Now this is where the Dodge looks like a Bluesmobile!
Did you ever take a freshly painted car and say, you know this turned out really nice, to nice in fact. Let’s shitty it up! I sure did.
Other than the actual markings, the next obvious detail is that the markings were worn, scratched, faded, rubbed off. Some scenes in the movie they were hardly noticeable, others they were more prominent. So I tried to find a happy medium.
As you can see in the above picture that the P1 on the door is really vivid. It was the same on the passenger side.
So I went to work on that and other areas of the cars to give it more of a faded look.
Besides the beat up markings, another notable feature of a Bluesmobile is that it is extremely filthy. I personally cannot drive a filthy car, there is something inside my brain that prevents me from doing so.
So I had to go to the next best thing, spray paint effects!
This took a little getting used to, but finally I think I got it. I stood approximately 18-20 inches from where I wanted to mist and sprayed, again depending on what I was trying to accomplish dictated how heavy or light I went. I used dark brown on the white, and light beige on the black to replicate how it would look in real life.
After drying I would scuff it in various directions to give the look of being rubbed up against.
There isn’t right or wrong way of doing this type of details, my advice would be to make it as random and natural as possible. I thought where were the areas that would get soiled the most, the least, what about the heavy use areas and went to town. If an area had too much build up of paint, ruining the illusion I knocked it down until it looked right.
Its really hard to explain, but you would know if by seeing it as you were doing it. If that makes sense.
As you can imagine, between the color sanding, wet sanding, spray painting, more scuffing, the Bluesmobile was pretty dull looking and not for the right reasons.
Remember in 1980 the Bluesmobile was a 6 year old car. Sure it was a cop car that was abused. It was dented, scuffed up, dirty, but it wasn’t dull. There would have been some shine on her underneath all of that dirt.
Now, I needed a solution that would bring back a certain amount of shine, while staying completely on the opposite end of show car finish.
One day on Amazon I came across a product sold Meguiars Performance DA System.
The buffer connects to any household drill, it comes with Rubbing Compound, Polish, and Wax and the polishing pads for each. They also throw in a few microfiber cloths for good measure.
I figured what the hell, let me give it a shot. Let me tell you I was impressed. I have only done the first stage, rubbing compound and was very happy with the level of shine that was brought back.
I thought after buffing with the rubbing compound that it brought the right level of ’70s single stage paint shine. After driving it around a couple of times though I am noticing that I should follow through with the other stages, more to come on that subject at a later date.
