rusty sheet metal Ford 600

Any thoughts/experience on how much effort to put into a restoration for the sheet metal?

I have the tractor in pieces, most of the red is primed and painted.

I was planning to try and bump out and bondo some areas of sheet metal. The more I think about it, maybe just paint and call that character? Any experience here? I'm not worried about brand new, more like looks nice and useful.

thanks, MODAY

Seems to me it depends on what you want your sheet metal to look like. Since you mention having your tractor in pieces I assume you are repainting it, so it doesn't make since to do a nice job on everything else and not the sheet metal. A little effort and you have a nice result that will give you satisfaction when you look at it in three months. But, if you really don't care then put some paint on it and call it good. I tend to have the attitude that if you're going to do a job do it right and enjoy the satisfaction it brings. Bottom line, its what make you happy.

The most important thing you can do is to kill the rust. I would sandblast it down to bare metal. Then hammer out the dents as much as you are willing. Then treat the metal with phosphoric acid and rinse clean and dry. From there prime the metal with epoxy primer. From there if you wish to bondo and level the surface do it over the epoxy primer. Then epoxy prime the metal and bondo again and you should be ready for paint. If you decide to try to make the surface look nice use a filler primer over the epoxy primer. There will be places you either sanded the bondo too much or too little and you can see it in the primer while it's still wet and shiny. Keep filling with primer and sanding until you eliminate these places and it should be ready for paint.

Epoxy primer is the best product to combat rust. A lot of times you can think you have it cleaned off and put primer on it only to find out a couple years later the metal is rusting under the paint. With epoxy primer it seals the metal so well you can scratch the paint all the way down to the metal and it will only rust where the scratch is instead of spreading out under the paint like it would do with other primers.

My cousin has a very nice 1650 Oliver. It has hail damage that he painted over. I would have fixed it first, but it is his tractor and he is happy with it. Totally your call.

2X kill the rust. Not even sand blasting can get it all down to the bottom of pits.