'98 SC Riv

Thanks, Aaron. I'll see where the alignment leaves me as far as drive-ability and I'll go from there.

Anyway, here are some new pics. Nothing special. Sorry for the so-so quality. I'll take some better ones later. I painted the seat control covers black here:


Painted the center console shifter trim gloss black with some clear:


Finally, I used black duct tape to cover the hole in my bumper and matched the other side up. I think that for $3.00 and about 30 minutes of filling in the hole with foam and lining the tape up, it came out okay. Will get better pics later:

Thanks to the suggestion of matt270avian, thought I'd do something a little different to see how it'd come out.

So, this:



Plus this





Equals this







The final product is 5 coats of black Plasti Dip as the base, with four coats of Silver Metalizer on top. I still don't think it's shiny enough  and I'm still not totally sure I dig it but I'll leave it on for a few days to see if it grows on me! Plus, it can be peeled off at a whim.

Anywho, before doing anything to the rockers, I wanted to see how the Plasti Dip worked on something I didn't really need, so I decided to Dip the engine/SC cover thingy, which I hadn't used in a year or two. Here's how it looked:



Here's how it looks now after several days of drying. I think I just might keep it on there from now on & might paint the text green:





And here are some more pics of the rocker panel final product and the in-between stages:



You can see it peeled a tad on the top where the Dip met the painters tape, but only on the front plastic (phew)! The Dip adhered to the tape and peeled along with it, so for most of the car, I had to go around with an X-Acto knife and separate the two from one another:



One coat of Metalizer over 5 coats of black:



Two coats of Metalizer over 5 coats of black:



Anyway... comments? Criticisms? Threats?  Next up, I'll probably either fix my front bumper hole up and re-tint the orange turn signal lenses; or re-tint the main brake light lens... 69GSColorado's mirror-finish brake light gave me a kick in the ass!
Rock on!

Great job, Zach. Rocker moulding looks brand new! I'm interested in seeing how well the plasti-dip holds up over time. Might do my own if yours is looking good after a year or so!

The car looks beautiful. Wow!

Wooo I did something. Anyways, for any future attempts you're supposed to peel the tape up after every 2 coats. It's a pain, I know, but it's how you get the best and most durable finish. How come you went with black instead of gray? I personally prefer the rocker panels to be the same color as the car, but that's just me. And does that metalizer really make it shine?

AA wrote:

Great job, Zach. Rocker moulding looks brand new! I'm interested in seeing how well the plasti-dip holds up over time. Might do my own if yours is looking good after a year or so!

Thanks Aaron! I was just sick of having to polish the plastic after it rained / after washing the car constantly. I'll let you know how it holds up. It might not stay on there too long if I decide I don't like it and peel it, lol, but we'll see.

robotennis61 wrote:

The car looks beautiful. Wow!

Thanks robo!

matt270avian wrote:

Wooo I did something. Anyways, for any future attempts you're supposed to peel the tape up after every 2 coats. It's a pain, I know, but it's how you get the best and most durable finish. How come you went with black instead of gray? I personally prefer the rocker panels to be the same color as the car, but that's just me. And does that metalizer really make it shine?

Lol thx matt. Let us know if/when you do the whole car! I looked at some different sources for how to unmask and I got everything from "pull the tape up right after you're done spraying a final heavier coat" to "tape up a few cm higher than where you want the actual line to be & then peel or cut"... I went with the former & it didn't work out but hey, live & learn! Oh and I went with black b/c I saw that black base plus silver Metalizer gives more of a gunmetal sort of finish. Gray base and Metalizer might have turned out lighter than what's on there now and I think what's there now is dark enough for me. I'll definitely get them painted down the road... literally and figuratively, but just wanted to try this stuff out now. Tough to tell from the pics, but the metalizer makes it POP and gives it a ton of metal flake! It's different from normal Plasti Dip... it's basically a bunch of glitter in a can lol - I'll see if I can get a vid of it to show how it looks in different angles

Great...

It was time. I figured after about a year of having shitty black duct tape covering a hole in my bumper that resulted from a van hitch magically getting lodged in there (oh yes... it was magic, but not in the good way...  ), I would man up and have the thing fixed. Also took the opportunity to re-tint my turn signal lenses because I had done a pretty bad job tinting them before. Here are some pics!

"Before" pic of the bumper. You can even see the turn signals are totally different colors... it's not just the shadows that make them look like this!


With the bumper skin off... this piece of foam actually just toppled out when we took the bumper skin off.


With the duct tape and the plasti dip I sprayed on there a few weeks ago. Ghetto black stripes  :


Eh? Eh??? All patched up  


After:


On the car! The plastic trim at the bottom was painted to match.


Turn signals came out just how I wanted them... super glossy. You can see my lovely arm in this pic like a mirror. A bit of orange peel, but not a big deal.


Pops helping out with the wheel well trim. He had the magic touch with that stuff... it definitely takes some finesse to take on and off




She also recently received a new shift knob (ghpcnm inspired  )


Also recently installed this... a Kenwood Excelon KDC-X997. I got it because of the EQ (and the billions of other features)!


Thanks for looking! Live on and Riv on!

Looks good. I like it all except the shift nob. Imo I think it would look better in black, but if you're happy with it that's all that matters. Good job on the repair though, could never tell anything happened. I should send you my bumpers for a good touch up/respray.

what did you use to do rhe repair? looks great

Looks Great Zach!

Well, I would love to say that I painted and patched the thing myself but alas, I only took it off, put it back on and de-tinted then re-tinted the turn signals  The good news is I saved a lot of money by switching to...... a different painter (the guy who has painted stuff for me in the past wanted 2x as much as the guy I went with, who did an awesome job)! And now that the front bumper's rocker plastic has been painted, I guess the rest of the plastic has to be done @ some point.  

I followed this thread's walkthrough to tint the lights if it helps anyone else: http://clubsciontc.com/forums/diy-install-guides-23/diy-tail-light-tints-19942/

matt270avian wrote:

Looks good. I like it all except the shift nob. Imo I think it would look better in black, but if you're happy with it that's all that matters. Good job on the repair though, could never tell anything happened. I should send you my bumpers for a good touch up/respray.

Yeah you either love or hate that shift knob style... I'm actually thinking about replacing it already lol. It's just not the right feel for me (especially when it's 90-100 degrees out and the metal nearly boils flesh)

99Rivman wrote:

Looks Great Zach!

Thank you Randall!

Dude, yes. Gorgeous Riv. Not to sound creepy but I have been sitting alone here on my computer just looking it over page by page. Mmmm. That's the good stuff

llamalor2112 wrote:

Dude, yes. Gorgeous Riv. Not to sound creepy but I have been sitting alone here on my computer just looking it over page by page. Mmmm. That's the good stuff

 Rofl dude what a creeper... j/k that made my day lol thanks! She's come a long way from Page 1. Her Indian name is "Never Ending Project."

Gorgeous car, Zach. Great work and BTW... I like that shifter  

ghpcnm wrote:

Gorgeous car, Zach. Great work and BTW... I like that shifter   

Thanks Dave! I actually just found out that the shifter you and I both have comes in black too. I think I'll be switching the current one out for that  

"never ending project" thats fukin funny!

Okay guys... last update for a while. I had taken my driver side mirror glass off in order to try to tighten the housing to the stalk because the mirror shakes pretty badly when at an idle. Everything in the housing was tightened, but the shaking continued, so I just decided to put the glass back on and give up (in hindsight, the electronic attachment assembly in the housing should have been taken out to get to a big bolt that is probably the source of the problem). Within 1-2 days of putting the glass back on, it turned a lovely gold color:



I would have liked that gold mirror if my Riv had gold emblems like some Rivs do but alas, you couldn't see shit out of it. So it was replaced with just heated, non-electrochromic glass bought from joshuadalegrimes on here. You may notice that the old glass had a sort of bezel around its rim while the new glass has no real bezel. It's just flat:



Also replaced a tire that had been on the car since 2004. It still had a little less than half the tread left but was causing vibration from 60-72 mph, so it had to get gone. The shop I went to to have the tire replaced only had whitewall versions of the tire so I just had them mount it backwards lol:

i never paid attention to that! i just looked at some of the others i have. some are some aint bezeled wonder why? how ya like it btw?

For ref, my autodim drivers side has the bezel while my passenger side regular does not. Had questioned it in the past myself

Yeah Evan same here... honestly I actually just noticed that lol

Josh you are a lifesaver it's like a night & day difference  

havent listed the pass side one yet if ya want it. also on those side lenses im gonna resand and clear them before i take pics. i just wasnt happy with how they came out the first time and if i aint happy i know you wont be!

They look great!!!