Shaving my tailgate, started 7:00pm Wednesday evening... Finally finished on Sunday morning @ 2:10AM..

GOTO PAGE 11 FOR FINISHED PICS

STEP 1 : Take the handle out of the gate and remove the Ford badge. Then use a electric drill with sander end to take it down to bare metal.

STEP 2 : Make a cardboard prototype of your filler plate. Be sure before you cut the metal!

STEP 3 : A useful tool you can make out of a bondo spreader to keep the form of the v-groove body line when bondoing and making the filler plate. You WILL NEED THIS LATER!

STEP 4 : Trace out your filler plate from your cardboard protoype and cut, bend and shape it to fit your handle hole.

STEP 5 : Filler plate fit testing... DO ALOT OF TESTING AND RETESTING OF THE V-GROOVE ANGLE, TRY TO GET IT AS DEAD ON AS YOU CAN BY USING THE BONDO SPREADER TOOL YOU SHOULD HAVE MADE BY NOW!

STEP 6 : Filler plate in place, check the v-groove angle with the bondo tool. MAKE SURE YOUR V-GROOVE ANGLE IS ALMOST EXACT TO THE V-GROOVE LINES ALREADY IN THE TAILGATE.. ANY SCREW UPS HERE CAN RESULT IN A NOTICABLE SHAVING JOB AFTER PAINT.. ( DON'T WANT THAT!)

STEP 7, Part 1 : If your at this stage, your filler plate should be fitting nicely and the angle should be just right. So now you can move to prepairing the filler plate for the cold weld. Use very rough sand paper to create scratches in the metal for the cold weld to adhear to.

STEP 7, Part 2 :The same goes for the tailgate handle slot... Again. use rough sandpaper to ruff up approximatly where the cold weld will be.

STEP 8 : Now you should use a TACK CLOTH to take away any bondo dust or anything else loose off the to be cold welded surface... GET A TACK CLOTH, THEY'RE .99 cents a peice... No paper towels won't work, trust me. Just shut up and get a tack cloth! = )

STEP 9 : So now you "should" be ready to mix your 2 part apoxy, I used Permatex Cold Weld, strongest sh!t you can get at Canadian Tire.

STEP 10: After you get the apoxy mixed, your have 5 minutes before it sets, so GET TO WORK QUICKLY! Run a thick bead along the rim of where the filler plate will sit... BE GENEROUS! I used 3/4 of both tubes for my plate..

STEP 11 : Once you get your filler plate set into the soft cold weld, make sure its in place by checking the lines you marked before, and double check your bondo groove tester.

STEP 12: Add a bit of weight if the edges of the filler plate don't want to sit right flush with the tailgate skin. And wait to dry... LEAVE FOR 10 HOURS JUST TO BE SURE ITS GOOD AND HARD BEFORE TAKING NEXT STEP.

STEP 14 : After apoxy has dried, sanded down excess, but don't sand too much, or the strength of the cold weld will be dimished.

STEP 15 : After the excess cold weld was sanded away, scuff up the surface using coarse sand paper and apply long strand fiberglass. ( Forgot to take the pic )... Then shave away excess with a bondo shaper/shaver.

STEP 16 : After shaving and sanding the fiberglass layer down, make sure the surface is roughed up a bit for the application of the bondo layers.

STEP 17 : Apply your first coat of bondo... Be generous!

STEP 18 : After a few layers of bondo and alot of fine shaping and sanding, your gate should look something like this.

STEP 19 : If the layering is good, and your lines and v-groove are up to par for your standards, then you can sand it down with fine sand paper... Try moving to 400grit, then 1000. After its smooth, then apply a few layers of GLAZE AND SPOT PUTTY if you wish to make your bondo even smoother. Then sand with 1000 grit again till smooth, and repeat until satisfied.

If you want to see how your bondo job is comming along or to see if anything is noticably off, then get some tinfoil, and spray soapy water on the area you want to test, and appy the tinfoil... Smooth the foil out using a bondo spreader, and reveal the curvature of your newly shaved tailgate!

Goto page 11 to see the shaved and primed tailgate!

ENJOY! - Nicholas