The first thing that you need to do is wash the vehicle to remove all silicones. For this application, regular dish soap works well. It strips the waxes and greases, which is the purpose of this pre-wash. Car soaps are designed to protect the car waxes on the surface. This step can save you many problems and headaches later down the repair process. If silicones are not completely removed, they may be smeared into the substrate and cause fisheyes during the painting process.

After you have properly washed the car, you may even want to use wax and grease remover to assure all contaminates are removed from the vehicle.

The front end parts were already removed when we bought the car. I will have to find and replace those parts when we start putting the car back together. Next, we removed the front fenders. As we mention in the video, one of the most important steps is keeping your hardware and parts organized. Whether you are going to have a car tore apart for a few weeks or a few years, this will make the reinstallation much easier.

One way to do this is to get some zip lock bags and label one for each panel that you remove. Put all the hardware and small parts into the bag and label the bag accordingly. Another way is to screw the bolts back into the bolt hole after the part has been removed. This work well, but may get in the way when working or painting the parts. Whatever method you choose, just make sure everything will be easy to lay out and put back together when the time comes.

You may have to remove adjacent parts to get to the part you are wanting to remove. On the mustang, we had to remove the rocker panel molding, to give us full access to the fender. Once the molding was removed, we removed the right front fender by using a 1/2 socket, 1/2 wrench, phillips screw driver, and the bags and marker to properly store the hardware.