My refurbished Emblems and door panels

[AbramJ]

Hi all, I don't know if this is the right place to post this, but I wanted to share with you. In my quest to save costs on my 76 Suburban restoration I've found some of these emblems in junk yards and have refurbished them myself.

I opted to use gold instead of the original yellow color for my emblems. My older brother also swears up and down that the bow tie emblem for the grille was always blue, so I painted it blue.

The woodgrain on my truck's door panels was fading in some spots, losing color in others, and most of them were chipping and rusting right at the top where it bends over. So I decided to re-do them as well. I bought some woodgrain contact paper from the hardware store that I liked and decided to give it a try. It worked wonderfully! I used this on the dash insert and in the steering wheel as well. Now my only problem is the woodgrain panel on the instrument cluster bezel....

And the last picture is of Silverado emblems I pulled off of a Blazer in the junkyard and refurbished

 

[david popple]

nice job on the door panels. What store did you buy the woodgrain material at?

 

[TheBeast_88K5]

Gawd... That stuff looks GREAT!!!!

 

[AbramJ]

Thanks guys!

I bought the woodgrain contact paper from Ace Hardware, if I remember correctly. It can be bought at Homedepot and Lowes too I believe.

 

[CGT80]

The bow tie on my 79 c20 grill is yellow

 

[str8axle55]

Looks great, nice work.

 

[yellowK20]

Nicely done!! the contact paper is a good idea.

 

[Chief Brody]

What type and color of paint is that inside the "350"?

 

[AbramJ]

What type and color of paint is that inside the "350"?

I sprayed the emblem with some paint stripper and got as much of the old paint/grime off. I cleaned it really well and then I sprayed it with Gold DupliColor paint I got from Checker/O'reily. I then scraped it off of the little raised lines around each number. Next I hand painted the background flat black. Finally I hit the whole thing with a 'satin' clear coat. I've done the same thing for the '400' emblem on my 4x4. I've also got another '350' emblem I need to finish (the black and clear coat).

I'd be willing to help anyone if they want their emblems re-painted or anything. I could give a whole spiel on how I did it or you could send it to me with the color request and I could do it.

 

[cdoggwsu]

I could give a whole spiel on how I did it or you could send it to me with the color request and I could do it.

Feel free to post a write-up in the Tech Articles section.

Awesome work!

I'm more concerned with cleaning up the chrome/chromed-plastic edges of the emblems. Any tips there?

 

[jghall]

excellent job....