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Hi All: Its time to repaint my 1971 CS
What am I getting myself into?
Background:
I bought the car in 2011, with 18,500 original miles, from the original family.
Saturn-Gold, White vinal top, 350/4bbl, AC
The car had not been actively used since 1976, the car was 99% original.
In 2011, I did a Refresh of a bunch of stuff, still trying to keep as original as possible.
I still have the original Delco asbestos brake shoes.
I drive the car 2-4k miles per year to dozens of car shows around New England.
I have never see another CS with the same Saturn Gold color.
The car has been very reliable.
People will often ask me, is it for Sale. I say yes, $50,000!
Paint:
The Hood may have been repainted in 1976. The rest of the paint is original.
From a distance the car looks great.
Up-close, you can see its time.
The front fender bottoms are rusting.
The Rear window base is rusting, Inside and out. All of those carwashes have caught up the rain gutter design flaw for the hardtops.
The rest of the car is Rust free. You can even see the original Red Primer on the under body.
Goals:
Try to keep the original Canopy vinal roof.
Repaint the whole body.
Fix the rust.
Keep the Original color Saturn Gold.
The trouble spot will be the rear window, which includes the First-year Rear-Window Grid Defogger [It still works].
To reduce the cost of the Repaint, I told the shop, that I will remove all of the trim and keep it at my house, with the parts carefully inventoried, tagged and bagged for later reinstallation.
I assume the shop may not be as gentle with the trim parts.
I will Post more pictures soon.
Last edited by Miles71; November 13th, 2020 at 11:32 AM.
An Interesting discovery. My Side marker lights on the Driver side are Chromed.
The marker lights on the Passengers side are NOT chromed.
In the picture below, I had already cleaned both fronts and Silver-painted the PS side which did not have any chrome plating.
If your car did not come with the side trim panels then you would get the Chromed side markers.
If you did get the side trim panels you got the Un-chromed lights.
Hi Speed, I decided to put all of the chrome trim back on to keep the original look.
I am even going to keep the Miss / Matched side markers as an obscure talking point.
For some reason, the Framingham factory, ran-out of Non-Chrome parts and switched to chrome for the cars with the Side Chrome strip.
I friend of mine also noticed the same thing on his Cutlass. One side Chrome and the other side Non chrome side markers.
I finally got the trip off.
condition of roof is good.
Making progress. Chrome trim is in good shape. Need to buy a few replacement plastic clips.
if you dontknow there is a pretty common gm trim removal tool. Ive never used it and i dont know if it works on the vinyl top trim but i do know its used on the windshield trim.
also the trim on the rain gutter is super easy to remove w a can opener. It sounds dangerous but works super slick, some wrap electrical tape around the can opener to prevent scratches but i removed the gutter trim on my supreme w no issues just useing the can opener.
If your car did not come with the side trim panels then you would get the Chromed side markers.
If you did get the side trim panels you got the Un-chromed lights.
Yeah, that's the difference between the Supreme trim and the S, 442, F85, etc trim.
if you dontknow there is a pretty common gm trim removal tool. Ive never used it and i dont know if it works on the vinyl top trim but i do know its used on the windshield trim.
also the trim on the rain gutter is super easy to remove w a can opener. It sounds dangerous but works super slick, some wrap electrical tape around the can opener to prevent scratches but i removed the gutter trim on my supreme w no issues just useing the can opener.
hope this helps
gl w the paint
dean
A can opener. I assume Not the pointer part to cut open old beer cans but the Rounded end for Bottle tops?
Sounds interesting, Ill look into int.
Thanks.
Making Progress on getting most of the external trim off.
This picture shows about 90% of the outside trim removed.
Parts are labeled and bags of screws are also labeled.
Some parts will be painted, "Off the car", such as the Center shroud, eyebrows, etc.
I also ordered some new plastic parts to replace the old parts.
Each part going to shop to be painted has the year and model information written on the back side of the part.
Last edited by Miles71; November 23rd, 2020 at 08:54 AM.
This is an Odd chrome mount!
Yes, this is a factory mount.
It's a 10.73mm [screw head size] Phillips sheet metal screw.
It acts like a Button snap.
There is one on each side of the roof in the same location.
Since I am planning on repainting the Trunk. I "might as well" put on a rear spoiler.
I looked through all of my CS factory manuals.
There is NO information on where to drill the holes?
Does anyone have any pictures of the Inside of the trunk where the holes go or any drilling documentation?
The spoiler is on order and will not be here for a week. When I asked the sales guy about documents and mounting hardware he said he was NOT aware of any [supercarsunlimited.com].
You are not going to find any factory documents for the spoiler on a 70-72 Cutlass Supreme since they never left the factory with one. Same goes for Cutlass Supreme/442 convertibles.
Those dimensions are for a 70-71 Cutlass S/442 deck lid. They are shaped different then the Cutlass Supreme/convertible and as I stated above no Cutlass Supreme or convertible (including 442 convertibles) left the factory with a rear spoiler.
The S and Supreme trunk lids are very different shapes. The S lid is, uh, "flatter", so the wing can be pretty close to the back, but still look like it's aimed correctly. The Supreme lid has a longer swoop, so if you put the wing at the back, then the wing points to the sky. You have to move the wing pretty far forward to get it to look horizontal, but then it looks a little strange being so far forward.
Or modify the stands.
Hi OddBall, thank you for your comments.
All of my 8 Oldsmobile's have had the Cutlass-Supreme body.
I never owned a Cutlass-S body.
Based on your information, the placement of the Spoiler on a Cutlass Supreme may be in a different
location than on a Cutlass-S body.
I have been searching for Pictures of a Supreme with a spoiler and have found a few.
I am still planning on trying it. If I don't like ting, I can always sell it on eBay.
The ranger likes that first pic, its me mocking up the spoiler on my supreme! from mm maybe 8 yrs ago....
ill see if i can snap a current pic w the wing on the car. Ok maybe not what you imagined but it is on the car
obviously i never mounted it on the trunk
Last edited by RetroRanger; November 24th, 2020 at 09:59 AM.
you can see in the pic the pedestal curvature doesnt fit perfect on the trunk lid but its not far off.
IIRC when i took that pic i tried to locate the wing similar to the dimensions in a drawing that is similar to the one you posted.
I never put it on because i had a line on a decent used trunk lid that fell thru and my lid has zero rust so i didnt want to put holes in it in case i didnt like it.
Its funny i was just cleaning up the garage the other day and i set the wing there until i find a better place to put it.
November 13th, 2020, 06:09 AM
from mm maybe 8 yrs ago....
I have not see you in maybe 8 years. I found this picture when i googled 442 spoiler pictures. Did not know it was yours.
