Vendor assembled body paint/ecoat caution

[skrit]

I recently purchased a new body from a very reputable vendor/builder. I'm very pleased with the body. That said however, for average DIY folks like myself, I found this could be a potential issue if you didn't know any better.

The parts they use have a very nice factory Ecoat. I don't think you can properly weld through ecoat so it gets sanded. Unfortunately, whatever they use to coat over the sanded and welded areas is not a good base. It is easily wiped off with lacquer thinner.

I had planned just to do a scuff job on the ecoat for primer, but now I have to get rid of the crappy paint used to cover the work they did.

Am I being overly critical? The price of these bodies is not cheap and I would have thought they'd use a quality paint over their sanding/ welding work.

The picture I provided is from simply wiping over the spot weld area with lacquer thinner. The factory ecoat is tough as nails and did not react.

 

[JB Fab]

Wow~! yours looks exceptional compared to the body we got a few years ago from a "reputable" assembler. the one we got was sprayed with something to cover the bare metal (they said they couldn't tell us for sure what it was) that caused an unbelievable amount of fish-eye in the epoxy primer and sealer. we ended up having to strip (sand/abrasive), and wash down every square inch of the body (top and bottom). We had 120+hours and materials into just cleaning it up.
We would have shipped it back, but we didn't discover the issue until after we had customized the body.

Next time I buy a body, I will fly out to inspect it prior to shipping

 

[PCB 4x4]

We leave all the factory EDP on, then use Epoxy over all of our welds. We just finished a complete body for a customer that wanted the entire body Epoxy primed. When we do this all the factory EDP comes off.

 

[skrit]

The body is very well made with quality parts and craftsmanship. I have 0 complaints. The company and folks that work there are amazing. Even the shipping frame and internal bracing is great which allowed me to flip it on the side with a shop hoist.

Not being a painter or fabricator, I guess I assumed epoxy primer would have been applied over the sanded and welded areas. It's really not a big deal and I'm being overly critical I'm sure.

I will have minimal prep with this body.

These inner fenders even look galvanized.

 

[Got4wd]

We leave all the factory EDP on, then use Epoxy over all of our welds. We just finished a complete body for a customer that wanted the entire body Epoxy primed. When we do this all the factory EDP comes off.

Can you expand on this? When you epoxy should “all” of the edp come off?

 

[PCB 4x4]

We strip all the factory EDP if we're going to do the body work and painting. We have a YouTube video on how we build the bodies compared to other builders. The video is under Patriot Classic 4x4.

 

[Jedeka]

We strip all the factory EDP if we're going to do the body work and painting. We have a YouTube video on how we build the bodies compared to other builders. The video is under Patriot Classic 4x4

Do you remove the EDP coating by sanding it down ?

 

[Soylent]

@skrit what company is that?

 

[PCB 4x4]

80 grit using a DA.

 

[skrit]

@skrit what company is that?

Dennis Carpenter