My home made paint job *pics*

AirForge

New Member
Apr 22, 2002
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NC
My white 96 mustangs paint was starting to peel and get really crappy. So me and my dad decide to do a nice home paintjob in his garage. My dad has an air compressor and the correct masking tape, everything else i bought from the local auto paint store. I used Crossfire crystal white paint. With the new paints now you have to buy diffrent components and mix them before you spray the car. The paint, clearcoat, reducer, hardener, paint sitcks, paint filters and a new gun with a 1.4 mm tip cost around $330 dollors total. It took 8 days from start to finish doing all the work my self (my dad got lyme desease early in the project). I kept a running log of time i spent working on the car. It took me 46 hours and 50 minutes. I didnt buy primer or sealer because i didnt feel it was needed. The first step in the process is to wash the car throughly and use wax/grease remover. The next step was to remove everything i could from the body. I removed the tail lights, turn signals, the fuel door, the spoiler, all emblems, the trunk lining and the hood scoops. Anything i didnt remove, i taped up. I then wet sanded the entire body, focusing on the imperfections ofcourse. The reason for sanding is to give the future paint a surface to stick to. After the entire car was sanded i used the grease wax remover again and then whiped the entire car off with a tac cloth to remove any dust or hairs. After all this, i was finally ready to start painting the car. We adjusted the gun to spray correctly then applyed 3 coats of basecoat. We let the coats flash dry for 5 minutes inbetween each coat, then waiting 20 minutes before applying the clear coat. Then we applyed 4 coats of clear coat. At this point the car was starting to look very good, but then a nasty little problem arose. A ton of evil little bugs begun to fly into the garage and get stuck in my brand new paintjob. Apparently we started spraying the car to late in the day and the bugs decided to jump in. The next day i resanded the body, reapplyed all coats and made sure no little nastys got in my paint. That was all i had to do for my nice $330 paintjob. Now on to the pictures....


These are the parts that i took off the car..
parts.jpg



These 2 pics are after the car has been prepped and is ready for paint...
preped1.jpg


preped2.jpg



This is the car after the basecoat has been applied, the black thing in the pic is just from the camera, not in the paint.....
basecoat.jpg


basecoat2.jpg



Here is our workbench...
workbench.jpg



And finnally here is the finished product....
done2.jpg


done1.jpg


:banana:
As you can see it turned out pretty well. The paint still has some orange peel and little imperfections in it, but i havnt buffed yet. It doesnt get much better then that for a 300 dollor paintjob :) What do u guys think?
 
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Not too bad.

You could have avoided the bugs and any dust by just making a makeshift paint booth. Make a frame out of 2x4's hang it from the rafters and wrap it in polly plastic. Weight it down and away you go.
 
So what was the process you used, and what products did you use? I am really interested in this, so if you could fill us all in on the details, please do. How long did it take? How many coats? All that info...please...thank you :)
 
So what was the process you used, and what products did you use? I am really interested in this, so if you could fill us all in on the details, please do. How long did it take? How many coats? All that info...please...thank you

The details of this project are closely guarded military secrets. It involves extreamly advanced products devloped by NASA. :rolleyes:
 
Looking good man....get that thing color sanded and buffed out now. Nothing like a good color sanded and buffed out paint job. Here's a pic of mine I did in my garage.
 

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Ok AirForge so you going to spill your secrets or what? Come on inquering minds would like to know or at least I do since one day I would like to paint a car as well....

I thought i explained everything fairly well in my origional post :shrug: , but ill be happy to answer any specific questions you have as best i can.

what products did you use?

My dad has an air compressor and the correct masking tape, everything else i bought from the local auto paint store. I used Crossfire crystal white paint. With the new paints now you have to buy diffrent components and mix them before you spray the car. The paint, clearcoat, reducer, hardener, paint sitcks, paint filters and a new gun with a 1.4 mm tip cost around $330 dollors total.

How long did it take?

46 hours and 50 minutes, yes.. i counted

How many coats?

I used 3 coats of base coat and 4 coats of clear. When you buy paint they will give you a tech sheet with instructions on how to apply the paint (number of coats, flash times, etc..).


I found www.autobody101.com very usefull, the forums mostly

www.carcraft.com also has some great tech articles about painting and refinishing cars
 
Did you have any problems with the paint building up or running together in the door handles and the bottom of the rockers, or even the scoops? I know the rockers would've been very easy to pop off, but you may not have had problems.
What's the next step? Stripes? Ghost Flames? You wanna paint my GT?, hehe For extra practice of course, hehe.
 
Did you have any problems with the paint building up or running together in the door handles and the bottom of the rockers, or even the scoops?

The only run ive found is on the upper right side of the trunk. Everything else seems to have come out nicely.

What's the next step?

Well im planning on putting on the bullitt suspension kit next week. After that some new rims. The ones in the pic are from the previous owner and i dont really like them. Im thinking Mach 1 rims.
 
Very nice job dude.You picked great color to paint with since this is your first paint job.And i see that you used to trusty old newspaper for the masking paper......you can't never go wrong with that stuff.I have masked a lot of cars using old news papers.And i also see that you wet the floor down before you painted.................good idea.What part of NC are you located in?