Mister Quickie

I'm looking at giving one of my cars a new paint job. There's not as much info out there as I thought but here's what I've pieced together with questions.

1. Sanding down to bare metal
What is the fastest/recommended tool to use for this?
What type/grit sandpaper should be used to sand off both clearcoat and paint?

2. Covering
Just use painter's tape to secure plastic sheeting over all the windows, mirrors, and lights, etc?

3. Priming
Is priming necessary if I'm sanding the old clearcoat and old paint completely off and down to bare metal?
Is there a specific car paint primer to use or any Lowe's primer will do?


4. Painting
Is there specific paint used for cars or any Lowe's paint will do and if so where would I buy it? The auto stored only have small quantities.
Is there any technique/finessing to note or just start spraying?
How many coats is recommended?
What is the drying time between coats?

Thanks in advance,

screamin94Z

when you say Lowe's paint, do you mean house paint? If so, I would recommend taking the car to a body shop.

mytrplseven

If you don't understand the process for a good paint job, I recommend letting the professionals do it. Even an "Earl Scheib" quality paint job will come out better than what you're going to get if you don't understand the process going in.

Van

I recently painted my track car - and, really, all the prep *before* spraying was the hard part.

But, to answer your questions:

First off, sanding will compromise the galvanized coating that prevents the steel from rusting - so don't sand down to metal unless you absolutely have to.

Second, in addition to masking with plastic (or paper) and tape, you really want to take *everything* off that you can. Like bumpers, mirrors, glass, hatch, windshield, door latches, marker lights, head lights, tail lights, bumper pads, etc. The results will just turn out better.

Third, if you want the paint job to last, you absolutely have to use a good automotive quality primer... and it has to be compatible with the color coat(s).

Fourth, if you're looking for good results - which, after spending 100+ hours of labor prepping the car, I imagine you'll want good results - you'll have to use a high quality automotive paint, and probably a clear coat over a base coat.

Number of coats, dry time, etc. will vary from brand to brand... but typically it's two coats of each, with the second coat going on shortly after the first coat. Because of the high-solvent content in automotive paint, it's pretty hard in 12-24 hours, but benefits greatly from curing for several days.

There are also severe health hazards in dealing with automotive paint, so make sure to keep safety first.

Here are some videos I recently made while painting my car. It took about 2 months of prep, and then 1 weekend to paint. Probably 100+ hours.

Van

p.s. it was about $500 for a half gallon of primer and half gallon of single-stage paint (meaning no clear coat was used). And it was a few hundred bucks of body filler and sanding supplies.

Jrboulder

Just roller on some latex paint

Butters944

I'm painting my car rustoleum sunrise red spray cans 1 can at a time. I've only done my front bumper so far and it took dozens of hours but it looks AWESOME! Especially since it only took like $5 of spray paint. Doing it this way you can paint your car at your leisure 1 body panel at a time and its only gonna cost me <$150 or so total.

Don't flame me, this job is to hold me off til I'm done with college and can afford to do a pro paint job.

Dougs951S

pics of the rattle can job? its ok, when I was 17 my first 944 was rattle can flat black with black wheel/silver lips and GT3 orange body accents. Looked pretty good! Better than my 951 does now with its terrible peeling clear coat!

Butters944

It's a good 5 footer, obviously is a little orange peeled but looks good. It's almost a perfect match to guards red.

The euro rear bumper has a super thin coat, like 1/4 spray can. I ran out of time before winter break ended (sprayed it the night before I left and installed the morning before I drove back to NM lol)


The second pic is plasti dip valence, rustoleum bumper, and guards red body. The 3 all match pretty good haha

Dougs951S

Good work Keith

A 5 footer is totally acceptable in my book. My flat black rattle can job was a 5-10 footer when it was fresh, compared to the 30 footer is was before paint. My 951 is a 20 footer at the moment, hoping to plastidip it anthracite gray with dark silver wheels this summer.

fejjj

You guys are too funny! Thanks for the laughs.

Mister Quickie

It was a challenge but I found a shop that has all the tools and paint required to do the job.
I will review Van's videos and post pics of the project.
It's not my 944 that I'll be doing this on but another car that, if things don't turn out great, I can live with.

Mister Quickie

Based on the visit to the local auto paint supply shop, the tools required to do the job are cost prohibitive (for me) and for that reason, I'm out

The recommended sander runs off a 10-15 cfm compressor ($1,500, ouch!). That's not a showstopper since I can get an electric disc sander at Home Depot, albeit with a smaller diameter disc (read more time sanding).

The dealbreaker is the recommended high pressure low volume sprayer that can only run off the aforementioned air compressor.

With the air compressor itself being $1500, tools and materials will run at least $2k which isn't in the same zipcode of what I want to spend on this.

terbiumactivated

Trust me on this, this last skill you want to attempt to acquire on the job without any professional journeyman experience is bodywork. Matching contours, prepping the area correctly, sanding all the micro scratches out and of course the paint job itself are all facets of the job that you will suck at the first time you run it. Even if the car you were practicing on was a rat car one time would not give you the skill to prefect time number two.

Intruder196

I tried this on a VW beetle I was restoring a few years ago. I had it disassembled and figured that I would prep and paint each fender or body panel at my leisure then l would reassemble the car when all was done. The first fender came out beautiful. So I hung it on the wall of the garage to get it out of the way. On another day later on I did another fender. It also came out real nice. The problem was side by side the fenders each were different shades of red even though the paint was the same color same brand. Humidity and temperature do affect the paint as it cures.
Currently I have a Galaxie 500 I am working on painting. But I refuse to ever use rattle can primer or paint as most of it really sucks.