The 70s vehicle I'm working on came from the factory with acrylic enamel metallic paint. Did the old paint have lead in it? I've been wanting to paint it with the same paint but people I talked with say I should use base coat clear coat for metallic. I would like to use Centari Acrylic Enamel single stage.
If you use single stage, you can't color sand and buff. Sanding will get you into the metallic particles and it'll start looking blotchy.
So, I am confused, your title says they say I shouldn't use BC/CC for metallics, but you are saying now that you should use it?
If you do use acrylic enamel use hardener , then you'll have UV protection, hardener has isocyanate , do not use without a suit , gloves and outside air respirator , the stuff is deadly ...
DuPont Centari acrylic enamel is no longer offered or supported by DuPont which is now Axalta. Expert painters can get very good results with acrylic enamel/hardener w/o rub and buff. . It all depends on what your expectations are.
if ya want it to have the factory look, little depth and limited gloss, use the single stage. do not run it or expect to remove any major imperfections from it sanding on a single stage metallic will goof it up base clear lays down the metallic much better and allows you to remove any imperfections that may occur easier to spray as well
I want the factory 70s GM look. Some how they managed back in the 70s to paint it acrylic enamel. Did the old acrylic enamel have lead in it? Where the acrylic enamels back then better then what there is today? On a newer honda I've had factory bc/cc peal on me. The old factory 70s paint does dull but it is nothing that some wax can't solve to make it shine again. The pealing of bc/cc looks terrible on the honda.
What GM car from the 70's had acrylic enamel from the factory? AFAIK, GM used acrylic lacquer across the board until sometime in the 80's. They made the change to base/clear at various times in the 80's. For example, some lines were converted in the early 80's, but the G body cars(Buick Regal, Olds Cutlass, etc) had lacquer all the way thru the last year of production which was 87 or 88.
Paint manufacturers don’t spend much time with single stage metallic When you get paint mixed at a paint store, the pigments are the same. It’s the binder you choose that is different. Meaning, one mixing bank at the store can mix enamel, urethane, base coat. It’s priced according to the quality of the binder/amount of pigment combo. Enamel is on the low side of the scale. Is it the same? Possible, why should they spend time on a product they don’t sell much of. Lead? You would have to read the spacific formulation from the paint manufacturer but I would suspect the EPA has caused them to remove it if it was even used at all. Plenty of factory single stage has peeled as well as bc/cc. Factories are limited on paint thickness by EPA regs. The Honda didn’t peel because of the process but more than likely a combo of limited thickness and care. GM used lacquer during those years anyway. It’s hard to find due to EPA regs and it’s just garbage in general unless it stays inside. Manufacturers changed to bc/cc to hold up better with industrial fallout and UV protection along with solvent content regulations. Lacquer is mostly wasted solvent. Plus folks don’t polish cars like thay used to
Your title makes no sense to me. Base clear is preferred these days, especially with metallics. Who said not to use it? Don't compare the current crop of BC/CC with the crap from the '80's when they were just starting with it, totally different stuff and it's come a long way in the past 40 years. I'm currently in the paint stage of my project and we were headed down the BC/CC path until it was time to paint my engine and tranny. I was doing that part and didn't want to use BC/CC on them, I wanted single stage. He mixed me up the single stage I wanted and I did my thing. He was painting some of the other smaller parts at the same time and decided to use single stage after looking at my results. He's in such a BC/CC rut these days, doing new car repairs, he hadn't considered single stage for my project. We had talked a LOT before we actually started the actual spraying of paint. I like the "looks" of the shine on single stage more than BC/CC. To me single stage has the gloss down inside the paint and BC/CC has the shine up on the surface. It's hard to describe but it looks totally different to me. We're now doing single stage on everything including the body, it has a more "old school" look to it, which is what I was after. My paint is also non metallic. If it were metallic we would be doing BC/CC. SPark
You can use a single stage urethane also, if you are after the original factory look. I am also one who likes single stage paint on older cars, it doesn't have the glare that clearcoats give. Most painters don't like to use single stage paints, because they are less forgiving when it comes to sanding and buffing, and if repairs are needed.
Put some clear over your single stage and really get a shine, or mix clear in the last coat of single stage.
Who in their right mind would say that bc/cc is not recommended for metallic paint?!?!? JMO, clear coat should be on all paint just for an added layer of protection, especially on lacquer and enamel just for the sake of possibly having to wet sand and buff without smearing the metallic. JMHO, though.
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