Date: Thu, 27 Apr 2006 09:05:05 -0500
Reply-To: John Rodgers <inua@CHARTER.NET>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: John Rodgers <inua@CHARTER.NET>
Subject: Re: Foam Roller paint your Vanagon with tremclad/rustoleum
In-Reply-To: <017901c669ce$8c3b16e0$c4a05341@workshop32>
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What a very interesting story! I would like to have seen that
carriage.From your description is must have really been a thing of
beauty. Can't help wondering about all those ground up pumas, though.
That must be what brought about the decline of the big cats in the West!
;-)
Regards,
John Rodgers
88 GL Driver
Raceingcajun wrote:
> This tread brings to mind something I saw on a trip I took years ago
> with the family to a West Texas "Old Wild West". Yes we took the Family
> Truckster, you think you hate it now, wait til you drive it!
> The town was set up and operated the way it would have 150 years ago.
> All the local crafts were done by hand, such as the candle maker,
> blacksmith, saddle making, leather goods, wooden furniture, gunsmith and so
> on.
> Then there was the Carriage shop. When we passed through the "Craftsman"
> was in the process of painting a new Carriage. Everything was done in the
> ordinal fashion. He didn't even have the luxury of a paint brush to work
> with. He made his own paint from a mixture of oil, charcoal, turpentine, and
> other items. Instead of a brush, he used a piece of cloth to spread the
> paint on in several coats. After each coat was dry, he would "sand" out what
> we would call brush marks and apply another coat. What he used for "sand
> paper" was a mixture of linseed oil and ground up pumas, rubbed on with
> another cloth. He kept doing this layer after layer, (about 20 coats he
> said) until there was a smooth build up of paint that fully covered the
> wood. He then started the polishing process in much the same way, using
> bee's wax, and oil as a base to again make a build up. He told us the paint
> job took 3 months start to finish, with drying times. So painting a Vanagon
> (Vanagon content) with a roller should be a snap what with all the modern
> conveniences, like sand paper, rubbing compounds, etc! ;-) By the way, he
> said this where the term "Hand rubbed paint job" came from.
> There was a finished buggy in the store front. The black, (with red
> leather seats) finish would have rivaled any modern base coat/clear coat
> paint job. Super shine a foot deep, with inlayed pearl scroll work, and pin
> stripes in gold leaf, a real master piece! It came with all the modern
> accessories of the day, a iron weight with strap for tie downs, a leather
> feed bag that fit over the horses head, also a bag with scoop hanging on the
> rear.........for the horse droppings! Must have been an EPA requirement.
> Price Tag, $25,000.00! The price 150 years ago, .....................
> $75.00, a ton back then! He said a store clerk would earn about $3.00 to
> $5.00 a week, and some of that would have been barter.
> We just don't know how good we got it. Why when I was a kid I had to
> walk 40 miles one way through the snow to school each day, and it was up
> hill both ways. ;^0
>
> Have a good one!
>
> Howard
>
> Subject: Re: Foam Roller paint your Vanagon with tremclad/rustoleum
>
>
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