The GMMG Registry Forum

Copy of the article.

Thanks for posting the article ! ! ! ! !



When my roof was done on my ZL-1, Matt Murphy told the dealership to PAINT the roof first before installation rather than painting it on the car after installation like is shown in this article (refer back to the first page of this thread and you'll see that my new hardtop roof was painted first prior to installation). Painting it and then installing it worked slick and that is what the dealership is going to do with my sail panel prior to installation on my Dale Earnhardt Intimidator SS. This same dealership also did a sail panel on a friend of mines car right after they did my hardtop and they did an excellent job with it as well. They painted his sail panel and then installed it just like they did with my hardtop. The dealership has my sail panel now from 6 liter eater designs and they are sanding and smoothing it up as they feel it was simply too rough and not uniform. They will be working on it over the next month or so whenever they're bored and shooting for an installation in April or May when the weather clears up here in the upper Midwest as I'm certainly in no hurry to get this done.

My body shop painted first and then put it on . . then no worries about over spray on the car . .



Granted with an after market part test fitting would be crucial before paint.



Fortunately I was able to acquire an OEM part before they became non existent.

Well finally at long last the process has begun. :text-lol:



The Chevrolet dealership body shop got my sail panel all sanded down and "true-d" up and have it primered. They will sand it again and apply another coat of primer and then it will be on to painting it and epoxying the underside of it before installation on my Intimidator SS.

I went out to the Chevrolet dealership body shop this afternoon to inspect my sail panel that will be installed on my 2001 Intimidator SS Camaro. I was extremely pleased. In fact, I'm afraid that the sail panel is going to look better than the rest of the car. The finish is as smooth as glass. The body shop guys who worked on it (Don and Dave) told me that they had around 4 hours of prep time into it before paint smoothing the waves out of it and filling pits, etc. They are planning on installing it on my Intimidator SS one week from today (Wednesday - May 29th, 2013)

Looks great

Well..................Intimidator SS #68 goes into the body shop this coming Wednesday (June 19th) to have the old sail panel removed and the new one installed.

Well...............as you all know.............my Intimidator SS "went under the knife" this past Wednesday (June 19th, 2013) to have the Sail Panel removed and a new one installed. Anyway............here are the pictures of the "surgery":



First..................Don Modlin (the body shop installer) covered the entire car in plastic to keep it as clean and dust free as possible.











Then Don cut the plastic to give him access to the Sail Panel and taped the plastic down on each side (again to keep the car as clean as possible underneath)











Then Don began the actual surgery.....................carefully cutting the old Sail Panel with a pneumatic tool with a cut off wheel.











After Don got a cut all the way around the Sail Panel.............he began "prying" it off of the metal supports underneath.











After he got the middle section of the Sail Panel removed...........here is what it looks like. Now it is time to start with the pneumatic knife.











But before he starts with the pneumatic knife..................he puts some wood strips down so that he doesn't accidently "gouge" the quarter panel with the pneumatic knife blade. :doh:











Now it's finally time to start cutting the adhesive underneath the Sail Panel with the pneumatic knife.



















































And now................ALL of the old Sail Panel has been removed. Now Don took a razor blade and scraped all of the old adhesive off of the metal supports (after I took these pictures).











Now.............it's time to "test fit" the new Sail Panel.







The metal underneath after Don had razor bladed all of the old adhesive off and prior to his laying down a new bead of adhesive.







The underneath side of the new Sail Panel. They had applied epoxy to the underneath side of the new Sail Panel and then painted it when they painted the Sail Panel to prevent the new adhesive from "outgassing" up through the new Sail Panel.











Prior to applying the new adhesive.............Don put a special primer over the old adhesive that was left after razor blading to seal it and prevent it hopefully from "outgassing" up through the new adhesive. Don layed down a new bead of adhesive and let it cure for a little bit and then installed the new Sail Panel.



Even having the car covered in plastic...................it still got very dusty underneath and I need to wash the car which I am planning on doing tomorrow morning (Sunday - June 23rd, 2013) so I will probably take some more pictures then.



IF you decide to do this procedure...............you will also need to get the Applique for each side which is the little metal triangle piece right behind the door window on each side. These are GM part number(s) 1024-0164 and 1024-0165 and it is called a "Applique - Qtr Upr".



******* IF any of you here decide to do this procedure...................I would HIGHLY recommend Bob Brown Chevrolet in Des Moines, Iowa to do this for you. They have done a half dozen or so of these now and Don Modln certainly knows how to do this and he takes his time and is very careful. Don Ellerman (the body shop manager) knows how anal I am and so does Don Modlin so they allowed me to stand out in the body shop the entire time and watch them perform this surgery on my "baby". David Boots painted this Sail Panel and he only works on Corvettes and Camaros at Bob Brown Chevrolet. YES, his painting is THAT GOOD ! ! ! !

Been there . . done that and YES mine came out just as good !

That goodness I Got a vert .....and some new pics would good too JD of the roof panel