Patrick, I just painted and mounted my original Fulton visor for my '47-2.
As you can imagine, I was VERY anxious about putting the two side pieces
together with the center section......and not scratching the paint. I found
that the best way to do this was to assemble the entire visor AS LOOSELY AS
POSSIBLE, then get someone to help you hold it up to the truck to check the
exact adjustments you need before tightening it and mounting it. I also
like your idea of putting some type of cloth over the side sections before
clamping down the middle section. I didn't do this, but I still didn't have
any scratches on the fresh paint (paint was one week old). However, it's
pretty good insurance. If your visor has assembly screws as short as mine,
you'll need VERY thin cloth. When I did my initial assembly, I found that
my best guess at putting all three pieces together was way off on the
adjustment. Thankfully, I didn't mar the paint when I had to move the side
pieces out about 3" each.
One other thing I did with my visor that might be helpful to anyone trying
to reconstruct one of the old Fulton visors. My visor had several small
dents in it. I was able to use a hammer and dolly to straighten most of
them out, but just to get a very smooth surface on the visor, I put on a
layer of body filler (bondo-type) on each side section. Sanded it smooth
and put on a self-etching primer....which is a must for aluminum. Followed
that with two coats of regular primer, then the paint. They turned out
great, and the body filler actually helped add some strength to the aluminum
visor side sections.
The center section of my visor had been painted by a PO, and when I stripped
it, I found that it was stainless steel....and pretty rough looking. Since
I wanted the stainless center section to show as bright stainless (ie, not
painted), I sanded it down with 180 grit paper until I got all the rough
places out. Then I sanded it with 380 grit, then 1000 grit. That got it
smooth enough to put on a buffing wheel. The buffing wheel in combination
with the right rouge made it look like new chrome. I couldn't be more
pleased with how the whole thing turned out. I had no idea you could sand
stainless to get the rough places out, but a friend who's in the hot rod
business showed me how to do it. Works great.
Sorry to be so long-winded here, but I just wanted you to know the steps I
went through. Let me know if I can provide more info. And best of luck
with your new visor!
Tom Caperton
47-2nd 3100....in Whiteville, NC
tcape@weblnk.net
----- Original Message -----
From: <237459N@knotes.kodak.com>
To: <oletrucks-digest@autox.team.net>
Sent: Monday, May 07, 2001 8:55 AM
Subject: [oletrucks] outside sunvisor
> From: W P. Fricke
>
> I recently had a sunvisor made based on the original design. Its currently
> "in the paint shop". The overall shape is pretty faithful. The brackets
> however are no where near as nice or authentic as the originals. At the
> same time, the place doing the painting acquired a '47 that came with a
> sunvisor. Two questions: 1)Is there a place that I might be able to pick
up
> more authentic brackets? 2)Because this is a 3 piece design, the left and
> right sides slide into the middle. How does one prevent the paint from
> being scratched? Should I consider some kind of small welt to slip over
the
> edges to prevent this? Have it painted as a unit?
>
> Patrick
> '53 3100
> oletrucks is devoted to Chevy and GM trucks built between 1941 and 1959
oletrucks is devoted to Chevy and GM trucks built between 1941 and 1959
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