Technical DID YOU PAINT YOUR HOT ROD OR CUSTOM?

Been doing body, custom work and paint as a hobby for over 40 years now. I probably couldn't find someone to ruin a car like this with a crazy paint job!

 

I did the bodywork , priming , and block sanding , but had a friend paint it .

 

I painted this outdoors with 5 year old Imron white paint and 20 year old red Centari paint.

 

I painted the El Caballo back in 1990 and it still wears that paint job while resting peacefully in the NHRA Museum. Before that, in about 1982, I laid down the white pearl on the R&C Dream Truck, and it was still looking good when Kurt sold the Truck last year..... Shakey Jake from Costa Mesa did the pinstriping, which was still there also !!

 

Painted many cars and bikes over the last 40 years. Like doing it on each subsequent build less and less.

 

I was going to have my '39 painted, but decided I wanted to continue with me doing every part of this build myself. So figured I'd give it a try, and go with single stage acrylic urethane paint job. So I bought all the supplies, and after giving the whole car one more coat of primer, I shot the paint. Once the paint was done in Wimbledom White, I thought it was a whole lot of white, and needed to be broken up. So I tried my hand at my first lettering work also, and lettered it up in 60's gasser style.






Paint isn't perfect, but better than I hoped for. Same for lettering; not perfect, but I like it.

 

I can fake it with the best of them but I've never really considered myself a painter. These days I'd rather stay away from the chemicals.

 

I'm officially doing my last restoration for someone other than me! I have never painted a car just for me. But from now on they will be ALL MINE!!!

 

Man, that Imron is some tuff stuff, I painted a few motorcycles with it, it's rough on the lungs even spraying out doors with a mask. HRP

 

And the overspray does not come off the floor. LOL

 

i painted my latest... Now I have to wash it and wax it... I hate that... lol

 

You nailed it buddy. That`s exactly what I did, reading that it helps with not getting runs which I did not.
Thanks for the info. On hidden parts floors and underneath/trunk inside fenders etc. I had bought acrylic urethane with a color that didn't match of what I wanted, but being tight with $ I couldn`t bear to see it go to waste That`s where I used it and it flowed great, like I remember how enamels or lacquer would shoot.
Thanks again.
Your dumb welder wanna be body paint guy

 

That's f'ing great!!!. It looks like someone cut open a GIANT bag above the Corvair and it rained flake.

 

i'm really good at painting engines.

 

It's been a while but I'm not really concerned about my painting abilities as much as I'm curious how my strength and stamina is going to hold up while doing all the prep work and the wet sanding afterwards.
It'll be okay.
A day of sanding...
a week in traction...
another day of sanding...

 

Like others said, I've never been one for paint. I've done motorcycles without issues but big parts are a no go. My specialty is metal fab and I'll just stick to that and trade work to get my paint done. Lol

 

WOW! Baumi I did not even realize that I was looking at your wife's panel truck, then I saw the channeled 34 with the Y block and the white frame and then the light bulb went on. The 2dr 56 Chevy looks good also. You do good work. Jay

 

5 1/2 cans of Krylon 1613 before they sold to Rustolem

 

Painted in Acrylic Lacquer in 1999. Everyday driver for 18 years, polished maybe 6 times with RE-PO cleaner and polish (no silicon or wax) sold in 2017 still looking good to me. Sold so I could pay out the mortgage and retire early.

 

@HOTRODPRIMER
Get a paint gun, shoot some stuff, see what happens. Even the $100 "paint for cars" kit is fun to mess around with. I wouldn't use it on something I was keeping
Post up what's going on and get advice on your spray outs.

No one would ever hire me to paint their car, but I have fun when I paint. I also have a really nice buffer for when I F'it up.

Sounds strange but you get a feel for it like anything else the more you shoot. Is it laying down, do I need to change my speed or overlap, do I need to cut the air down or increase fluid flow at the gun.
Or one my favorites - ah crap I really shoulda gone to the store for the right temp reducer.

 

In my youth I sprayed my car with my mom's
Electrolux vacuum cleaner.
White primer with purple paint mixed in.

 

Yes, learned how to from my dad and a friend at 14. So, when I was putting the T together is was a no brainer. Shot it in my folks garage.This was done it PPG Urotech, an Industrial Single Stage.

 

My Dad painted his '50 Ford using all the mixed together old paint he could find. It turned out looking like old, dull, dead grass or an aged army green. It was a smooth consistent finish though. He used Ma's vacuum that came with the cup gun attachment. It was a "Silver Knight" brand vacuum that I finally pitched a few years ago but I still have the spray gun on display with my other old stuff.
There sure is a lot of great looking paintwork done by Hambers on these pages.

 

I really liked painting with Lacquer. I'd have a dedicated primer gun always full of Lacquer primer ready to go. Now if I try that with the lacquer primer you get now, it always cracks within a few days, if not hours. Not sure if it's the thinner or the humidity here that causes it to crack. Now I buy the ready mixed spray cans of automotive primer from the parts store, (we don't have any dedicated automotive paint stores here, the local O'Reilly,s mixes the paint) Lacquer was so simple, not the the crap we have now that requires a chemistry degree to mix and spray it. I do like the single stage acrylic enamel though. I hate the gravity feed guns. I did a complete on a buddies full size truck a couple of months ago, and by the time I was done my wrists hurt. I should kick my idiot stepsons ass again for ruining my old Binx and Devilbiss suction guns. I really need to see if I can save those guns.

 

I am going to take on the whole shebang on my coupe.

These days folks really get hung up on perfection and so they don't "swing for the fences" on their own. Maybe it's comparing themselves to the jobs the see on TV or the internet?

I don't know much of anything about the whole process but it excites me to learn. Hell, I am psyched to be this close after all these years.

I'm not looking for showstopper... it's just a thrasher Model A. After seeing a details of my favorites (the stuff they don't seem to post pictures of) I'm more eager to paint my own.

The worst critic will be me, anyway. I think I'm picky enough to get it good enough... haha.

 

Well yesterday I said I hoped to have color on it tomorrow, and for a change, tomorrow happened.

I don't know how I'm going to sleep tonight with this huge grin on my face. Turned out better than my expectations. The other side has some minor stuff that I must have missed that I will fix when I get it together. The only reason I decided to paint this truck was I had to swap the roof cause it was a rollover. The patina guys would have murdered me for destroying the original finish, but it was mostly rusty anyway. I had to paint the interior, so I figured what could go wrong if I sprayed the firewall and down both sides while I am at it. Everyone knows I'll never match the finish on the doors and front fenders because I haven't welded the bottoms on the doors yet. It had rust free doors, except that they were bent over on top from the rollover. The doors from the donor truck fit the openings perfectly, but they are still red, and rusted out on the bottom. I'll paint the whole thing once its all together.

 

I just finished repainting the blue on my Impala wagon-acrylic enamel with DAU75 clear

 

I've always done my own because I couldn't afford to have it done. First thing I ever painted was a ski boat with an antique airless sprayer. It actually turned out pretty decent!

I've done a couple of VW Bugs, a Dodge van, and my ot Maverick, all to a certain degree of success. I've always used enamel, and had decent results. On the Maverick, I did solid yellow with a clear enamel top coat, it really helped the shine and made it look smooth. I've used the paint for cars paint as well as the NAPA brand when we had a store close by. The pfc stuff will last if you clear over it and keep it out of the sun, if it is parked in the weather all the time it fades after a few years.

I plan on doing the Lincoln one of these days. I dread it as it is such a large car, whoever painted it before did a crappy job on the body sanding, it has scratches all over it. It will take lots of sanding to get rid of those. I'm more of a drive it to a cruise in guy instead of a judged car show trophy hound, but I still want it to be as slick as I can get it.

 

I aleays did all my own paint!
The 32 I'm working now, I decided to have someone paint for me. Do to lung and back problems etc, and it being winter time, I figured it would be the best!
I thought I would have it back before spring, so i could get it finished for summer??
Well, that was 2021. I just got all the parts back last week.
The clown held the fenders ransom??
A year and 3 months and two times the money?
What a rip off!
Never again! I will do all my painting myself, even if its outside!!

 

I grew up in a body shop and helping my dad. It is the one thing Im actually good at lol and a good source of side/play money.