Car restoration projects are like snowflakes. No two are alike. The car’s make, its age, its condition, and the restorer’s knowledge, skill level, and vision – all of these variables impact the project’s cost, workload, and timeline in (often unexpected) ways.
It should come as no surprise, then, that your blasting & coating shop needs some communication about the particulars of your vehicle in order to give you an accurate quote.
Here are a few things I need to know before quoting a car project:
Is the car body on a rotisserie?
To be clear: it doesn’t need to be. We prop car bodies up on sawhorses in the blast booth, and that works just fine. But if it’s coming to us mounted on a rotisserie, I’ll probably knock some money off of the quote for you. Just let me know ahead of time.
Is your frame C-channel or fully boxed?
We can blast it either way. If it’s a C-channel frame, we’ll use steel grit – it’s an efficient medium, and the shape of the frame makes it easy for us to blow out when we’re done.
If the frame is fully boxed, however, we’ll have to use crushed glass. While crushed glass is slower to remove rust and old coatings, it’s also a safer bet for any part we can’t fully blow out. You won’t have to worry about trapped grit rusting and ruining your new coating.
Are you bringing us a rolling car frame, or is everything fully disassembled?
Yes, we can help you either way…but the more you disassemble, the happier we’ll be. A fully-stripped car frame is much easier to blast, and allows for the possibility of powder coating (if that’s what you want). If the wheels and suspension system are still attached, however, we’ll have a harder time blasting, and powder coating is off the table.
How much work do you want done?
It’s important to clarify that Kaser Blasting & Coatings is not an auto body shop. We’re in the business of corrosion removal and mitigation. We encounter cars in the early stages of restoration – we take your old, rusty, flaking car parts, and turn them into blank canvases for you (and your body shop) to play with however you’d like.
The more work you put into disassembly, the more thorough we can be with blasting, powder coating, and/or applying liquid epoxy primer. Our goal is to lay a solid foundation for your restoration project.
