Painting - Educate Me

[DJpowerHaus]

I was initially going to pay a professional to paint my engine bay and eventually my car, but recently I have been toying with the idea of painting the car myself. I've used the Rustoleum + mineral spirits + spray gun technique on the interior and engine bay of my race car and it was good enough for a racecar which isnt saying much. This time around I'm hoping to use professional tools and paint and hoping to get professional looking results. I'm justifying the cost of tools by reallocating $$ I was going to spend on labor on quality tools.

 

In both cases I would have been doing all the prep work. I simply can't justify paying someone to do all the sanding and body work when I've got more time than money. So, all prep work being equal, what do I need to do buy in order to get the paint job I'm looking for?

 

What paint should I buy, how much and where?

What tools do I need?

What about a paint booth? Is it worth the trouble to build?

 

I already have a compressor (30 gal electrical) and hoses. Also have an old crappy paint gun, but I think its the first thing that needs to get upgraded here.

[Frenchi934]

I painted my car using a sharpe finex gun. (fx 200 gravity fed conventional)

 

I went with summit paint, which is apparently made by sherwin williams. Painted most of the car in my garage in a sort of make shift paint booth. (you can check out most of the details in my build thread). I spent a lot of time on prep and was extremely maticulous about contaminants in anything and everything.

 

One thing you do want to have is a good water filter on your air compressor. I have about 200 feet of hose between the compressor and outlet (for condensation space), then two filters plus a small final filter on the gun.

 

My car came out pretty good in my opinion (it won a couple awards at the southern classic mopar show). Any imperfections in the job were due to inexperience and can be improved upon as i learn.

 

One thing i really like to do is take a lot of time before painting to set up the gun properly. you can see in several of my posts where i spray it onto brown paper before spraying the piece i was working on and that was to get the volume/ air pressure just right before spraying on the part.

[Frenchi934]

also, burton has some pretty good how to manuals in his signature. something like 21 chapters of very useful material.

[markhansenconquest]

I just painted my bumpers and air dam, prep is the most important thing .Go to a auto paint shop and they will be able to tell you what you need and how to mix it . Drape your garage with plastic.......... ,electric air compresser out side of garage......... one spark will blow up garage!!!!!!experiment with air presser and paint settings.good luck

[Lance_S]

Wet the floor down with water before you shoot. It will trap the airborn particles that hit the floor. Make sure it's nice and wet.

[Burton]

Yeah, Mike, check out my online auto body/paint/detailing etc.. manual.

 

There's 21 chapters on 26liter here....

 

http://www.26liter.us/forum/index.php?topic=1604.0

 

links to all the chapters are at the bottom of the first post. You won't need to read all the chapters if you're just painting, but there are 3 or 4 that might give you some helpful info. I also have the manual on my website, but it hasn't been updated with the two most recent chapters, however, I don't think the missing chapters are anything pertaining to painting...

 

http://www.burtonscustoms.com/body_manual.html

 

 

As far as paint and tools go, those are questions that you may get 1,000 answers to because all body/paint guys usually approach things a little different or have different opinions on paint brands and tools they like to use.

 

You'll deffinately want a good quality paint, but some of those can be pretty pricey. All of the major paint brands are all pretty good quality, but every paint brand is a little different to spray, and some people only like the brands that seem to work best with how they do things. Some paints are more expensive than others, and some are super cheap. I tend to avoid the super cheap ones unless I can confirm that they are either made by a paint company I like, or that particular paint is a copycat of a brand that I like. For instance, Matrix is a copycat of PPG. I've used both a ton, and they are extremely similar in the way they are mixed, sprayed, and their quality, but the Matrix is 1/2-2/3 the price. I've also sprayed some cheaper stuff that I like, that can be had at tcpglobal.com. Their Reatoration Shop/Kustom Shop paints and clears are really inexpensive compared to some of the major brands, but the quality is still very good, and I like how it sprays. I can get a gallon of base, a gallon of clear, and all the reducers and hardeners for any OEM color back to 1926 shipped to my door for about $400. The same stuff from Matrix would be $700-800, and from PPG would probably be $1200+. If I want one of TCP's own "aftermarket" colors, I can have that kit for about $300. Really tho, you can't go wrong with any of the big dogs.... PPG, DuPont, BASF, RM, House of Kolor, Sherman Williams, etc... If you gotta do this cheap, there's nothing wrong with finding a cheaper paint like Matrix, NAPA (made by Sherwin Williams), stuff from TCP, or something else- Just make sure only to use a brand you've heard good things about. I can tell ya a couple brands I won't use... Acme, and Kirker. Those are the only two brands I have absolutely hated.

 

The tools you buy will depend on how much stuff you plan to do. Some people want all the cool tools to make all the work the easiest, and some people try and stick to the basics cause they can't afford all the cool stuff. For prep work, you'll probably want a DA sander at least. You could sand everything by hand if you had to, but a cheapie DA would make your life much easier. For paint guns, you could go out and buy a Iwata, Devilbiss, Sharpe, etc..., but paint guns can get pretty pricey. You could buy one nice gun that would work for base and clear, but it wouldn't work for primer. No biggie if you aren't priming anything, but if you plan to get all the flaws out of the body before paint, you will surely need to lay some primer. Rattle can stuff works, but it's not the best quality. Devilbiss makes a starter gun kit that comes with a paint/clear gun as well as a primer gun for around $125 IIRC. There are also cheap tool suppliers who offer 3 gun kits for around the same price. Either kit is a great starter setup, and allows you to have all the guns you need for really any body/paint scenerio you may run into, yet keeps the cost down in case you decide you hate doing it and never want to touch a spray gun again. If you decide that you don't mind doing paint work and want to do it more, then you can step up to better guns at a higher price later. My clear gun alone cost me $450, and my base coat, primer,and sealer guns were all at least $300 each. I've seen too many people buy $1000 worth of guns only to realize they hate painting. Then they either throw them in a box and let them rot, or they try to sell them online. Of course, half the time the guns are junk anyway because they got frustrated with painting and when they were finished they didn't clean the guns properly, due to frustration, ignorance on how to clean a gun, or both.

 

 

You'll want a booth, especially if you don't plan on wetsanding and polishing the paint after it's cured. A simple garage with some fans and the floor wetted down can work pretty good, or you can make a booth by hanging clear plastic. The better you can control your environment and the cleaner the environment is the better your project will turn out. That being said, you don't HAVE to have a booth. I painted my starion in my backyard with no booth and about a 12 MPH crosswind. It got some dust and dirt in it, but less than I expected and not anything that didn't come out with a little wetsanding and polish.

[marso]

I made an evacuation filter for paint mist inside the plastic booth with 6 large pleated home AC filters taped together like a box and hooked the hose from a large shop vac to it so the mist is trapped on the filter media. Make sure you have the vacuum filter on inside the canister also. Make a hole in the side of the plastic booth then tape two large pleated flters to cover the hole to let in clean air. The vacuum goes outside of the booth of course or booth go boom.

[carldonovan]

If you are painting the car in your garage, I recommend keeping the floor wet with water. This will eliminate much of the particulate matter from getting drawn into the paint. It worked great when I did this.

[Burton]

There's also chemicals you can spray on the floor instead of water that will trap dust particles, and won't evaporate like water. I don't know all the names but I have used one called Dust Down. I'm sure any auto body supply place would carry it or something compareable.

 

Water works OK, but if it evaporates half way thru the paint job, you have to re-wet the floor and then you run the risk of possibly splashing up water particles with floor dirt onto your paint job and possibly ruining it.

[Frenchi934]

I didnt do water on the floor when I painted my car. I knew it would be a good Idea but i was darn scared that id drag the hose through it, splash it, or drip it into the paint somehow.

 

I didnt have much problem with contamination (other than a mosquito - which i later sanded out, lol). but like i say i was extremely maticulous with cleaning the entire room before and after pulling the car into the room.

 

Im not an expert, just sharing my painting experience.