Repaint questions?

I highly recommend spending time on autobodystore.com forum and autobody101.com forum for a wealth of current information from some real pros who share information with do it yourselfers and discuss paint and body topics with other pros. - Jim

I painted my car last winter and I think I'm in the same place you are. I track my car alot and drive it to the golf course on saturday and the grocery store on sunday. But I wanted it to look good at the local car shows and oh, I have a thing about doing everything myself. I panited some cars back in the 70's so I figured it would be easy. I would use the same single stage paint that I used back then and all would be good. Well the new HPLV guns are very different than the old syphen guns and it took a little time to get the pressure figured out but it came out good not great but good and doing it myself I'm into it maybe $500.00 and time. I bought the paint from "Paint for Cars" off the internet and I am very happy with the quality and the price. No it's not PPG or Dupont but it's not $1,000.00 a gal either. I used a gravity feed Craftsman gun and it worked great. I rented a booth for a long weekend to spray it in so I didn't blow up my house and after wet sanding and buffing it looks good and I get alot of good comments about the paint. Take your time with the prep and go for it, if you don't like it do it again.

do it right....strip it to bare metal. Go buy aircraft paint removal and a putty knife. It will take you about 1 week working 5 hours a day but the final project will be worth it and then you will see if there is any rust or if its ever been hit..mike mayberry

I agree with Mike M- strip to bare metal 'cause -A- thick paint is more likely to crack, and -B- you never know what's under there. When I did our apparently untouched car, besides 5 layers of paint (the removed scrap weighed 4 lbs!), I found a weird greenish epoxy-bondo patch 8" in dia. on top of the left fender. This was apparently shipping damage- stevedores WALKED on our cars down in the ship's hold....
Even with Aircraft stripper, it took 4 applications plus a scraper to get the stuff off. Then a glove on my fist & a sharp smack under the fender and the dent oil-canned out- no filler needed. Why Bill Stroppe's shop didn't do that I'll never know...

Check out these two threads by Bill Gaino (lastpushbutton).

Restoration begun on a customer's Pantera:
http://pantera.infopop.cc/eve/...0045562/m/8591004946

There's also an older thread/gallery in which Bill repainted his Pantera in 10 days if I recall correctly, but I can't find it. Bill, do you have that link handy?

A variety of vendors have these abrasive wheels for the grinder:

http://www.harborfreight.com/r...t-remover-66101.html

use-enco.com also another good source. I would probably avoid open areas in large body panels but anywhere fairly rigid they do a good job of cutting through the paint and bondo.

This is what I meant which are meant for grinders:


http://www.harborfreight.com/4...ive-wheel-94016.html

http://www.harborfreight.com/4...ive-wheel-60571.html

http://www.harborfreight.com/4...ive-wheel-94017.html

I will play devils advocate here and not recommend stripping to bare metal. It takes a huge amount of time and commitment and you do not have a lot of experience and going to bare metal will undoubtedly open a can of worms. Your paint will hide a thousand sins and unless you are willing to put in many hours to repair them all don't give yourself the pain. I have seen many a home repair man (me included) try to take on a bare metal paint job only to loose interest half way through once they realize the mammoth task. Do it the easy way this time, there is nothing to say you can't come back in 5 or 10 years time and do it again when you have more experience.

As for the actual painting I would start by aligning all your door/trunk gaps first. Then block the car back as you said with 120 and feathering any cracked areas and blisters. This will remove any flaking paint and anything that is not bonded well. It will also give you an idea of where all the dents are and problem areas. Then fix the rust and apply bondo to areas needed. Once you are happy, apply your sealers, primer/fillers and add more to the areas that have been repaired to give some build. Once the primer dries go around the car with spot putty and find all the little spots that need attention. Block the car back again with 240 dry, making sure everything is smooth and relatively flat. Then apply the final coats of primer filler. It will now be ready for blocking with wet sand paper in 400-600 but do not rub back any areas to bare metal. Last will be the easy part applying the color.

A few tips. Use 2 pack paint. It is so forgiving for beginners as it is non reactive. This means you won't have the old paint blistering and carrying on for not apparent reason. If you have too much orange peel in the paint it can just be wet sanded and buffed. It is much harder and less prone to chipping accidentally when you rehang the doors etc. Use a gravity feed gun designed for 2 pack. Get the largest compressor you can and have two water traps. When you think you have applied enough primer/filler add some more, very important if you don't want ripples in your panels.

There is so much more to painting and as previously stated check the paint forums.

Remember rule #1 if you paint over crap. you still have crap. http://pantera.infopop.cc/eve/...900062093#5900062093

Panterawannabe has a decent procedure there and I have painted over a lot in my days. I would swap the 120 for 180. You just have to find the stopping point when removing the old. If you find your getting some areas to bare metal and 2,3layers of old paint in others you may as well bite the bullet and strip it all. I use evercoat brand aircraft stripper from napa. The customers car in my shop now only took one layer of stripper! That is rare, usually it takes 2-3 applications. Wear gloves and use a razor blade scraper, change blades if it starts to scratch the metal. You can roll the edge of the razor a little on glass to help it not dig in. I hold a box in one hand and scrape into it. Once you get 90% off you can wipe it down with a wet rag. This makes the residue get hard so you can sand it off without gumming up the sandpaper. If I can advise in any way, please don't hesitate to ask. I live for painting cars!

Thanks for all the advice everyone. All great points points and suggestions.

I started stripping a front fender to bare metal and will see how it proceeds. It's going to be a couple weeks until I can really attack things.

Is there something I can coat the bare metal with until I am ready to prime?

Another question: How should I strip/paint the undersides of the hood and rear deck?

quote:

Is there something I can coat the bare metal with until I am ready to prime?

Rub it down with Phosphoric Acid. It will acid etch the metal, iron phosphatize it, and protect it from flash rust.

You can use Eastwood Metal Prep, Por-15 Metal Prep, Jasco Metal Prep, etc. They're all the same thing.