me if this needs to be level? The passenger side seems to be level but because the driver side has a stiffening rib, it is throwing me off. I can tell on the perch that the washer that is on the body mount has a slight indentation that resembles a dent.

I guess my main question is, do the body mounts need to be close to level or can it vary some? How would one go about pulling that thicker metal back into place?

Last night I got the body mount back to a more level state. I ended up welding a bolt onto the body and used a slide hammer to pull it back into place. It took some effort but it wasn't too difficult like I thought it would be. I welded up the cracks, cleaned it all up and put the cavity wax in.

Today, I need to pick up a few things from the store and I could potentially lay down primer on the bottom of the tub. Hopefully I get to this point. more will come soon!

Last night was the first of the priming stages! Started priming the bottom as it was getting dark and finished with a flashlight in the dark. I didn't want to prime in the garage because the smell transfers right into the house and I feel that is not safe for anyone.

My shipment of undercoating came into today I will undercoat the tub and prepare to flip it over to finish priming! I'm getting excited but I know I just need to pace myself before I make a mistake. I hope this weekend the epoxy primer will be done but that may be questionable for fenders and the grill. They still need some slight work.

I also added something I saw from @weapon. He used those weld on tab nuts for the trans cover. I figured these would work considering those holes were already modified and they worked perfect!

This weekend was full of working on the Jeep and getting it in primer before it gets too cold. It was a successful weekend to say the least. Seeing a new color on what seems like a never ending project is the best feeling I've had in a long time. And its only in epoxy primer...

Anyways, like I said, it's in epoxy primer. I used Eastwoods grey epoxy primer and it sprays really nice. I also used the Eastwood Concourse Pro paint gun. I bought the paint gun "kit" which comes with a detail spray gun and a few spray tips. It may have been a little pricy (I paid $300 with tax and shipping) but it was well worth it in my honest opinion. Eastwood has sales on them frequently and that's how I picked it up. The harbor freight purple gun works great but after spraying my dads Jeep M715, we have found the flaws and I didn't want to deal with that on my project. I also got the undercoating on the bottom.

Eastwoods epoxy primer is a 1:1 mix, so I followed the instructions and sprayed at 25 PSI. This was my first time spraying anything large and I had no runs. I surprised myself because I was certain I would have runs all over the place. I had a few bugs get in it, but I expected that for spraying outside.

My plan moving forward is to sand down the small imperfections from the bugs and maybe spray it one more time... still undecided about spraying again in epoxy primer because a urethane primer is next before the base color. Either way, I'm getting super close to color.