Optimus Prime - The '68 Coupe

gregski · Mar 2, 2011

Am I Making A Mistake Here

Here's a tip. When cleaning and prepping your surface for paint, you should also clean the surface that you will stick your tape to. For instance when back taping the door jams, I had to clean at least an inch all the way around the edge, that way the tape would have a good clean surface to bond too, otherwise it will fall off, especially when blown by compressed air from your paint gun. Same goes for the tape and paper I will put underneath the car along the rocker panel seam. The back of that seam is the dirties part of the car, so I made sure I cleaned it off the best I could. I may end up using duct tape on the back of it just for good measure.

I don't know what I was thinking when I decided to use a long piece of used drop cloth to cover the roof and the already painted tailgate. Maybe it will be ok, maybe not. It was getting late in the evening, I put in a 12 hour day, and it seemed like a good idea at the time. Now that I think about it, won't the compressed air from my spray gun blow out any dust from the drop cloth out into the open and onto my newly primed surface. Am I making a bone head mistake?

gregski · Mar 4, 2011

Adversity

Well here's the weekend forecast.

1. I am sick
2. It is supposed to rain
3. My family car is broken and needs new lifters

Why am I posting this? Well because this is how it goes, the one time I have money for supplies, materials, paint, what ever, the other stars are not aligning. Yes I will find a way to get it done, but I want to build a temporary booth outside to paint the loose bits outside. But if it is going to rain I am screwed. Also I would like for it to be at least 60 degrees outside so the epoxy is happy when it goes on. The first kid was sick, the wife was sick, the second kid was sick, so guess what, it's my turn. However the weather forecasts have been awful lately and completely inaccurate. Will labor of love prevail, stay tuned...

gregski · Mar 9, 2011

It was a 70 degree day!

The original plan was to built a 10 foot wide by 16 foot long booth using some basic hand tools, but as it turns out I did not have enough lumber to do that plus the patio is only 8 feet wide.

I tell ya building a 8Wx8Hx10L box out of sticks by yourself is no fun. Luckily the house gave me a hand. Not to mention I barely had any 8 foot studs I had to make do with what I had so I started lengthening them, that was a PIA.

I know, I know, mow the lawn right, well let me get my list of excuses, the stupid mower won't run, yes it has gas in it, and the lawn is so wet I'm waiting for it to dry out a bit. (Plus it's not my house)

65ShelbyClone · Mar 9, 2011

I had thought about getting one of those cheap tarp-covered carports and using plastic drop cloth to make a temporary/portable booth.

gregski · Mar 9, 2011

65ShelbyClone said:
I had thought about getting one of those cheap tarp-covered carports and using plastic drop cloth to make a temporary/portable booth.

As did I but they are still more expensive than constructing your own, plus they are very narrow if you were to try to paint a car in it, plus there's absolutely no chance of slamming your thumb with a hammer while assembling one of them PVC pipe like structures, LOL where's the fun in that!

gregski · Mar 9, 2011

Size Matters

This just in: an 8 by 10 foot booth is not that big, the classic Mustang doors are 7 foot long and only dwarfed by the 9 foot long fenders, geez. I kid, I kid!

I decided to build a booth to spray the off the car bits since my car doesn't run yet and the brakes don't work and it's a pain to push it in and out of the garage with flat tires, get the idea. Also I thought I had a ton of lumber that I was saving for just this type of project... WRONG!

I bought three rolls of 9 foot tall by 12 foot long plastic which I decided to run on the inside of the lumber frame so it wouldn't matter if it was moldy and yucky and dirty

so let's do some 3rd grade arithmetic, 10 foot side plus 8 foot side plus another 10 foot side plus another 8 foot side give us ... 36 feet all the way around the box... and three rolls of 12 foot long plastic give us... [wait for it] that's right just enough material to go all the way around and look like a genius when this was sheer luck (by going on the inside that allowed for approximate 3 inch overlaps... BONUS!

gregski · Mar 9, 2011

It Will Do!

is it perfectly square - nope
does it lean a bit - yup
will it fall over - nope
will it get the job done - yup

used duct tape to keep the staples from tearing through the plastic

seal the seams with universal multipurpose duct tape (cause it's not just for gagging by the mafia anymore) had I planned it better maybe the seem could have ran along a post or something

put some long screws as the stoppers to keep the 10 foot joists from falling on my head when I go to slide them over since you can't see the ends, the goal is to hang pieces on these 2x4s using baling wire and slide them from one side to the other as I paint them, we'll see how that works out...

gregski · Mar 10, 2011

if you build it they will come

a painters ladder with a tray made life much easier, otherwise this could be a two man job, and wear gloves these bits are sharp

the doors hung naturally, but the fenders took a bit of figuring, hanging them from the bolt holes laid the fender on it's side and one would have to paint them whilst on his back, and Sistine they were not, nor I Michelangelo, so I went through the antenna hole instead and then on the opposite side attached to one of the headlight bucket holes, of course the driver side fender had no antenna hole so I cleverized that one, lol, but got it vertical

the plan was four rows, you slide three to one side out of the way and spray the first row, then slide that row out of the way and slide row 2 into the open and shoot that

The method to my madness:

shooting 1 - - - - - 2, 3, 4 in waiting

1 done - - - - - 2 getting shot - - - - - 3, 4 on deck

1, 2 done - - - - - 3 under the gun - - - - - 4 on the bench

1, 2, 3 done - - - - 4 shot last but not least

cause it was way to cramped to space out and shoot all of them in there at once

gregski · Mar 10, 2011

on the inside

here's the 100 foot spool of galvanized wire I used to hang up the parts, I got it at Home Depot, didn't really need 100 feet but that's all they had, I cut the wire into 6 foot sections for the bottom pieces cause that's how tall I say I am, I would stand on the end stretch it to the top of my head and clip it off (I'm actually 5' 11" and 1/2 but don't tell) the top sections got 3 foot wires

as you can see it got quite cozy in there real fast, hardly any room to even fart, i had two levels of parts the lighter stuff hung from the same joist above the heavier part (seemed like a good idea at the time...)

headlight extension over door

rear valance over fender

front valance over other fender

headlight extension over other door

the poor stone deflector was still too rusty to paint so he had to sit this one out

gregski · Mar 10, 2011

do it right

so that stupid drop cloth draped across my beloved was keeping me up at night, something had to be done, so off it came like a prom dress, and I masked it off with paper like god intended, yes I did run out of the brown paper so I had to resort to my bag of old tricks, ie newspapers

notice the antenna cable I carefully masked off with blue tape, well after it was all said and done and I went to remove the tape the whole cable came out of the hole, but I swear when I tried to yank it out before it would not budge

gregski · Mar 11, 2011

just shoot it already

alright, geez, here we go, these shots are crammed for a reason, to show you how tight it was in that booth, I felt like a contortionist trying to get primer inside all the nooks and cranies, I also have a bruise on my forehead that should have received a stitch or two had I had the time to go to the doctor

gregski · Mar 11, 2011

now for the car

so I started shooting the bits in the booth, spraying the undersides of the fenders and the insides of the doors, then I went to refill the pistol and while in the garage already decided to use that refill to shoot the car and the hood that was hanging inside the garage

(that was one quart of primer mixed with half a quart of activator)

guess what... I ran out of primer

guess what... it was 5:30 PM

guess what... Jerry's paint supply closed at 5:00 PM

The Greg was pissed. So I cleaned my equipment and called it a day.

8:00 AM the next day picked up another quart of primer and half a quart of activator and at 9:00 AM we were back in business making things gray. 9:15 refilled the gun, 9:30 AM we were done - 11:30 we hung the bits in the garage... and at noon it started to rain

66Coupe289POWER · Mar 11, 2011

Very nice work. I couldn't help but notice the rotted floors. Have you checked the cowl to make sure it is not rusted out before laying down all that primer? Just a thought.

gregski · Mar 12, 2011

66Coupe289POWER said:
Very nice work. I couldn't help but notice the rotted floors. Have you checked the cowl to make sure it is not rusted out before laying down all that primer? Just a thought.

thank you, the floors will definitely be replaced, and yes I did check the cowl the best I could with a flashlight and it looked decent in there

gregski · Mar 12, 2011

remember these

originally i primed the rear end with the quarter extensions on the car, but then I was persuaded to remove them and [ahem] do it right, so I did

gregski · Mar 12, 2011

Earth Wind and Wire

Well I was not impressed with the booth at all, but I did learn a ton from using one aside from the fact that an 8 by 10 is way too small, and I am so glad I did it during the primer phase and not the actual paint phase.

Naturally on the day I built it there was no wind at all, but as you know I ran out of primer so I had to finish it the next day, and on that day the wind picked up.

I paid the price for being lazy by not using my duct tape trick to secure the bottom of the plastic like I did the top. The wind tore the plastic off the staples and at one point it touched a wet fender, luckily it was after the first light coat so I re stapled the plastic and re shot that section and all was well.

What I learned is that you need some 1x2 cheap wood studs every 3 feet or so on the inside of the booth to keep the plastic from being sucked in.

Surprisingly going topless, ie no roof was not an issue no debris flu in that I could see. But the double decker concept backfired for two reasons, one it made the parts that much heavier to slide from one end to the other, and more importantly over spray dripping off the top pieces had a place to land, ie the purdy big pieces underneath. (I only caught one on the rear valance when I tried to get some under the license plate bracket, I caught the drop with my glove, ninja style.)

I punched the holes after the pieces were all dry to the touch to give the wind an escape route, that didn't work at all so I pretended I did it to shoot the pictures through.

I will not be using a booth outside to do the final paint job. I may construct one inside the garage just to keep the dust out, but definitely not outside.

More importantly once all the bits were out of the booth and inside the cozy garage, I mowed the lawn, mulched it actually, as I was in the mood for trying something new.

mercurycapri · Mar 12, 2011

What spray gun are you using? What nozzle size are you using for the primer? I want to start painting my car.

gregski · Mar 12, 2011

mercurycapri said:
What spray gun are you using? What nozzle size are you using for the primer?

You don't wanna know, lol

I show pictures of my setup on page 3 of this long thread, below is the direct link to it.

http://www.stangnet.com/mustang-forums/830090-optimus-prime-68-coupe-3.html

It is basically a Mickey Mouse plastic setup from Harbor Freight that comes with a High Volume Low Pressure suction bottom feed paint cup gun, electric compressor built in, a hose, and three different nozzle sizes, small medium, and large. Not being a jerk, that's just as precise as they get, lol. I used the largest one because I was shooting epoxy primer, and that is tough to spray it's basically shooting rubber glue.

I don't think I would recommend this kit for painting, although I did shoot primer with it. You want to shoot primer with the same get up that you will shoot the final coat with so that you know your equipment. What I used was a joke, but I got it done.

Best of luck to you on your project, painting a car is a lot of work, give yourself a lot of time, be patient, you can do it.

gregski · Mar 12, 2011

Drive Side Close Ups

just some close ups of the driver side door jam

gregski · Mar 12, 2011

Passenger Side Close Ups

and some close ups of the passenger side door jam

Optimus Prime - The '68 Coupe

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