Anyone here ever painted their own car?

[Flyboy]

Just an idea i've been kicking around of doing my garage up as a "booth". Would be pretty easy since I already have flourescent lights hung, can get my hands on mass amounts of plastic to hang, and could easily do up a down draft style exhaust in the garage. Since the car is already apart, and the body work is already 95% completed. I've heard from a few people that it can come out VERY nice if you take your time, even if your make-shift "booth". Comments? Ideas if I was to actually do this? I'm actually pretty serious about it if I get some encouraging feedback. But please, post up why I shouldn't if you know something I don't (which is usually the case with me ). The color that i'm going to dress the car in is probably going to be the blue off of the Subaru WRX... or possibly even Electron Blue.

[68protouring454]

base/clear is very easy to use, when applied right, sealer and base should be applied lightly 2 coats to achieve even coverage, not 1 or 1.5, take 2 it will flash dry quicker, thus preventing dust to get into it, and i would tack cloth in between coats, this is where the light coats help as you will not have a tacky spot as you will not have even air flow in the make shift booth, once you get to the clear there is not much you can do, just apply 2-3 medium wet coats, or as much as you can get on without running it, and just go with it, once done after 2-3 days, nib, wet sand and buff and you should not be able to tell if it were done in a 50,000 dollar booth or a home garage, that is if the bodywork is good and you do not rush the paint, causing solvent pops, etc, also give your urethane primers time to shrink, its not worth rushing, goodluck
jake

[camcojb]

I've done several. If you look at my sig the 67 Nova, and both Cobra's were painted in my garage. You definitely cannot tell I did not have a booth.

I will also be painting the twin turbo in the next 2-3 weeks, again at my house.

Jody

[Flyboy]

Jody, you have a PM

[CAMAROBOY69]

I have also painted a couple cars of my own. Recently I primered 2 different cars. My 69 Camaro and the 66 Nova. Soon the 67 Mustang will be primered.
Yes Grey.

[Flyboy]

I have also painted a couple cars of my own. Recently I primered 2 different cars. My 69 Camaro and the 66 Nova. Soon the 67 Mustang will be primered.
Yes Grey.

Yeesh, one in every crowd.

[Kevin1kas]

I painted a couple cars in my garage in Hawaii which came out nice. I did that about 14-16 years ago. I recently did the Body work on my full size Blazer, but had reservations about spraying it due to the size of the vehicle, an untested spray gun, and it had been so long since I painted a car. Anyway, I ended up driving the vehicle down to a body shop and had them paint it for about a grand. Those *******s did a half ass job. There was dust in the paint, they ran a door, etc. I couldn't believe they were a professional shop with a booth. I ended up spraying the removable hardtop myself in the garage. The hard-top came out great. I wish I had just done the Blazer myself.

A few suggestions for the painting. Turn off the gas to your water heater. Open flames are bad. Make sure you have some kind of inline filter, and I have always watered down the garage to keep dust from blowing into your paint. I cracked my garage door up about 2 feet to allow some ventilation. When I was done spraying I opened up the garage door for a minute to air it out. Was some serious fumes coming out of there. I'm sure the neighbor selling/showing his house wasn't too happy. The looks I got from the buyers were something else.

[68LSS1]

I will be painting my project too. I figure I can't do anything that wet sanding won't fix (hopefully) .

[Radio Joe]

I painted my Vette in my Michigan garage. The biggest problem I had was mosquitos coming in under the door. When I do the Corvair I am going to cover the the open areas with furnace filters.

The Vette job came out very well for my first paint job.. not perfect but definitely nice. You can see some pictures of it (including during painting) here:

Franken-vette

Go for it.. you'll be happy and save money!

[Flyboy]

What do you guys think about a gun like this?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...category=43987

Seems kinda cheap, and I know you get what you pay for, but how fancy do I need to get? It IS an HVLP gun, but i'm kinda hoping someone might be able to give me a better idea.

[RatMalibu]

like you said you get what ya pay for Doug.....I recently picked up a $35 gravity fed HVLP thinking eh it'll be ok for primer.....first time I used it I had primer oozing out of the needle packing onto my fingers.....I took it apart and found out why....they used a common rubber o-ring instead of a packing (all of the packings were o-rings in this gun)....rubber and thinners/reducers don't mix too well and the packing had kinda expanded until it split.....just from being used about 30 minutes

Sharp has just introduced a "budget" line called the "FX" I ordered a 1.3mm tip HVLP last week......it looks to be well made and Sharp is a good name It was $93 I think......I'll let ya know how it does after it comes in

[Flyboy]

Please let me know what you think once you get it in. Thanks.

[68protouring454]

also sears sells a decent hvlp gun with 3 tips, however you will need to pick up a 1.3 or 1.4 for sealer/base/clear , it is marked with a sears logo but it really is a devillbiss finishline, it has plastic tips which will where out after heavy use but you will never wear it out, it comes with a 1.6, 1.8 and a 2.2 tip so you will have primers and thick coatings covered, any autobody shop should have the tips in stock, they should be around 15 bucks, i believe the gun is like 150 or so bucks at sears, i would check that gun out. it does not touch a sata or iwata but is real nice
jake

[Flyboy]

I guess that's something that I haven't asked about yet. What's the deal with the different tip sizes, and which sizes do you recommend for each step of the painting process? My apologies if i'm asking too many questions, i'm just trying to get this somewhat right the first time around. :icon996:

[hotrodgary]

I've painted several cars in my garage at home and they come out pretty damn nice...I get more compliments on the paint than anything else.

I use a Devilbiss Gravity Feed HVLP and I like it alot. When you buy a cheap gun you get what you pay for.

The diff. tips depends on your paint(or primer).....smaller tips are for thinner mixtures(basecoats), larger are for thicker mixtures(primers, some enamels, some basecoat metallics & pearls, & clearcoats).

But one thing to remember is that its not necassarly how you paint it but what underneath the paint.

The preparation before you paint is what can determine a show job from shmo job!!

Later, Gary

[68protouring454]

for primers, urethane/epoxy i would use a 1.8 to 2.0, i would maybe go to a 1.6 for a 2nd or 3rd coat or urethane primer.
for sealer/base/clear no matter what pearl, flake, clear use a 1.3 or 1.4, anything bigger and you will have orange peel problems especially if you are a novice, goodluck
jake

[Happyfunballs]

Paint in my garage all the time, even turned it into a "booth" as you suggested. I filter the incoming air and achieve proper laminar flow with the correct CFM. The best part is I don't get any complaints from the neighbors. But having the correct place to paint is only the first step in a lengthy process to getting a quality paint job....as the others have noted.

[84gp]

If you get everything clean, hang plastic, and use furnace filters, you can get great results in a garage. Cleaner than some "professional" booths. The plastic made by 3M creates static electricity and attracts most of the dust. Seems to help alot.

[el-camino]

hi,
all my cars i painted in my garage with HLVP

[harshman]

doug
there is a paint store on d.i. and valley view'ish that sels some pretty bad ass guns - they are all rebuilt but top notch.