J. Mike Rollins

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Photos: Camo Truck
photos taken during the process of painting my truck camouflage

September 5, 2004 Blue 1986 Ford Ranger, V6. A little rust is present, and some of the paint is coming off. There is also a dent in the fender and the bumper is twisted.
October 16, 2004 Photo taken at night. The passenger side fender and door have just been finished.
October 17, 2004 I was doing some sanding.
October 17, 2004 Thinking about what to do to the front.
October 17, 2004 Decided to sand and paint the front. Here it is all wrapped up in paper. That is a flagpole holding up the hood. The arm which holds up the hood had to come off with the fender. You can see the fender in the background.
October 18, 2004 There was a threat of rain today. So, no painting today. I decided to pull the bed off so I could sand and paint the parts between the bed and the cab.
October 18, 2004 A view from the back.
October 18, 2004 There are still parts in my bedroom waiting to go onto the truck. A door and a fender need primer sealer, and a piece of the front needs to be painted.
October 19, 2004 The humidity was very high today, and there was some rain. I took off the pinstriping and crome molding from the bed. I washed off the dirt and grease so it should be just about ready to sand in the morning. I did find a praying mantis on the frame of the truck. It was neat in that it was somewhat camouflaged where it sat. Click here for more photos of the praying mantis.
October 20-21, 2004 The humidity is very high today and possibly the rest of the week. So I guess there will be no work on the truck. I tried to do some priming yesterday, but the humidity was too high. I will probably have to sand that off and do it again. I hope I will have no new rust.
October 25, 2004 I was able to re-sand the back of the truck today. I did not see much new rust. I got the fender and the door back on. It is not easy getting the door lined up.
October 26, 2004 Finally! The bed of the truck is finally sanded and primed. I was also able to get a little paint on the back of the cab and the front of the bed. The driver side door needs a little more adjustment. After that, it is all down hill.
October 30, 2004 The pattern for the rest of the truck is now layed out in a rough draft. Here is the passenger side of the truck.
October 30, 2004 The driver's side is also sketched out. I will need to sand the black lines a little and put on another coat of black. Then I can tape out the lines. You can see the tailgate in the back, proped up beside the house. The tailgate will require some Bondo. I need to get the painting of the truck done first.
October 31, 2004 The 1/8 inch tape is in place.
October 31, 2004 The bed has been pulled back again so that I can continue the pattern on the edges of the bed and the cab.
November 1, 2004 I crashed on the couch last night; However, I woke up at 4:15 AM. So, I decided to mask out the brown spots on the truck. I worked about 3 hours on this. I was able to paint it during lunch.
November 1, 2004 I don't remember if it was just after 9:00 PM or 10:00 PM. Anyway, I masked off the sections for the Olive Drab. I finished about 1:30 AM.

November 6, 2004 I thought I was only three painting days until finished. But, I had a bad surprise waiting on me. I had masked off the areas for the Olive Drab on Monday night. It was supposed to be good painting weather on Tuesday. It rained all day. It rained on Wednesday. It rained on Thursday. I did not want to take the paper off since it took about four hours to put it on. I thought it would be all-right. After painting the green on Friday, I took the paper off and found that some of the paint came off with the tape and that there were bubbles in in some of the paint which had been covered with the newspaper.
I assume that the paint soaked up the water from the newspaper. I found that the little bubbles were full of water. I tried to sand down to the primer, but figured it would better to just redo it. So today, I sanded the driver's side of the bed down to the metal and added primer and primer sealer. I will plan to sand off the other side of the bed, most of the door and most of the front driver's fender.

November 7-8, 2004 Well, I am almost ready to paint. I was able to get the drivers side door and fender sanded, primed and the passenger bed side sanded and primed.
On Monday, I finished the rough draft of the outline. I still need to put tape on it. I was afraid to do it last night because there was a little moisture still on the truck from the cleaning. I guess I am a little more cautious after the last problem which set me back two weeks. I don't have a photo of the design for the passenger side yet.

November 9, 2004 The outline is done. Here is the driver's side.
November 9, 2004 Here is the passenger's side.

November 10, 2004
Was only able to do one side of the truck today. About, four painting days until done.

November 13, 2004
They were calling for the temperature to be about 50 today. Plus, there was supposed to be a lot of wind. However, it turned out to be good weather: Almost 60 degrees, low humidity (< 50%) and only a little wind. Just in case the weather did change, I only masked out one spot at a time. I worked mostly on the passenger side today.

November 14, 2004 The back is coming along too. I have three painting days left on the back. I thought I would have more time today, but the temperature was just not above 50 degrees for very long.
The front has made some progress, but there are still at least two painting days left for the front.

November 15, 2004 Today went very well! Five spots left on the drivers side to paint.
		For the passenger side, the cab is complete on the front. The back only has two remaining spots. None of the spots on either side share a border. So, this means that I could do all the panting in one day.

November 16, 2004 I'm done! There is still a little touch up, but the main stuff is done. I just washed the truck, so there is still a little water present in these photos.

November 17, 2004

I put the front back together.

November 21, 2004

The truck is now in the driveway.

The touch-up is mostly done. I always see additional things which I could do, but I need to stop somewhere. The clear-coat date is around the second week of December. Until then, I will probably do a little more touch-up and work mainly on the tailgate.

I will also work on the idea of fabricating a 4x6 for the front bumper.

December 13, 2004

The tailgate is done.

It was not easy, I had to tape over the letters with a plastic tape and cut out the letters with a razor blade.