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Date:         Sun, 21 Apr 2013 18:56:42 -0700
Reply-To:     Stuart MacMillan <stuartmacm@GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Stuart MacMillan <stuartmacm@GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Re: Painting tip--leave your window rubber in place and still get
              a              perfect job
Comments: To: Jim Felder <jim.felder@GMAIL.COM>
In-Reply-To:  <CAFnDXk1mmYj2+f0pwKZ8wQcNeGAMtu+PLQUzkY-YgUoOA=K0=Q@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

I've done this many times with 14 gauge solid electrical wire, but that's a lot more expensive!

Stuart

-----Original Message----- From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of Jim Felder Sent: Sunday, April 21, 2013 3:47 PM To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM Subject: Painting tip--leave your window rubber in place and still get a perfect job

Most of what I have learned about painting cars came from the Internet. Most of that came from Ben Huot when he was into painting and working on Vanagons. He passed along a very handy tip that I had occasion to try out this weekend.

If you want to paint your Vanagon, but don't want to pull and replace otherwise good window rubber, especially on the passenger side which requires either pulling the overhead and closet cabinets or some luck and and some pretty fancy rubber wrangling--not to mention the time and expense--then do what Ben suggests.

To get a perfect job with the window seals in place, buy a hank of para-cord. Take an upholstery panel tool or other non-marring spatula-type thing that is sufficiently strong and get it under the edge of the window rubber. Lift the rubber. With the other hand, go along laying in the cord into the gap between the body and the lip of the rubber as the plastic blade passes in front of it. This goes fast than you think; five or ten minutes per window.

The cord can now be adjusted to turn the outer edge of rubber into the air about 1/8 inch or so from the body by pushing it in or using a pick to pull it out as needed. Now you can wrap the entire edge of the rubber with tape, and you have enough room under the taped rubber edge to shoot primer and paint and of course sand (the rest of the window gets masked as normal, obviously). When the paint has cured overnight, unmask the windows, pulling out the outer edge tape as you pull out the paracord.

The rubber will drop right down into place as is was before, with no paint on the window rubber and no cleanup to do.

Jim


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