How hard to paint your own?
 

My 930 needs the rockers and spoliers repainted... Most of the shops around here will charge $500-1000 to do it, and I'm considering re-doing them myself. Spent a good deal of time around some auto-body/paint shops to see how this is done, but am I fooling myself?

Chris

Preparation is the most time consuming part. Matching the paint is difficult is you have metalic or old paint. I don't think either apply to your situation. DIY automotive painting is also one of the greatest expense savers. I mean $500 - 100 for a spolier and rocker!

A good paint supplier will be able to provide lots of information as to the proper primer, paint and any flex and mixing agents necessary, as well as application instructions. If you have the equiptment painting is pretty simple. Some places will even rent the equiptment. A good BBS re body and paint ishere There are lot of pros on that site and are more than happy to answer any of your questions. I spent about 4 hours on the site just doing topic searchs and found way more infor than I needed.

If some guy in my area hadn't blown up his house by storing paint in his garage, I would be doing my own rockers and hood. But now, my wife believes that I will blow up the house if I store paint in the garage. But she doesn't mind about the welder, and the many cans of paint and cleaning solutions already in the garage. Sometimes it's just not worth pressing the issue.

It's not hard at all, and the small stuff like that can be painted quite well with a $20 Harbor Fright [sic] touch-up gun. If you lived closer I'd say bring on over.

When I found out how much shops wanted to paint my 72, i decided to do as much as I could. Ended up preping about 80 percent of the car myself. If your only doing the rocker panels and dam try it yourself. Start with the rockers and go from there. Buy a book first. It's just time consumimg. It took me about 8 hours to do the rockers on my 72. Then someone else painted them. If i could do it, you could. I did not even have a garage.

Its not hard. There are a ton of good books and other info on the subject. If it doesn't come out right, you can always just start over again. If you are using a non-clearcoat, color sanding and polishing can remedy any number of ills, as long as you have enough material on the car.

(Theoretically, you could paint the car with a paint brush, and as long as there is enough material, you could color sand it and polish it to a perfect mirror finish.)

Its not hard to get the settings right on the gun (you will have the pressure specs from the paint mfr., and there are ways of getting the right flow and pattern, described in tons of books). Once you have that done, its pretty much like painting something with a spray can. Keep experimenting until you get it right.

(Clearcoat, I don't know, I've never done it).

Are the HVLP guns better that standard gravity feed?

Paul,

And I bet your wife does not blink an eye about the 40+ gallons of gasoline (for two cars) that sit in your garage every night???

Properly handled, most things like this are not dangerous...

JA

I'm not so sure I'd automatically assume that . . .

Gravity feed is HVLP. Conventional guns are siphon type. Get the Harbor Fright (love that spelling, it says a bunch) one. Its a siphon gun. You are going to paint these off the car, right? Piece of cake.

Sssshhh! You're giving away my secret!

It would help if you guys said which Harbor Freight gun you're talking about. I see about 20 spray guns listed on their site.

Does anyone have compressor recommendations? I was thinking about buying a Sears Craftsman compressor. The particular model I was looking at had the following specs:

6hp
150psi
8.1scfm @ 40psi
5.8scfm @ 90 psi

Looking at the spray guns on the harbor freight site it appears that most guns need a higher cfm rating. For example one gun I'm looking at says

required pressure: 35-80psi
average air consumption: 11cfm


So it seems that this particular compressor wouldn't work with this gun. Is that right? The thing is that only super huge non portable compressors have cfm ratings of 11. Surely everybody doesn't use these mammoth compressors for painting?


Finally, what is the major difference between a 30 spray gun and a $150 spray gun?

Wal-Mart has touch-up guns comparable to Harbor 'Fright' for $25-$30 ... and they work very well for small jobs, in my experience! HVLP is costly to adapt to if you already have a conventional compressor that has less than 10-12 cfm capacity at 40 psi!

Last year I painted my SC with a Harbor Fright gravity feed HVLP gun. For $100, the gun was outstanding. I believe it was a DeVilbiss brand. It work even better than my $350 Binks.

Chris..you must want to do painting..it's tideous and dusty..I suggest you start w/a touch-up gun to develop a technique before you try a big gun..buy a $15 book and check it out...but a good home shoot can look more beautiful than an expensive shop..If you are serious and need more info from me, you know what to do...how did the orange peel look on the guards red?? ........Ron

clear-coat sanding
 

Clear coat can be color-sanded, too. There has been some discussion as to why it is called color-sanding on clear coat, but it is the same process. I've done two vehicles with clear-coat, color-sanding and the results were great. Michael

anthony...I use a 5hp w/60gal tank..I think it would be the minimum to power a 10cfm tool and gun...not a pro, but I do nice work..and the materials you select is imp..what is good in a pro shop may not be good at home..and metalics can be a PIA..and solids don't need a clear for beauty, IMO.......Ron

Just painted my front fender today.
Base coat, clear coat. Used Sherwin Williams 7000 series.
My paint is relatively new from previous owner and the SW paint is a perfect match. Porsche #700 Black.

Nothing to it.

Hit the clear coat with 2000 grit wet and then buff away with a cream like 3M Finesse-it, and then 3M Imperial Hand Glaze or Machine Glaze. Machine buffing is the way to go if your feeling lucky - easy to burn through the new paint.
Apply multiple coats of clear.

A cheaper gun is fine. An expensive one is better, but not worth it if your only going to use it every few years.

I spayed my last car in metalic plus clear and after wetsanding and buffing it was as straight and clear as a mirror. Problem I used acrylic lacquer and it started getting water marks and the finish didn't last.
has anyone else experienced this ?

But on a base/clear system, what if the imperfection is in the base coat? After you clear it, how do you color-sand away base coat imperfections?

When I used base/clear the base went on smooth and thin and dried very quickly. This gave less chance for stuff to get in the paint and hard to get runs. If there is a mistake in the base you would have to redo it. Most of the flaws are in the clear as it takes longer to dry, letting dirt, bugs, etc. get settled. Also, the clear goes on heavier, giving potential for runs. I was painting in my garage and found the BC/CC very forgiving. Michael