Ask anyone who has painted a car properly: there is more sanding than you can comprehend. Even if you are just blasting on another layer of paint, you have to scuff up what is present and accounted for first. Now picture scuffing up a farm tractor that is big enough to require a ladder to get into the cab. Outside of the poor souls that have to prep and paint aircraft, there isn’t much more we can think of that requires time and energy and sandpaper by the crate in order to get every panel set for fresh color. The work that the Welkers have put into the restoration of their Big Bud 525/50 speaks volumes…even with the film editing and the sped-up footage, you can tell that a healthy amount of physical work went into making sure that this classic Montana-bred behemoth was ready to go under the spray gun, from wearing down an eraser wheel to the point where it starts to heat up to stuffing one of the guys into the wheels with a wire wheel to clean up the old paint, rust and scale. After the work they performed on their International Eagle restoration, we’ve been waiting to see how this Big Bud turns out and after several episodes of sanding and cleaning, it’s time to break out the paint gun…finally!
