Ron Dunn Ford in paint

November 1, 2014 Rik Hoving

RON DUNN FORD IN PAINT

The Team at Steve’s Auto Restoration in Oregon are keeping up the pace on the Valley Custom Shop-built Ron Dunn Ford. At the end of October 2014 the body was painted Sierra Gold.

[dropcap]The[/dropcap] last time we reported on the Ron Dunn Restoration the car was at the Rodder’s Journal Studio in San Francisco for a famous Geoff Miles and Steve Coonan Bare Metal Photoshoot. In the meantime the feature has been published in the Rodder’s Journal #64, showing all the wonderful work the Valley Custom Shop team had done on the car in the early 1950’s. And the restoration team at Steve’s Auto Restoration in 2014.

Openings spread of the Rodder’s Journal with the Ron Dunn bare metal article written by Curt Iseli.
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After the Rodder’s Journal photo-shoot the was was taken apart again and it was time to freshen up the lead-work on the car. Most of the lead-work was done expertly by the in hours body and lead guy Bryan Bidema assisted by Steve. We are very fortunate that the team at SAR are documenting every step of the process, and even better are sharing it with the world. Thank you very much for that. It is a pleasure to see all this amazing work being done on this Milestone Custom.

SAR’s Bryan Bidema at work applying lead around the taillights of the Ford.
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After the lead-work the body was prepped for primer.
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Fresh coats of primer which was followed by black sanding until the body was absolutely perfect.
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When the Ronn Dunn Ford was redone in 1957, the team at the Valley Custom Shop had used a custom mixed color based off of Chevrolet’s ’57 Sierra Gold. During the restoration samples of this color were found inside the car, and the perfect match for the color was mixed from those samples. At the end of OCtober 2014 the Ron Dunn Ford was finally repainted again in the same color as it was in 1957. SAR’s Jay Spencer did the color matching on the paint as well as the painting of the car. And wow.. the color looks so good. I cannot wait to see the car getting back together over the next period. Stay tuned for more updates on the Valley Custom Shop, Ron Dunn Sectioned Shoebox restoration project.