Technical Trash in paint, getting ready to slit my wrists

I rarely ever post on these paint threads and liked it when Paint Guru was on the HAMB as he was pretty decent with his advice. I have been painting since 1964 and did show work, fleet work and production work for GM. After that I did some paint consulting for them and for Greyhound (Transportation Manufacturing Co. in Roswell NM when they bought GM’s Bus line which was all shot with catalyzed systems). I dealt with paint problems with catalyzed paints on a daily basis for about 5 years. That being said it can be hard to diagnose paint problems over a computer screen. Hardener cost a bunch but the labor costs (and wasted time) are often worse so sometimes it pays to toss hardener after a few days IMO. Sometimes refrigerating can help but that goes only so far.

It sounds like you are going to go thru a great deal of work and I believe you should take one more stab at it without making too many adjustments. In my opinion it looks like there was a chemical reaction with the hardener-probably due to age. Why not sand down the surface as good as possible and reshoot with brand new catalyst? If after sanding down if you still see evidence of craters then I would consider plan B which may be to remove what you have. If you are waiting for better temps you should be out of the recoat window that can also cause problems. I would wait for better temps though as I found shooting below an ambient temperature of 70 degrees is asking for problems with quality paint jobs. You should know right off the bat if you have further problems. I think it is worth the chance.

By the way it looks as though your system is pretty decent. I have always been a huge fan of galvanized pipe as it helps dissipates the heat from the compressor, especially in high humidity situations. I always insisted on it when setting up paint systems. With proper filter(s) you should be good to go. I have the same pipe in my home shop as well.

 

It has 2 water/oil separators, then a 5 lb desiccant dryer, then another water trap.

 

I pulled some of the piping down to install the water traps and it looks like it did when I installed it.

 

Do you let your hoses lay on the floor. If so condensation can be built up in the hose too. I always hang mine.

 

Best thing I ever did to my air supply set-up was install a cheapie ( less than $425.00 shipped to my door) Harbor Freight electronic air dryer. Been 3 years and 100% trouble free and zero moisture in my system. Helps to have a best friend from High School who's a car guy and master plumber also !

 

I may have missed it but what kind of gun and what air pressure are you shooting at? Lippy

 

I have a Sata 2000 with a 1.4 tip and I spray around 35 lbs at the gauge.

 

Mainly because of the high gloss, I was going to ask if it was POR-15 you were using, but that does not utilize a catalyst. I know from experience Por-15 will look like what you have if painted on a high humidity day.......even worse., But I am curious why your primer has so much gloss, never saw that before.
I agree with the many that said first suspect is the catalyst, and also highly recommend both solvent and water based cleaners.
What is your shop temperature at when spraying? Lower temps require longer flash times.

 

I found Kirker to be higher gloss as a epoxy primer although I have never had the issues the OP is having with any primer or paint. I could only guess its the product, either the catalyst or the paint. OP has gone to great lengths with equipment to avoid this problem from the usual sources.

 

It doesn't hold the gloss after it dries. It looks sort of like the black that comes on Chinese replacement fenders etc.

 

Fortunateson, maybe a poor choice of words-I imagine he is still out there but I have not seen him post in awhile. Hopefully he will chime in-I consider him an asset on matters of paint.

 

Yeah, I bet he'll have something interesting to say...

 

Not a paint guru by any means but I bough some mixing cups once and didn't rinse them before using them.
Had a similar result, took a while to figure it out but I suspect that there was some sort of release agent on the cups from manufacturing that reacted with the paint.

 

Your best mixing cups are found in the kitchen. Pyrex glass mixing cups, easy to clean and lacquer thinner won't wash the measurement # off.

 

Alternatively, there are cheap plastic ones at the feed store with mixing ratios printed on them, like 4:1:1.

 

I didn't read the whole thread, but here are a few issues I've had:
1.) My air hose was deteriorating even though it was new. Put a filter between the gun and the line-Problem solved
2.) Spraying with an older gun (non HVLP), the gasket was crap, so little chunks were dropping into the cup (likely not your problem)
3.) Wax and Grease remover was crap. Even though it dried and flashed off, it still caused lifting. I switched to rubbing alcohol to prep and had no issues.

 

I had an issue once with adhesion on one of my squirt jobs. I peeled off a section with the a blade and sent it to DuPont for analysis. Came back that there was the presence of silicon between the primer and color coat. I stripped that entire vette with a razor blade and the longest continuous sheet was the entire hood that we peeled off and had as a wall hanger for a while.

Maybe send in a sample of that nasty page one photo? It is not likely an intermittent system issue (water, in-line contamination) as you have shot the cab sucessfully. I'm leaning toward a defect in the chemistry (paint, hardener, contamination, etc).

 

I would suggest mixing a small amount brushing it out if it checks out it's not the product. It looks like from the pictures oil and water from the compressor got to it. Flush the gun with the proper thinner. I would try thinner coats little more flash time in between. And the old factory standby ':airborne contamination", WD-40 rust bust etc. lastly check the wax and grease remover. I love my turbine sprayer, one day I shot this clear with my compressor and it looked very similar to your photos. I dumped it into the turbine came out perfect.I hope this helps

 

UPDATE####################################
I ordered some new primer, problem went away. I agree with those that said the activator went south. Just wanted to close the loop on this. I know we all have a tendency to rant when we have problems but never let anyone know what fixes the problem.

 

Good deal, glad it all worked out in the end.

 

I had issue with DUPLICOLOR precleaner. It smelled like acetone but took forever to dry. I'll be back to RM precleaner.

 

Thanks ! Too many people never post when they finally get an answer to their problem. I'm happy for you paint problems can drive you nuts.

 

******Update on an Update*******

After much head scratching with the problem coming and going, it was determined that air compressor was leaking by and oil contaminants were traveling through the line. I broke down and bought a new compressor after 25 years of use. It is like driving a Cadillac compared to a Yugo.

 

One thing I always do is wet down the floor to keep dust down.

 

Funny. I usually wet down the floor and the whole freaking yard. It’s never from lack of trying.