Re: [AMC-list] paint job

["Eddie Stakes" <eddiestakes@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Figured some of the badassgramlin people would like to chime in on paint jobs....back in
the Reagan administraion 1980s, my old 68 AMX was being done at a shop over off T. C.
Jester and Loop 610 here in Houston.

http://www.planethoustonamx.com/Photo_Gallery_AMX/thereddeath-restoration1986.jpg

These guys, a bunch of Nicarguans, did excellent work and came highly recommended by a
number of old car people whose restorations usually ended up winning something or another
at shows like Best Paint at AutoRama ISCA at Astrodome. So they knew their stuff. The
problem was, you never knew when la migra would move in. There was no such thing as ICE
back then, only 'Immigration' or as we joke about it in the bar/restaurant business "La
Migra".

I went over to that shop one day, used to go there maybe once a month, but went there one
day to check out the old Red Death only to find big Federal padlock on gates and sign
saying that the whole shop had been seized by authorities. You could still see the Red
Death back therre with many other cars. So after work at Dirty's one night old friend
Randy Helm (who passed away a year ago) and me decided to liberate my AMX. The lock was
easy, the dogs easier, and pushed out the car at 3:00am into street, hokked up battery,
poured in some gas and it fired right up. There was no glass in car, headlights,
tailights, and one 1/4 and part of sill panel had been cut off. Before I pushed it out I
had gathered all the parts I saw were mine off the car outside and on shaelves out there
and tossed them in car. I left behind stuff that was in the locked building though. I
drove the car home, no lights, down I-10 with Randy behind me in my Hornet, emergency
flashers going; I had my tshirt pulled up over nose & mouth as the bondo dust was flying.
It was so thick it looked like the car was on fire, big cloud of smoke, Randy laughing all
the way, but hoping Houston's finest would not pull us both over at 3:00am, as they are
usuall yout thick that time of morning after bars close.

I drove the car home about 14 miles without incident. I never went back to get grille,
extensions, emblems and others items, and not sure what happened to the 10 guys who worked
there or the fellow who owned the place. In 1980s dollars the stuff left behind was
probably about $300 worth, in 2010 dollars over $1000 of stuff. But I was not going to
forfeit my car due to whatever the owner(s) may/may not have been doing legal or illegal.
I ended up getting it finished off at another place here in Houston,

http://www.planethoustonamx.com/Photo_Gallery_My/mycars11.jpg

and the rest is
history, enjoyed it for 170,000 daily driven miles.

Bottom line is even with research, word of mouth, recommendations from other old car
people, or fellow AMCers, you never know with a paint and body shop. I never asked them,
nor I guess should have, their legal status in this country. I was going by what I saw on
other old car owners paint and body work, and the excellent work this shop did spoke for
itself. Sort of don't ask, don't smell primer policy.
Eddie Stakes
713.464.8825
eddiestakes@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
www.planethoustonamx.com

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Eddie Stakes" <eddiestakes@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <amc-list@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, March 05, 2010 8:37 AM
Subject: re: paint job


Russ sez:
"One last thing, then I'm going to bed. Take all the hard to find stuff, such as that
primo AMX bumper or spotless '64 Ambassador mirrors, and keep it home. These shops
sometime employ maskers or sanders who follow Ebay and they know what a 70 AMX grill is
worth. It's easier to just keep it home than to fight with the shop after the part is
lost. When I drove my AMX to the shop, I have had about a dozen cars painted at this shop,
I kept just enough on the car to make it safe and legal. I spent 10 minutes in the lot
taking off the remainder and it went in my chase car. Then I took pictures of the car,
with the morning paper sitting on the hood, before turning it over. I trust the shop, but
I'm just sayin'......Russ"
I sez:
Great advise Russ, no matter how reputable, or even the shop might be, sometimes stuff
happens, whether items get lost, stolen, mis placed, ect. A guy who was having his 74 AMX
rotisseried down here in Houston in Sugarland would be good example. The shop does second
to none work and the AMX was probably the low end car they were going thru, Lotus, a
Pantera, 50's Jag, but they do excellent work. However, some of the items on the 74 AMX
got accidentally tossed in the outgoing pile; that is the pile in back where old
fiberglass, broken plastic, rusty fenders, and what have you, goes to be recycled. So they
ended up buying replacement items from me. The fellow felt bad that it happened, but
readily admitted it was a simple mistake one of his workers put good stuff in bad pile.
And then gone forever.
Eddie Stakes
713.464.8825
eddiestakes@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
www.planethoustonamx.com

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