W113: New Life Old Soul, Ch. 12 Cleaning

So the weather was cooperating and I can't stand doing bodywork while getting covered in 40 year old grime, I put the car on the ground on it's temporary bundt wheels and pushed it out into the alley for the junkmen to take.

The end.

In all seriousness, this car has 40 years of road grime and grease in the engine compartment and I can't stand sitting in it to do the body work I need to do. So I pushed the thing outside, sprayed down everything I could with degreaser and started agitating it the best I could without ruining my nice brushes. 

That got old really fast, so I pulled out the 4000psi pressure washer and had at it. I was hoping it could rip out as much of the undercoating and spray paint that was sprayed in the bay. It didn't get everything, but it sure saved me a lot of time. I sprayed down the rest of the car too in an attempt to get some of the dust that accumulated off of it to avoid scratching the paint.

It looks like a complete disaster in here. Rightfully so, because it IS a disaster. A lot of the original paint survived underneath the undercoat and paint, but with many heat cycles, it's been etched and just can't be brought back. I'll be leaving as much of the original paint as I can for the respray as it's adhesion to metal is better than anything right now.

You can see the little rusty spot on the right hand lower corner. That will have new metal and the battery tray mount will be reinforced and bend back properly. Now that the engine bay isn't greasy I can bring everything back into spec properly. This will be nice and pretty soon.