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Spray-painting newbie - advice?

Hey guys,

I'm completely new to this stuff, so I apologise for not knowing the correct terms. In fact, if I did, I probably wouldn't be posting here, as I'm sure there's a wealth of information online, if only I knew what to search for!

Some bits of the interior of my car have got rather tatty, and I'm planning to spruce them up by painting them the same colour as the exterior bodywork. However, I'd like to be a bit adventurous, and see if I can do something a bit more creative with stencilling.

My plan is to paint the majority of the panels blue (the colour of the bodywork), but to have my car's logo painted in silver. As such, I'm planning on:

  1. Spraying the whole piece with primer (after prep).
  2. Spraying the whole piece with silver metallic.
  3. Masking off the bits I want to remain silver.
  4. Spraying the whole piece with blue metallic.
  5. Removing the mask.
  6. Spraying the whole piece with clear-coat.

Firstly, is that the correct general idea? Secondly, should I be reapplying primer before step 4, or is it OK to spray the blue directly onto the silver? Thirdly, the bits I want in silver are all at one end of the piece - do I need to spray the whole piece silver, or can I spray only a bit of it silver and not have problems with the overlaying blue coming through a different colour depending on what's below it?

Worth adding that I'm using aerosol cans - I know it's not a patch on airbrushing, but sadly I don't have the money or the space for a decent airbrushing setup. I'm prepared for the results to be... somewhat less than factory-quality, shall we say! ;)

Any other advice would be appreciated, as would any sites, newsgroups or fora where this kind of thing is discussed - I'm planning on starting small, but I've no idea where to begin if I wanted to do three colours of paint, for example!

Many thanks,

Alexis.

P.S. I'm prepared for the possibility I'm going to royally screw it up, don't worry! ;)

Reply to
Alexis
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It'd be easier and better to buy a new interior.

But yes, you've got the basic idea. Practice spraying on something else, and be prepared for it to be expensive as you'll get through a lot of rattle cans. Halfords ones are shit, get them from your local motor factors. They cost at least £8 a pop, and the paint is heavily thinned to get it to spray well with the poor pressure you get with aerosols. Aim to spray coats that are light but wet. Too dry and you'll get orange peel or a matt effect, too wet and you'll get runs. Try to get the cans warm before you spray with them. There's no need to do major overlap under the area you intend to spray blue, as long as you spray plenty of blue - flat the blue areas before you spray silver.

Flat all the primed areas before you spray top coat, probably with P800 or P1000 as aerosol paint is piss and will hide very little. You'll need plastic primer too. I imagine the whole exercise will cost you at least £50 by the time you've finished buying masking tape (you'll need plastic fineline tape), and it's likely that you could pull off the paint you've just put on when you unmask it... And you'll need to sand any textured plastics, be willing to expect the paint not to stick to certain finishes and wipe everything over religiously with panel wipe...

Reply to
Doki

Point taken, but you haven't seen the quality of my interior! While it would certainly be easier, it's shabby even when it's brand new!

Thanks for the advice - I've got the spray cans directly from the dealer, as it's a slightly rare colour, and while colour-matching is obviously not a factor as it's inside the car, I'd still like to do it properly.

When you say 'flat all the primed areas before you spray top coat', do you mean sand the primer before applying the colour layer, or sand the colour layer before applying the lacquer/clearcoat? I had planned on sanding the primer down, but I had read a guide suggesting sanding the colour down using P1200/1600 before applying the lacquer. Everywhere else seems to suggest you don't need/want to do that, though.

Also, am I going to have issues with varying paint height - i.e. the bits I want silver and going to be masked when the blue paint goes on, and as such will be lower (as they only have silver paint applied) than the surrounding area (which will have blue applied on top of the silver). Will I end up with a noticeable step in thickness, and if so, what should I do about that?

Thanks again,

Alexis.

Reply to
Alexis

You need to sand the primer. You may or may not need to sand the colour coat - if you can avoid doing it with a metallic colour, it's probably for the best. Aerosol paint doesn't set like 2-pack, so the next layer of paint will melt into it well, so you shouldn't need to flat / key between colour coats, unless you f*ck up (runs or orange peel).

You will, and there's nothing you can do about it. I've seen very tidy cars with sprayed rather than vinyl graphics, and there's f*ck all you can do. Fact of life. Try and feather the edge with sandpaper, and you'll get a soft edge...

Reply to
Doki

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