I got my 1st car in '68 a '41 Plymouth coupe, and it had been brush painted black. Of coarse it looked like crap because the car was crap, but 3 years later it was a show piece. About 7 years ago I bought a $50.00 alum pick-up bedcover and it was a crappy red, so I bought some black Rustolium paint and rolled it on and hey it didn't look that bad.
Painted two of our vintage dirt track cars with a brush in the last few years. Used tractor paint from the local Farm & Ranch store. Trick is to thin it out, that greatly aids in making the brush lines go away. Paint flows together before it dries. Our shop doesn't lend itself to spraying, although I have done that as well. If I were bucks down and my car / truck needed paint I wouldn't hesitate a second to brush it on. Practice first, use a good brush. You would be amazed at how well it can turn out. More often than not people won't believe me when I tell them our cars are brush painted. It won't rival a $5,000 body shop job but if done ,way good enough for a daily driver. My Father grew up in the depression and knew how to stretch a buck. He repainted our old 56 Chevy pickuo a couple times when I was a kid. It looked damn fine from across the street. Looked good, no apology necessary up close too. Next door neighbor did his old International work pickup after he saw Dad do ours. It turned out very nice. Two tone green & white. Worken2much
Don't know if this is applicable to the thread but I worked for a period of time with a friend who ran a sign shop.We used rollers to lay down enamel(1-Shot mostly but occasionally Ronan)on sign boards.I suppose this technique would work on flat surfaces of a car. Most of the signs we did were MDO(medium density overlay) plywood finished on both sides.The boards were laid out flat on saw horses and one coat of primer(usually Kilz oil base)was rolled out using a 50% overlap.After covering,the roller was cleaned of excess paint(using the cutout on a putty knife)and the dried roller run back across the surface again using a 50% overlap.The roller was re-cleaned as needed.This served to remove any excess paint and help level the surface.A good trick to use when boards are flat is to hook up a desk fan and blow air across the surface to help remove the evaporating solvents.This will keep the solvents from falling back to the surface and prolonging the dry time. We could do both sides quickly by supporting the boards on 2x4's with drywall screws inserted and the points protruding about 1/4 inch.Paint one side and then flip it over and support it on the screw tips(marks are minimal)and paint the other side.Do the edges last. This technique with the rollers made for a very smooth and mark free surface.Not sure if this would work with lacquer as the dry time even with a small amount of retarder added is fairly quick.Enamel dries much slower and is self-leveling.
Sid was an old man already when we meet him as he drove by as my friend Rob&i where rebuilding an engine in the car parked in the street.... he drove a 40 ford business coupe;the back&trunk was loaded with a gas welder set &lots spare parts as he made his living driving around the socal freeway system getting paid by helping motorist broken down..... we became friends & Sid came by couple times a day to see if he could help us teenagers......his car needed a paint job;so to pay him back for all the help we bought him 3gals of the best black lacquer we could find.... few days later he drove by to proudly show us his painted car/painted by hand >it had no shine at all >it was hard for us to hide our disappointment!>>>few days later he stops by to show off the paint job after handsanding&polishing it >>>a deep/deep mirrior paint job as good as the best we saw at the weekend drags...........
I just picked up a Hudson today that has had the paint rolled on. The texture looks like the walls in my house. It isn't too bad from 50ft away....
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