May 12
What’s more frightening? The Lucas ignition module or the bare, twisted together wires leading to it. I think we’ll get this one in and out asap, while the shop is still standing.
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Reply to Hupp31…
Reply Replies (27)
· May 12
Saw a car the other day where the fan was just clipping the headlight wiring. Bare metal showing. Twisting those wires together like that was a crime.
· May 12
@BillSmith You mean like this?
· May 12
Bare wires like that let the smoke out. You used to be able to buy more smoke from Lucas to refill your system.
· May 12
@Chandler-Six
Every machine is a smoke machine if you use it wrong enough.
· May 13
@ShawnG Challenge accepted!
· May 12
Yeah, an XJS was never a safe bet in the best of circumstances but I see at least three red flags in that one photo.
· May 12
I get less problems from Lucas electrics than I do from previous owners "improvements".
· May 13
Electrical hacks are not just found in British cars. A lot of my buddies have a hard time with that side of the maintenance.
· May 21
@428CJ-1969
It's not a proper project car until you find the wire nuts used by the previous owner.
· May 20
The Jaguar hasn’t yet gone up in flames, so I guess I have no choice but to paint it. My paint company must not like British Racing Green because I come up with absolutely nothing for a formula on this car. Picked a chip that was close to it and even that had no formula. The old chips must have used a discontinued toner so it was back to the drawing board. I had to use the color match camera (which I hate) and that came up with some Rolls Royce color. Still needed to tint it to match by eye.
· May 20
@Hupp31 Imagine if it had metallic in it. Is there a piece of the car you could send out as a sample? I've had very good luck doing it that way.
· May 20
@alsancle There is a color lab to send samples in to but they would do the same thing I did. They shoot it with the camera, which looks at every formula available, finds the closest, then tries to adjust it better. It gets you in the ballpark but there’s no substitute for old school tinting by eye. Sometimes there’s just not a correct option in existence and you have to make your own color. The trouble with this specific color is that whatever toner was used to get the right look is discontinued
· May 20
@alsancle The worst metallic color tinting job that I’ve ever done was last year on a light blue metallic Chevelle hood. The car had been painted with who knows what 25 years ago and the guy was insistent on painting only the hood and not blending. Basically impossible to get a perfect match on a light metallic color without blending. I had quite a few hours tinting and doing sprayouts before I came up with something acceptable.
· May 21
Well, this is one of those cases where you can’t save the world but you can leave it better than you found it.
· May 22
@Hupp31 Nice!!!
· May 22
@Hupp31 Beautiful work!
· May 22
@Rambler0155 Thanks. That one doesn’t look quite so good in person because the paint on the entire car is showing its age. Not a lot you can do when you have to stay in one panel and have to clearcoat over areas of checked or acid rain damaged paint. The joys of doing insurance work. Like I say, sometimes all you can do is make it better than it was.
· May 23
She went home today. Still a decent looking 20-footer.
· May 23
@Hupp31 Nice work Travis!
· May 23
@Hupp31 Looks like a perfect color match
· May 23
@alsancle Thanks. I may be doing some more work on the drivers fender and door in the fall or next year. The owner was tapped out for now because he just got a quote of $3800 to put a top on it. Always something with these things.
· May 23
@tom1980 It’s close anyhow. I had a whole 4” of blend room on either side of the repair and I used every bit of it. Fortunately, you don’t need a ton of blend area to trick the eye with a solid color.
· May 23
@Hupp31 Metalics never seem to match no mater what you do.
· May 23
@alsancle Sometimes you have to get creative with the blends on a metallic and lose the color in body contours or around corners etc. Losing the blend in the middle of a big slab-sided truck or something without a lot of contours can be tough if the color isn’t very close. In rare extreme cases, you have to spray the entire side of the car and lose it on the corners. A wise man once told me, “You can’t look at both sides of the car at the same time”.
· May 23
@Hupp31 😂
· May 23
@Hupp31 Looks great!
· May 23
Nice job on the paint in a classic Jag color. My wife always liked these and I told her we could get one as soon as they made a stick available. That never happened.