Refurbishing the Visors

Refurbishing the rear panels took some time between the cleaning, drying, priming, drying, painting. To fill the time, I've been slowly taking smaller things out of the truck that need a little touching up: The door runners, seat belts, rear seats hardware, etc.

The first things I've finished are the front visors.

This was an easy update. The visors were both in fantastic condition. No cuts or tears and the visors' spinning hardware where they connect to the ceiling both worked fine. However, they were dirty, and I wanted to take proper measures to ward off rust... which they never would have, but it gave me an excuse to do some painting.

Removing the Visors

Removing the visors is easy: two screws. I also took down the ceiling clip the visors clip into when stationary. 

After removing the visors from the car, I unscrewed the screws on the visor to remove the rotating hardware. 

Then, using a coarse brill brush and dishwasher soap, I gave the visors a good scrub. I was careful to keep water away from entry points to the inside of the visors, so the water wouldn't get in and ruin the inside sponging or rust the inside metal parts since there is no way to open the visors up. This basically meant keeping the visors' top edges dry as I cleaned them. I used a wet wipe and some Cotton Tips to clean the area around the entry holes.

Painted Screws

After washing the visors, I gave the screws a short bath in my homemade rust remover (lemon juice + baking soda) then scrubbed the bolts with a steel brush before washing them off.

I  used my handy, patented, screw painting device (a card board box edge) to hold the screws up so I could paint them all around and underneath the heads without having to touch the wet paint on the screws. I first gave the screws a coat of Rust-oleum metal primer and topped them off with Rust-oleum Painter's Touch glossy grey paint.

Visor hardware prepped for painting

Most of the oxidization was on the visor hardware, so I sanded the metal arms with a light grade sandpaper (220) and then taped the crap out of them to protect from overspray. Taping the holes for the arms was tricky because you don't want any spray getting on the plastic guard, but you also want to get far enough into the hole that a passenger can't see where the paint didn't reach. Use small pieces of tape and a pair of tweezers to place and press the tape into the crevice.  I also taped the lower half of the arms (which I didn't sand because I didn't want to remove the factory rust preventative covering). There's no need to paint this part of the arm anyway since it's not visible, and I thought the paint might rub off inside the visor as it is turned back and forth and eventually gunk up the inside.

After the taping, the hardware, I gave the arms a coat of Rustoleum metal primer, waited 24 hours, and then applied the Painter's Touch glossy grey.

Reassembly was an easy 4 screws, and I was done... mostly.

After getting the visors back up in the car, I noticed how ugly the round plastic bit on the visor that connected into the clip looked. It didn't match. So I pulled the visors back down and went to work on them again.

Like the visor hardware, I taped the crap out of the visor to protect it from overspray. Because of the awkward shape and location of the round cylinder, I first taped directly to the visor. I tore the tape into thinner, smaller strips to get around the corners and up next to the cylinder. I even pulled the plastic cylinder to each side, one at a time, and taped the cross bar so when the cylinder was centered, the tape was a little underneath the cylinder ends.

Taping the visor clip cylinder

After carefully getting all round the clip cylinder, I taped off the entire visor.

I gave the cylinder a coat of Rustoleum primer for plastic, but it didn't try right, the paint pooling and blotching in some areas. I cleaned the paint off, gave the cylinders a slight sanding with light gauge sand paper (the 220 again), and then reapplied the primer. Second time around went much better. After waiting the obligatory 24 hours for drying, two coats of the Glossy Grey went on, and finally, I was finished.