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    Results 1 to 6 of 6
    1. #1
      Join Date
      Feb 2015
      Posts
      37
      Country Flag: United States

      Tips for painting with Pearl paint

      How's it goin!


      Got a few questions for you guys on painting with Pearl paint.


      The color I bought is Valspar Audi Lava Grey it's a pearl paint (already mixed into the base coat; done at the paint shop) I clarify that because I've had some people ask if it was the 3 step type of paint.


      My neighbor owns a paint shop with a booth that he will rent to me for $100 a day. It's isn't air temp controlled (living in San Diego, CA I'm sure helps with that). It's just a standard booth with a standard compressor and filtration, nothing overly fancy.


      My car is a 1970 Ford Torino. It's a big one that's for sure. I can't figure out the best way to paint this car. Should I paint all the jambs, trunk underside, front fender and rear quarter ends first. Then assemble the car and paint the whole thing together in 1 shot.


      Or if I should disassemble everything (doors,trunk lid, fenders, hood, bumpers, etc...) and paint everything seperatly, then reassemble once done. I've heard the only issue with doing it this way is to just make sure the panel is sprayed in the position it will be in. Will spraying them separately create a slight paint mismatch once assembled?


      Also, I want to add accent stripes to the car and I planned on spraying the accent stripes first, then masking them off and spraying my grey base coat, then removing the masking tape from the accent stripes and shooting clear. Do I need to scuff the accent stripes before shooting the clear? Or am I good to go? Just remove the masking tape and let it rip?


      Any tips for spraying Pearl paint? I sprayed some out on a test panel and there seemed to be some type of spray variation in the base coat after it dried. Some of it kinda looked like dry spray but I know it wasn't, it just appreared to look like it. Will it all look uniform after the clear has been applied? Or are the variations from my spray distance?


      Any tips would be great!

    2. #2
      Join Date
      Oct 2009
      Location
      CT.
      Posts
      738
      Lots of good questions there. The good thing is that you have a booth to spray in, going to have better, more consistent air flow that doing it in a garage at home.

      If you are a novice painter, then I would suggest that you jamb all the parts first, then assemble the car and paint it as a whole. I do the opposite and spray everything separately, but I have 25 years of experience and am very consistent in my spray technique. For someone with less experience painting everything together will net best results.

      Doing it this way will actually make doing the stripes easier as well. I like your thinking, I alway want to mask off the smaller area, so by laying down the accent color first and taping it off, then spraying the Lava Grey will make things easier in my eye. I am a PPG guy, so I can't speak on your paint, but most paints need to be cleared within 24 hours. So if you are able to get the accent color down and masked, then spray the Lava color, then unmask and clear all in that time frame you will be successful.

      Its a hot time of year, make sure you are using a SLOW reducer in your colors. They need time to lay down and smooth out. The metallic and pearls know what to do to orient themselves, sounds stupid I know. But we need to give them time to do it. Using too fast of a reducer will not let that happen and the base will appear mottled, or and uneven finish. Slow is much better! I can't stress this enough. I have seen more people ruin a paint job by using too fast of a reducer out of fear of it going too slow. Everyone wants it to flash off fast, but then they have no control over the look of the pearls/metallics and how they lay.



      I hope this helped. Any more questions feel free to throw them out!

      Glenn



      Glenn

      1955 Chevy BelAir
      1951 Chevy 3100
      1987 Chevy Silverado

      My last project....
      https://www.pro-touring.com/threads/...my-72-Maverick!!

    3. #3
      Join Date
      Feb 2015
      Posts
      37
      Country Flag: United States
      Quote Originally Posted by HotRod47 View Post
      Lots of good questions there. The good thing is that you have a booth to spray in, going to have better, more consistent air flow that doing it in a garage at home.

      If you are a novice painter, then I would suggest that you jamb all the parts first, then assemble the car and paint it as a whole. I do the opposite and spray everything separately, but I have 25 years of experience and am very consistent in my spray technique. For someone with less experience painting everything together will net best results.

      Doing it this way will actually make doing the stripes easier as well. I like your thinking, I alway want to mask off the smaller area, so by laying down the accent color first and taping it off, then spraying the Lava Grey will make things easier in my eye. I am a PPG guy, so I can't speak on your paint, but most paints need to be cleared within 24 hours. So if you are able to get the accent color down and masked, then spray the Lava color, then unmask and clear all in that time frame you will be successful.

      Its a hot time of year, make sure you are using a SLOW reducer in your colors. They need time to lay down and smooth out. The metallic and pearls know what to do to orient themselves, sounds stupid I know. But we need to give them time to do it. Using too fast of a reducer will not let that happen and the base will appear mottled, or and uneven finish. Slow is much better! I can't stress this enough. I have seen more people ruin a paint job by using too fast of a reducer out of fear of it going too slow. Everyone wants it to flash off fast, but then they have no control over the look of the pearls/metallics and how they lay.



      I hope this helped. Any more questions feel free to throw them out!

      Glenn

      Awesome man thanks for all the help! I appreciate it.

      So for doing the jambs and stuff separately do I clear them as well? I imagine it would be easier to shoot the jambs and then clear them VS shooting them in base coat, the painting the whole car and clearing the car, then clearing the jambs.

      Would it be fine to paint some parts separately? The front and rear fender and quarter ends (there removable) the bumpers?

      Also should I paint past the jambs? So that way I don't have hard paint lines and then I can just mask off
      The jamb and scuff the feathered paint?

      Also, how do I prevent hard paint lines since I will be masking the jambs? Trunk jamb, door jambs, fender to hood jambs?

      Thanks

    4. #4
      Join Date
      Oct 2009
      Location
      CT.
      Posts
      738
      Quote Originally Posted by Andre.servin View Post
      Awesome man thanks for all the help! I appreciate it.

      So for doing the jambs and stuff separately do I clear them as well? I imagine it would be easier to shoot the jambs and then clear them VS shooting them in base coat, the painting the whole car and clearing the car, then clearing the jambs.

      Would it be fine to paint some parts separately? The front and rear fender and quarter ends (there removable) the bumpers?

      Also should I paint past the jambs? So that way I don't have hard paint lines and then I can just mask off
      The jamb and scuff the feathered paint?

      Also, how do I prevent hard paint lines since I will be masking the jambs? Trunk jamb, door jambs, fender to hood jambs?

      Thanks
      Always happy to help!

      For the jambs, yes base and clear them when the past are separate from the car. I have zero issues painting things in pieces, some people do. I can't speak to your abilities obviously,but over all I would say you should be fine on the smaller parts.

      Not having a tape line is the hard part of doing it this way. With some practice and patience it is possible to roll the tape in the jamb, or use foam edging tape to help prevent that.



      Glenn

      1955 Chevy BelAir
      1951 Chevy 3100
      1987 Chevy Silverado

      My last project....
      https://www.pro-touring.com/threads/...my-72-Maverick!!

    5. #5
      Join Date
      Feb 2015
      Posts
      37
      Country Flag: United States
      Quote Originally Posted by HotRod47 View Post
      Always happy to help!

      For the jambs, yes base and clear them when the past are separate from the car. I have zero issues painting things in pieces, some people do. I can't speak to your abilities obviously,but over all I would say you should be fine on the smaller parts.

      Not having a tape line is the hard part of doing it this way. With some practice and patience it is possible to roll the tape in the jamb, or use foam edging tape to help prevent that.
      Experience wise, I've painted 7 cars successfully. I believe they all came out successful, but all the paint jobs where on an assembled car (no jambs) and they where all single stage paint jobs.

      This will be my first basecoat/clearcoat paint job, which from what I understand these can sometime be more forgiving? I've been doing body work and paint on my home projects for about 5 years now.


      I personally would kinda prefer to paint separately so that way I can get all the panels covered nicely, jambs, inside of doors. So that way I get no paint lines and full coverage.

      Well, you think I should just spray them seperately? Any tips or things to keep in mind when painting seperatly?

    6. #6
      Join Date
      Oct 2009
      Location
      CT.
      Posts
      738
      Ok, so you have experience. I didn't realize that. That being the case, go for it and spray all the parts separately.

      The most important thing when doing it that way is consistency. Same amount of coats, same reduction, same overlap, same air pressure etc, etc.

      Consistency is the key. If you can do that then you will have complete success!! You can do it, i'm confident.




      Glenn

      1955 Chevy BelAir
      1951 Chevy 3100
      1987 Chevy Silverado

      My last project....
      https://www.pro-touring.com/threads/...my-72-Maverick!!






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