First thread in this forum. Paint job coming down the pike.

[MongooseGA]

Hello all,

I've been somewhat active in the 911 technical forum for over a year, but now I'm getting close to sending my 911 to the shop for a full over paint job.

I'll try to keep this short as I tend to get a little wordy (especially after a few rum & cokes).

I bought my 911 in the Summer of year before last. It had a less than stellar paint job, and has had more than one paint job in its life. Not all at the same time. Last month it got so cold here in southern Atlanta that the poorly done paint on my car cracked, almost like throwing boiling hot water on freezing cold glass.

Luckily for me, my wonderful insurance company has agreed to cover the damage. The downside to this deal is that the paint was in poor condition to begin with, leaving me with what will likely become a bill requiring money out of my pocket to repaint the whole car.

I'm looking for some pointers from experts here as to what I may expect (obviously nobody will have a 100% idea until the paint is stripped) to have done, what it may cost, and what avenues I should pursue.

I've attached a lot of pictures to show both the existing paint flaws and the cracking that came about with the cold weather (which is the first I've ever seen, even having grown up around exotic/antique/muscle cars).

I bought this car as a project and a driver. She was my daily until the paint issue. I do have another daily driver. I certainly am not looking for a concours quality job, but something probably equivalent to an OEM quality job. For reference sake, my insurance company's initial estimate was $1500. I will take a day this coming week to travel within an hour of where I'm located for supplemental estimates as I feel I was severely shorted by the insurance quote.

Any questions I'll be happy to answer, and any suggestions I'll be happy to receive. Thanks in advance.

[MongooseGA]

[MongooseGA]

[MongooseGA]

No thoughts or advice on this, huh?

[962porsche]

the car just has not a bad repaint but a real ****en bad repaint .
why is it cracking well it could be for many reasons but my 1st guess is the person that painted it was not a painter and just a sprayer .
cracks like that tend to happen from the sprayer putting on to many coats to thick with out letting the product flash off between coats . so over years and years the coats under the clear finely cure and shrink and as it shrinks it pulls the clear and cracks it like a fault line .
you see this on many tri-color paint jobs and when they try to fix things with spraying on to much undercoats .


on top of the door it looks to me like they did not use a etch or epoxy primer over bare metal . so the filler primer will not stick to the bare metal all that well causing moisture to get between the metal and the undercoats . undercoats is not the black useless crap they sell in spray can it's primers and sealers .
hack shops will just spray there filler primers over bare metals .

they did a crap job taping off the car there are tape lines from bad masking all over the hole car .

[MongooseGA]

Sorry, I completely forgot about this thread.

Definitely agree with the crap paint job. There's not a nice body panel on the car as far as paint goes. However, with what I paid for the car, I still ended up with a deal. It's pretty well sorted with lots of upgraded goodies.

A local enthusiast buddy of mine volunteered today to help me do as much prep as possible. This includes most of the sanding, panel/trim removal, etc. I intend to buy mostly new rubbers all around the car which will require loosening/removing the fenders, bumpers, lips, spoiler, etc...

Seeing the pictures provided, is there anything you think I should expect or any tips you'd have? I've got moderate mechanical/engine experience, but this is my first trip into bodywork.

[962porsche]

I have stated so many time what to much product will do when your painting a car .
this car is a classic case of just that !
way to much product right from the primer thru the mid coats to the clear .
one thing you see are big chips from this another is the long cracks in the top coat .
the long cracks are just like fault line on the earths crust .
one reason why you get them is the person that painted the car did not let the mid coats flash off all the way before the next coat went on then with out the base coats being dry the painter went right to the clear coats . so what you get is the last coat of clear drying and curing before the 1st coats of base dried . this traps solvents causing the top coat not wanting to stick or bite into the mid coats aka base . making it chip ez .
then also over time as the base finely cures it pulls the clear coat apart as it moves around finely curing .
so you get long fault cracks in the clear .

the only fix for this is a total strip of at the least the last repaint but best just to strip the hole car down to bare .

this is all to common with people that have not been in the auto body trade for not that long .
many times the substrates are not all that bad it's just real bad paint .
so if you don't find they did hack body work under the bad refinish you will make out good ?

[MongooseGA]

Hopefully I'll still make out pretty well. One thing I need to know is what sort of primer I can spray on the panels after I strip them down to metal. Is there a particular rattle can brand I can use to keep flash rust from occurring before the car goes to the body shop for body work and paint? It may be up to a free weeks before it gets towed to the shop after I do the prep.

[strath44]

wow I've never seen paint that bad, I've only seen crazing like that on a fibreglass car like a lotus or tvr.

One major prob is it seems to not have had a trim off, glass out respray. The bubbles on the door look like where moisture has got between the window scraper trim and paint where the masking tape has left a gap, same at wing mirror, where I think you can also see a wide run in the paint.

Has it had a water based paint over the original, huge amount of shrink on the clear coat.

Anyway on the plus side it will soon look awesome, as you say you can save money by removing all trim and glass yourself which makes for a proper respray, doesnt take much time or technical knowhow if your aren't that way inclined. To save even more you could do some prep such as stripping off the old paint, the best route is paint stripper rather than sanding if you don't want to remove the galvanisation coat which is only a few microns thick.

[MongooseGA]

I do intend to prep myself, to include removing the paint all over, removing panels, possibly the windshields, etc... I've stripped paint before from a '70 Camaro, but I wasn't involved in the priming.

Still wondering what I can coat the car with once the car is in bare metal before it goes to the painter.

[strath44]

did you see this thread...

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/paint-bodywork-discussion-forum/800662-professional-input-please-product-sequence-over-bare-steel.html

962 will give you the best info on bare metal on, there are a lot of threads if you look back also in the technical forum of people doing full restorations. Its like building a house crap foundations = problems down stream!

rattle cans are a big no go imo you'd be surprised how cheap a compressor and gun are to hire and the finish is night and day,!

[MongooseGA]

Had not seen that thread. I just read through it, though, and it looks like a nice outline of what I should be doing.

I have access to a compressor, and can buy a gun. They aren't necessarily that pricey. I don't intend to do any body repair on my own. Just strip, prep, and prime so the body shop can use their expertise.

Looks like an epoxy primer is the way to go. I'll have to do some research as to what brand/formula/whatever. Any suggestions?

[962porsche]

when your pick a product line pick one were your not mixing different brands .
I always tend to go with the BASF products that would be limco , RM and glasurit .
glasurit is the paint system Porsche uses .
so if you pick say glasurit for the e-primer then use glasurit for the rest of the coatings as well .
any paint system will work if you follow the TDS .
if your looking for help on info the people here are very good and knowledgeable on paint and body from what I have found better then many of the other people on paint and body forums . I have found on the other forums there is allot of bad info from some so called body and paint people .
time in the business does not make some one good at body work .


you will not dough be removing most all the galvanized coating Porsche uses for metal protection . not to worry ! any car you strip to bare steel you will be removing the coating .
Porsche people tend to obsess alittle to much about it ! most all cars by the 1980's have a galvanized coating on them .
pick a chromated E-primer that would be epoxy or etch primer . it will replace the galvanized coating that was there to begin with .

[MongooseGA]

Would you recommend finding out what paint systems my body shop uses, and then selecting a primer accordingly?

I don't believe my '77 is galvanized, but I could be wrong.

[962porsche]

I would work with the shop you tend to use . that way your not going to use a product they don't know about .

[MongooseGA]

Originally Posted by 962porsche

I would work with the shop you tend to use . that way your not going to use a product they don't know about .

Unfortunately, I'm living in a new area. I had "my guy" at home, who would work magic for me. He used to do all of the paintwork for the Gravedigger monster truck franchise. I've probably sent 15 cars to him in the last 5 years and never got anything less than excellent.

Now I'm in a new area and I have to find "my guy".

[bpu699]

Originally Posted by 962porsche

when your pick a product line pick one were your not mixing different brands .
I always tend to go with the BASF products that would be limco , RM and glasurit .
glasurit is the paint system Porsche uses .
so if you pick say glasurit for the e-primer then use glasurit for the rest of the coatings as well .
any paint system will work if you follow the TDS .
if your looking for help on info the people here are very good and knowledgeable on paint and body from what I have found better then many of the other people on paint and body forums . I have found on the other forums there is allot of bad info from some so called body and paint people .
time in the business does not make some one good at body work .


you will not dough be removing most all the galvanized coating Porsche uses for metal protection . not to worry ! any car you strip to bare steel you will be removing the coating .
Porsche people tend to obsess alittle to much about it ! most all cars by the 1980's have a galvanized coating on them .
pick a chromated E-primer that would be epoxy or etch primer . it will replace the galvanized coating that was there to begin with .

Are all 2 part epoxy primers chromates?

I keep seeing people taking paint down to bare metal, but I have tried this in the past and it rusted. Quickly...

Took an old ford and sandblasted the door bottoms to bare metal, treated with metal prep, degreaser, and shot on 3 coats of epoxy primer. Within 3 months, some snow, it looked horrible. The e-primer definitely didn't protect from rust...

All the spots I touched up with cheap rustoleum, looked great and still do...

What's the secret? Seems to me that without galvanizing, even the smallest scratch leads to big time rust...

Bo

[962porsche]

no not all 2 part E-primers are chromated .
3 coats is to much product all you want is one to 2 coats at most . again more is not better it's in fact worse .

primers of all types do and will not hold out moisture at all in any way !
in fact some primers will soak up moisture like a sponge because of the talc used in primers to give them mill build .
the talc is almost like baby powder in fact in many ways is baby powder .

when you blast any galvanized panel of any car you will be blasting the coating right off the surface .
galvanized coating is best for between seams and areas were you really can't keep clean and waxed .
on areas like out side of say a door skin the coating does little to nothing because it's covered by primer and paint .
paint or top coats is what protects the substrate .

yes the galvanized coat will do it's job when you scratch thru the top coats more so then if there were not any galvanized coating at all .

[bpu699]

Originally Posted by 962porsche

no not all 2 part E-primers are chromated .
3 coats is to much product all you want is one to 2 coats at most . again more is not better it's in fact worse .

primers of all types do and will not hold out moisture at all in any way !
in fact some primers will soak up moisture like a sponge because of the talc used in primers to give them mill build .
the talc is almost like baby powder in fact in many ways is baby powder .

when you blast any galvanized panel of any car you will be blasting the coating right off the surface .
galvanized coating is best for between seams and areas were you really can't keep clean and waxed .
on areas like out side of say a door skin the coating does little to nothing because it's covered by primer and paint .
paint or top coats is what protects the substrate .

yes the galvanized coat will do it's job when you scratch thru the top coats more so then if there were not any galvanized coating at all .

Thanks! Thats very helpful. I thought epoxy primers were by definition waterproof??? Epoxy is waterproof, so I thought epoxy primer was also? Perhaps thats where I screwed up. I didn't top coat it right away.

[MongooseGA]

Will it make a difference for me that the car will be garaged as I prep it? Or, will the ambient moisture in the air be enough to cause concern of rust?