Every spot of corrosion was hit with the angle grinder until bare metal was reached. There were a number of spots in the back-seat area, and also in the boot around the spare wheel.
Once these were cleaned and dried they were all primed with rust-stopping primer paint. This came in a rather fetching beige colour, but that's fine as the red covers it well.
The red paint used wasn't a specific colour matched can (although I do have a small can of colour matched paint). It was Halfords generic enamel red spray paint. This appears to have been a near perfect match for the GTOs stock red, so that's highly convenient. I may use this to re-spray the bonnet, and other external body panels in the future.
Next up, sound deadening. While this GTO is less offensive than previous ones (as it still has the stock exhaust on it) the drone is still a little louder than desirable. I sourced a bulk pack of Dynamat sound dampening material. This is well known and respected for what it does. Normally you would try to apply it in as large a sheet as possible, but the undulating surface of the GTO makes that next to impossible so the next best solution is to use small patches and strips. The gaps can then be covered later if the noise is still an issue but it should still offer a significant reduction in noise.
Half way through the boot with the plastic bins back in place. Everything seems to still fit and is nice and secure.
The boot finished for now. The coverage isn't great so I may revisit this later but there will be a wheel, and sound dampening mat above it so this isn't quite as important as other areas.
Next up the rear passenger area. The intention is to remove the seats and box it out for storage instead. This means we will lose the dampening effect of the seats themselves, so this area got a decent coverage.
Cutting up the Dynamat is fairly straight forward, just a knife and a ruler. Above you can see my glamorous assistant working diligently into the night to get the lining cut while I installed it.
The Dynamat installed. There are a few little gaps but nothing significant. I took the opportunity to add a bit to the thin side-walls. This likely wont have a huge effect, but it should help reduce the road noise a little. You can see I have identified the random grey cable running up this side (the primary reason for removing the panel). It was the AM antenna installed at the factory. Nothing uses this now although I may re-use the cable for something else. Watch this space.
Lastly, installed the rear-quarter panel. This was a total bitch to remove, breaking one of its clips in the process. It seems they are all these really annoying barbed metal clips, with no obvious way of seeing what you are working on. Getting it back on was a bit of a challenge too as trying to line up all the clips, effectively blind-folded, is next to impossible. Once everything is in place you just twat the plastic hard and it all clips into place. Note to self, don't take this off again unless you have no choice.
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