First time opaning doors.(Pics inside) need advice/ help!

[Zeekodadi]

Ok guys so last night i couldn't sleep, after reading about opening doors here and there i decided to give it a shot. Unfortunately i mad a very simple mistake i used the sharp side of the blade and butchered one side, and its gona cost me at least couple hr maybe more. so this morning i did the other side the right way and used the the back side with light strokes. I think came out ok but the gap is small. so here are my questions

1. what do you guys thing about the gaps? because i know i still have couple cots of Tamiya primer, couple cots of paint and finally the clear cote.

2. should i add putty and sand them straight? (this is that im leaning towards ) or is there anything i can do?

This is the side that i butchered

This side came out ok. I think

Edited July 29, 2013 by Zeekodadi

[Ace-Garageguy]

Your gaps look good for a first-time effort, so don't feel bad. How tight you want to make them is up to you, but be sure to leave enough gap to compensate for the thickness of a little primer, paint and clear later on.

IF you want to tighten your gaps up, here are two methods I've come to rely on exclusively, and they ALWAYS work, but you have to be patient and go slowly.

METHOD 1) You can apply a little bead of gap-filling CA all around one side of the opening (either the door or the hole, which ever one seems to be worse off). Let it dry completely, or use an accelerator to kick it quicker. Then carefully fit the panel back into the opening, using files or emery boards to fit a little at a time. Keep your curves smooth and work slowly. Patience will reward you with a panel that fits perfectly.

METHOD 2) Strips of .010" thick styrene can be glued inside the worst areas of the opening with regular liquid plastic cement. Allow it to harden up completely, and then shape and file until you get a perfect fit, as above.

EXAMPLE: The decklid didn't fit very well, so I've added .010" strips as described above, to the sides and rear of the lid to tighten it up, filed to fit nice & clean...

It still needed a little more after primer showed up the flaws, so I added material as necessary...

Fit finished, square and tight lines all around...

I DON'T recommend either 2-part filler or 1-part filler for doing panel openings, as it just doesn't stick well enough to the thin edge you have to work with. One of the methods above WILL solve the problem though.

Edited July 29, 2013 by Ace-Garageguy

[Zeekodadi]

Thanks Bill for the big help, and also putting me at ease. Im defiantly going to try METHOD 2. Do you have to take off a little material then add the styrene? and how much gap would you say you need to have the door sit nice and flush once painted finished, or paint dosn't build up that much around the edges?

[Blown03SVT]

The edge would have the styrene strip aded and then file/ sanded fit to the opening.

[southpier]

paint never fixes things. do it the best you are able before, prime, and keep at it until you're satisfied.

and, you did pick a fairly complicated body to start with!

[ScaleDale]

I don't do opening doors but I did a removable front end on a Pro Stock Mustang and used the thin strip styrene thing to clean up the edges. One thing I did was to try it on a scrap body first to find what didn't work without wrecking a work in progress.

EDIT: That's one of the most complicated doors I've ever seen for cutting.

Dale

Edited July 29, 2013 by ScaleDale

[Jeremy Jon]

Looks like you're off to a good start!

For building up around the edges, you can use a modeling putty, but I really prefer to use an emery board - because of it's larger flat surface - and file the edges down "just" enough to lay a thin strip of styrene along it - until tight fit in opening - then fine tune it from there ...often it's nice to have that strip rise "just" above the surface, so that it can be sanded with body, and leave a nice sharp edge along the seam, avoiding need to build up the typical "rounding" that can occur around edges of panels/openings