My sons car

[Flatie46]

Thought I'd post some pics of my sons car while I was trying to get the hang of it. It's a 52 cranbrook. It's rough but he bought it himself with his own money at the age of 16 so I was proud of that.

[55 Fargo]

Hey Flatie 46, That is a cool car too, bet your proud of that Boy, I would be too.

Here's what I did with my old Chrysler, with some bodywork, just the rough work, stripped her down, some to bare steel, some to OEM finish, did somemetal work, some filler, then primered with Canadian Rustoleum rusty metal primer, it is marketed up here under Rustoleum as Tremclad.

On the advice of Tim Adams, I reduced the primer with medium speed automotive acrylic enamel reducer, Dupont brand.

This was sprayed onto the car, 3 coats, with a flashtime, between coats.

It turned out great, drove the car like this for a while, then did all finishing body work ontop of this. I used 2k urethane primer/surfacer over it, no issues, then painted the car,no issues to date.

Here is a pic of my car, before, and after primer, very low budget, and very good quality results IMHO...........Fred

PS I sprayed this on with a cheap gravity flow HVLP gun, and a 30 gallon Sears compressor, you could also roll it on with small 4 inch sponge rollers if youhad too, and it would be fine, this primer seals much better than lacquer based primer.

Edited April 11, 2010 by Rockwood

[Flatie46]

This car was mine for a while. A friend asked about it a few times and I didn't want to sell it. He was going to AA and trying to quit drinking. So I gave it to him, I thought it would keep him busy and maybe help. He put brakes on it and lowered it. My son, who I didn't think would be interested it let me know that he had wanted it. I told him it's gone and not to even ask the man about it. One day my friend tells me he may let it go. So I told my son to go talk to him, they struck a deal and it's back at the house.

[maurice wade]

Sounds like the car has a good background of memories. Have fun. M

[Flatie46]

Looks good Rockwood thanks for the tip, I like the before and after shots. . I've used the rustolium in the past and if you preped it good the rust didn't come back. I never thought of spraying it like that, I'll sure keep it in mind. I've always used it in the spray can. A quality product for sure, I always buy the one for heavily rusted metal. I wonder what the difference is between it and the regular. I bet the regular is not a sealer primer

[JerseyHarold]

The car has a lot of potential. It's good to hear your son took an interest in it...my 16-y.o. wants to work on our '51 business coupe with me this summer.

Are you sure it's a Cranbrook? It has the rubber windshield molding and no horn ring (from what I can tell in the photo) so it may be a Cambridge.

[Flatie46]

The car has a lot of potential. It's good to hear your son took an interest in it...my 16-y.o. wants to work on our '51 business coupe with me this summer.

Are you sure it's a Cranbrook? It has the rubber windshield molding and no horn ring (from what I can tell in the photo) so it may be a Cambridge.

It may be a Cambridge all the stuff, chrome etc that had the name on it I haven't got back yet. I don't know much about this model, which one was high end? This car is just heater and key. lol

[JerseyHarold]

The Cambridge was the less expensive model and the Cranbrook was the better one. The Cambridge came with plain gray cloth door panels with burgundy vinyl at the bottom. The Cranbrook came with two-tone door panels separated by a shiny plastic strip. The top part had stripes and the bottom part was solid-color vinyl with embossed lines to make a box design. I've seen the door panels in blue, gray, and green depending on the outside color of the car. Another thing that shows it's a Cranbrook is the courtesy light switch on the upper hinge of the right front door. It's actually a modified hinge screw with a pin-switch in the middle of it.

After all this rambling, I remembered the sure-fire way to tell what model it is: Look on the firewall for the body number tag. If the number begins with a 100, you've got a Cambridge. If it's 105 you've got a Cranbrook. The VIN on the driver's door hinge post also has a different sequence depending on the model.

I've had a bunch of these cars and like them a lot. Hope this helps.

Harold

[mackster]

sure is nice to hear your son has good taste in cars at the tender age of 16...kids around here drive around on asian cars that sound like a lawnmower brething thru a soda can! when I was 17 I could only afford a vw bug. but I am glad your son has a better start in cars! I like the lowered look. how was this achieved? blocks on back and cut springs?????

[Flatie46]

He's always liked old cars even some off the wall stuff that I give him a hard time about[ AMC Gremlin:rolleyes:}. He's 17 now, he's had the car about 6months. This car even though it was a parts car, his papaw had owned it and drove it a few times. They were really close so thats alotta why he wanted it so bad. The springs were heated in the front and the rear was lowered by blocks. Gonna take the blocks back out and cut an inch off, it's just too low. The muffler drags pretty bad. I think a smithy will work better and not drag as much, they're thinner and will tuck under better. You may not believe this and some wont but this car drives really good lowered. If it didn't drag the muffler from time to time you wouldn't know it.