Hi,
First off - take care of the stuff than needs taking care of.
Regarding your crank - if the thrust face of the crank needs to be
resurfaced, throw the crank away. Welding the crank up and then re-facing
the thrust face is false economy unless you have something really special
(like a race crank that's had all sorts of work done on it) and even then,
simple economics should dictate to replace the crank _assuming that the
crank thrust face is bad to start with_.
On most of the motors I've taken apart, the thrust faces are fine after
(in some cases) over 100k miles. Plus, the only one that usually takes a
beating is the rear one because that's the one that takes the load when
push the clutch in.
But if the thrust washers are intact and in place, just replace them. A
"good" mechanic can do this job with the motor in the car by just dropping
the pan and the rear main bearing cap. It's a two hour job, tops.
I think your mechanic "smells money", or something like that. He may be
well intended, but $2k is a tad over the top.
Along those lines, presuming that your crank is bad, a new crank can be
obtained for cheap money (used is actually better, but I digress) and
installed for the cost of yanking the motor and replacing the bottom end
bearings (you might as well do this while you're in there). But the cost
should be in the $1500 to $2000 range including parts (and possibly some
machining).
As far as the paint goes, using modern materials you simply cannot do a
driveway paint job like you used to. The paint and solvents now are very
toxic if used improperly can lead to nasty side-effects. For example, the
hardner for most Acrylic Urethanes contains MEK which is a known cancer
agent. Yes, you can spray the car, but without a booth you'll get dirt and
crap in the finish and then you have to deal with the bugs (and other
critters).
I speak from experience, without a garage or paint booth access, it's not
worth the aggrivation to shoot a car in your driveway.
That said, check with your local voc-tech school. You can either have them
work the body and then shoot it or you can sign up for a night-school
class on auto body repair (and/or painting). The key - you get access to a
booth. If you have the school do the work, don't expect the car back for a
considerable amount of time. They're learning and it takes time.
And that's the key to body work - it takes a lot of time.
'Nuff said for now,
rml
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