Well aware that I have the entire van to shape and prime, and pretty much no experience of applying filler I decided to have a go on the rear hatch to get a feel for it. I’m epoxying all of the outer panels, so started by taking the hatch back to bare metal (you can see the repair I had to put in along the bottom edge):
And the result of a few nights trying to get the panel flat (this is going to take me a while to get the hang of, but I’ve got to start somewhere right?!).
So far it’s not coming particularly natural to me trying to feel the highs and lows on the panel, and then levelling it out. Even applying the filler isn’t easy as I can’t seem to spread it particularly evenly and keep running tracks through it.
I decided to epoxy it anyway to give me a better idea of the panel shape, and how the filler translates into primer.
As I had the gun out I also bare metalled the engine lid which is a brand new panel so needed no filler:
Engine lid in epoxy:
And rear hatch:
It doesn’t look too bad from this angle and distance, but it’s far from straight when viewed side on:
I can apply filler over epoxy so I’ll keep going on the filler to try and flatten it out more. Practice makes perfect!
