painting my car

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w2rbass

Member
how hard is it really to paint a car? it would be a helluva lot cheaper for me to just buy the gun and paint, tarp off my garage and do it at home than to pay some body shot.. and im def. not going maaco.. so im just wondering how hard it really is to paint a car, im willing to learn, but i mean fuck, i make like 5 grand a year. lol

p.s. anyone in CT with car painting skills?

thanks a lot
 
hmmmm is it hard to paint a car? No. is it hard to paint a car with no skill or experience? Yes. depending ion what u want to do it will become more difficult (if u want to do the bodywork to the car to make it staright) and also more expensive. all depends on your budget and what you want to do more or less
 
Well I am doing it now, and I don't have much experience. It is still expensive to do it yourself, but ALOT cheaper then to have another person do it. I can't give you really any painting tips because I am still in the learning process. I will tell you that you need a good gun (hvlp preferred) (I found for $80), a LARGE & oiless compressor (9cfm at 60 psi type of big) ($300 on sale at sears), air pressure regulator if the gun doesn't have it ($20 or so at sears), water separator ($20), air hoses (mine came free with compressor), air fittings. I learned this the hard way, get a good air resperator, sears has a couple $20-$30, if you go cheap the paint will go right through the mask or the sides of the mask. My nostrils turned black because I used a cheap one, I was blowing out black stuff for the next two days. It really isn't that hard to do all things considered, but, it takes practice, skill and lots of time. I bought all my paint at napa, cost about $250 for the paint I used, including primer, basecoat, clearcoat, reducer and hardener. They sell a cheaper single stage which mixes the basecoat and clearcoat together, I also found out the hard way that it is not as forgiving if you make a mistake. I ended up redoing the car with the basecoat/clearcoat and now find it much better.
 
im in the process of fixing my body.. the bumpers dont sit right, i gotta replace the impact bars and some other stuff.. so im just gonna get a wings west kit since i gotta get new bumpers neway... the doors are kinda funky, nothing i cant live with, other then that i need a new rear hatch, and then the body will be good enough for me.. not a show car or anything..

http://www.hokpaint.com/scripts/depot.exe?pgm=showchip5.bbx i wanna use hok.. prism pearl blue over white basecoat

my dad and my uncle both have compressors.. i have enough money for a good gun and all the paint i need

i have no problem with it taking time.. my car is gonna be off the road anyway so i can fix up a new engine, why not do both at the same time, and i will have another car to drive, and a g.f. with a car... so time isnt an issue... plus there is a auto paint shop down the street they just sell the stuff tho, no painting, so i could get sum stuff there

but what skill would i need.. im a carpenters son=ive been sanding since i was a kid, but what else would i need to know, ive read a lot.. it all seems like common sense, but then again, im prolly wrong

thanks a lot
 
learn like i did get a couple shaets of dry wall and prime the good and seal the practise spraying untill you get uniform coats
 
my first paintjob was flawless. not one single run in the clear and no dry spots. my second (my car) i did in the booth and one of the lights was blown so the rear bumper isn't as dark. as long as you have all the right equiptment and a good teacher its not too hard. the only difficult part is the clear. and make sure you use the right reducer for the tempureture when clearing.
 
maybe the blown out light made a shadow and made it harder to see how much paint he sprayed on the bumper thus making it lighter then the rest of the car
 
first paintjobs are NEVER flawless....your a rookie, as you stated it was your first paintjob, might look flawless to u but i could probable find a million imperfections
 
give him a break you dont know what he did. ive been painting for three years now and my first paintjob was beautiful. thats not to say that all of them since have been but painting is not "easy". any one "can" paint but it takes a professional to fix your fuc*ups.
 
Just be willing to learn, and face the harsh reality of fucking up. My first paint job is still holding strong, but is far from perfect. You have to be sure that all of your bodywork is absolutely perfect. If you can see or feel any differences, even slightly, then it will show.

The good news is that your learning curve goes way up after the first paintjob. You figure out where you messed up, and find out how to avoid repeating the same mistakes.

My first paintjob, I had big ideas, too big for my skills. I had a V-8 s-10. Before they were popular, I molded in a hood scoop and fender vents from an early 80's camaro. Then I grafted on fiberglass ground effects. After that, I painted a multi-color base clear paintjob. I painted it bright yellow, with black racing stripes. It's still not rusting, 7 years later. It's still not perfect. I could have redone it by now, but I've learned to love those mistakes, and I'm still proud of how well I did despite of them.
 
I am a preffesional. whats flawless to me and or any toher professional is going to different than that of someone who has just painted their car on thier own for the first time. not to say that anyone with time and patience cannot do a very good job, and be damn proud of it but thier idea of perfect and and proffesionals idea of perfect who paints for a living is gonna have some differences. That is all
 
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