July 5th.....Woke on my own at 2:30am, thought "ridiculous, and that's what I get for going to bed too early.
Whoa there....It's clear coat day. Hit it."
I took my time getting ready with a small meal etc, I definitely took a few minutes to get psyched up for the job, and was out in the home shop at 4:00am. It was already ridiculously humid.
Again.
Insert F bomb.

After the base, clearcoat was much more fun with only a few exceptions.

Though I'd painted the GTX 31 years ago, my last paint job was my C body Polara, 17 years ago. My #1 biggest error on the Polara was being in a rush and taking instructions too literally. Not only did I wait the minimum time between base and clear, but
because of the horrible "spray it how you want it to look" instructions given, I laid the first coat of clear down way too wet, ran it, and "pulled" the metallics out of position. This was a major disappointment 17 years ago.
I still have the car, I like it, and it is a reminder of that particular failure.

"Every vehicle is a test vehicle, every day is a school day" are words I live by as a gearhead.

I was determined not to repeat that error on the GTX and the new strategy was successful.
I laid the first coat down a little on the dry side to lock down the metallics. The second coat went on very wet and the car looked fantastic at that point.

I really could have stopped there/production is 2 coats and works fine, but......this isn't production.
All along I had planned on adding plenty of extra material to work with for correction.
Initial plan was 3 coats, then decide whether to either flow coat later, or lay down more material.

After the third coat I decided I did not want to flow coat, and decided I would lay on more material and work with that instead.

Not surprisingly the more coats I added, the more errors and insects stacked up on me.

Insects were picked out with tweezers midstream during and after every coat, but I couldn't get them all, there are a couple that will be embedded there, or be sanded out later. On the fourth coat I created a few runs and sags. I'd previously deliberately ran it on test panels and knew how easy the product was to work with, so it was really not a worry and I didn't care too much as long as the metallics were still locked down, which they were.. I went over those areas with a little extra material to sand off later/ "repair coat" so to speak, and gave a short flash time. Near the end of the 5th coat I found one group of ugly drips low on the body that was still moving, I sat there and added a little material at a time until it ran completely off the panel on to the floor masking.....now it looks like glass, except for a small, easier to work with sag.

I neither demanded nor achieved perfection, but I did exceed the target of "really good".

I make it sound terrible don't I?
This is why I didn't want to say anything at first. Because the critic in me is dead wrong.
NGL: The car is stunning!
If it was someone else's project, I would be super impressed.
The color alone has more class than I do LOL.

The more chrome, stainless, and black is added to it, the more amazing it's gonna look.
It's going to take some effort to get there but we will make it. I'm stoked!

A4 silver is not an easy color to spray, especially in high humidity.......It really takes a ton of skill to make it look right....but when you do, it looks incredible.

The best is yet to come

If you took the time to read any of this, thanks for sticking with me.