MA240SX | Forums

Awhile back I had a site (ss14.net) that I used to show some of my writeups and other info I thought would be helpful to others. Since the site is no more and I've been given a request for my writeups...I guess its best I post them here....

I’m making this write-up to give detailed steps to the methods I used for this paintjob. I should note that there are different routes you (or anyone else) can take when doing this paintjob. I will also give an insight on what I’ve learned thru out this whole process and I hope you can view this as helpful advice.

As simple as this can be, I should also note that I’m not at fault if you mess up your car and/or property of your own or someone else.

USE A TEST PIECE BEFORE DOING THIS ON YOUR CAR!!! I'm dead serious about this...you will learn the properties of the paint, the ideal method of rolling and mixing, and what NOT to do when working on your car. Once again...USE A TEST PIECE BEFORE DOING THIS ON YOUR CAR!!!

Introduction

Some of you are wondering why the heck I decided to go ahead and do such a paintjob…well here’s my story….



Back in 2001 I bought my car and everything was nice and clean. Until in 2002 I was involved in an accident (not my fault). The end result from that accident was an entire change to my front end. This meant that the front end of the car was a different shade than the rest of the car…since it was newer paint. I said to myself “fine I’ll deal with it”.



So time rolls by and at some small car meet this kid backs into my car. I don’t know what he was thinking...but it obviously was not look behind you while backing out. So that resulted in a dent in my quarter panel which then resulted in another shade a green. This shade of green was lighter than the front end, but darker than the door…so I had three shades of green on the driver side and two on the passenger side. I’m convincing myself that it will be okay and eventually I will make it better.




Well, believe it or not…it gets worse. So one day my car is parked on the side of the road, right in front of my patio door. I’m relaxing inside the house and then I hear a crash sound. I instantly look at the patio door and see a pickup truck hauling ass and my car completely messed up. I didn’t have the time to catch up to the punk, so I was pretty much SOL. The guy was doing some donuts or some crap like that on the grass and his pickup bed caught onto my hood and ripped my passenger side fender. The only solution I had was to replace the fender ASAP and for awhile I was driving around with an unpainted fender.




I eventually came to my senses and spray painted the fender to somewhat match my car. Of course, that means yet another shade of green. On top of that for a brief moment in time, I had side skirts that….you guessed it….was ANOTHER shade of green. So now the car is five shades of green (six when I had the side skirts on) and people are constantly pointing that out to me as if I don’t know my damn self.



It’s been like this since early 2006 and what finally made me snap was when a girl questioned the different colors as I was opening the door for her. Of course I didn’t slap her or anything like that…I just said “oh it’s a long story” and took a hard hit to my ego. I’ve always wanted to paint the entire car, but I don’t have the money to fork over for a good paintjob. Also those cheap $300 paint job places will paint the car…but it will last for a year before it starts chipping. I don’t have a garage, so I can’t attempt to do it myself. I’m pulling my hair out on what to do until I see hope…in the form of a post on a forum I frequently visit. His thread eventually led me to another thread:

http://board.moparts.org/ubbthreads/show...art=1&vc=1

This spawned the idea in my mind to go ahead and tackle such a paintjob. I had nothing to lose and worse case scenario would be along the lines of having my car FUBU...but at least one shade of color.

I had only a week to paint my car since school was coming up and my new job. This meant at times I had to rush or cut corners (such as not removing the seals). I suggest that if you want to do this paintjob you give yourself at least seven days to complete it and don’t rush. You MUST have patience…that is key to having good results.

Materials

Most of the materials I bought came from Home Depot. Some of them I had to buy from an automotive store such as Pepboy’s, Autozone, etc. Those items will be marked in green lettering. Here’s a list of the materials I used:

* One Gal. Rustoleum Professional Gloss White (Oil-Based enamel) (Qty: 1)
* One Gal. Mineral Spirits (Qty: 2)
* Five Pk. 4" High-Dense Foam Rollers (Qty: 2)
* Roller holder (Qty: 1)
* Disposable Roller Pan (Qty: 1)
* 3M Blue Painter's Tape (Qty: 1)
* Mixing Bucket (Qty: 1)
* Easy Pour Lid (Qty: 1) not pictured
* Cheese Cloth (Qty: 1) not pictured
* Painter's Rags (Qty: 1) not pictured
* 400 Grit Sandpaper (Qty: 1)
* 600 Grit Sandpaper (Qty: 1)
* 800 Grit Sandpaper (Qty: 1) not pictured
* 1000 Grit Sandpaper (Qty: 1) not pictured
* Liquid Rubbing Compound (Qty: 1) not pictured
* Orbital Buffer & Pads (Qty: 1) not pictured

The Process

As I'm explaining the process (or methods) I used I will include pictures from working on the entire car and working on just the rear bumper (make sure to click on them to view a larger size). Both pieces where not done at the same time. In fact, the rear bumper was done after I finished the car since I was waiting for it to arrive. You will notice in the pictures that the results are slightly better because I didn't rush. Everything was done outdoors during the summertime with low humidty. On average humidity was 60% and temperatures ranged from 65-70 degrees (F). I don't recommend trying this if humidity is above 80%.



Day 1:
I start of by cleaning the car free of loose dirt. I also did the same for the rear bumper, which was a separate piece from the one on the car. If you happen to have any tar or adhesive on stuck on your car, I suggest you clean that off throughly before continuing.
After that, I started to wetsand the car with 400 grit sandpaper. Make sure that both the surface and the sandpaper are wet. Due to the location of my car, I was limited to using a bucket of water and a spray bottle to assure the surface and sandpaper was wet. As I was wetsanding, I noticed the only the clearcoat was coming off and leaving a chalk residue. By this time I was telling myself "WTF am I doing? Damnit..oh well I have to keep going." This took me roughly two hours and when I was done I was exhausted and my car looked really crappy.




Day 2:
Your properly wondering why I didn't clean of the residue. Well, believe it or not, I had to drive my car to take care of an emergency. No time to spare I drove my car as is, and man did I get some looks. So if you try this out...make sure you have another car to drive. Anyways, I clean up the car with mild soap and water. Once it dried, I started to clean the car with mineral spirits to assure I removed any grease. After that I took a cheese cloth to remove any fine dust particles (remember I'm doing this outside). Besides removing the seals, I just taped over them with the painter's tape and covered the windows with newspaper. I only did this because it would have taken awhile to take off the seals, and I was tight on time. I strongly recommend you remove the seals for better results. I also fit garabage bags over the wheels. After this was done I began to mix the paint and rolled it onto the car.




Here is the tricky part about mixing the paint...there is no definate formula to follow. It's difficult to explain, but I started off with one part paint and two parts mineral spirits then added more mineral spirits until the paint was the same thickness as milk. Once the paint is mixed, I pour some into the tray and soak the roller. The paint is very thin and runs alot when you start rolling. What I did was roll the paint over a certain length and then catch the runs with the roller and spread the paint as much as possible to level it out. I also came across mini bubbles, but those evenutally popped as the paint self-leveled. Very sparsely did I have to resoak the roller with paint. To save the foam roller for future use, I wrapped it with plastic food wrap.




Day 3:
I wipe the car (and rear bumper) free of dust using a cheese cloth. After that I roll on second coat. For the car, I let the paint dry roughly nine hours and proceed to roll on the third coat. This is where I rushed because its ideal to wetsand the second coat with 600 grit before proceeding with the third coat. Also the drying time could have been longer as I was initially doing at roughly 20 hours. As for the rear bumper, I rolled on the second coat and left it alone. The color doesn't show until the third coat.




Day 4:
On the car, I wetsand the third coat with 600 grit sandpaper. Rinse with water, then I wipe any dust with a cheese cloth. After that I proceed to roll on the fourth coat. By this time the color shows and I get some reflection. As for the rear bumper, I sand the second coat with 600 grit sandpaper (the ideal route), clean (as I did with the car) and roll on the third coat. The main reason your sanding between every two coats (ideally) is to get rid of runs and orange peel you might come across.




Day 5:
The night before, I get a notice from HOA to move my car or else it would be towed. Rather than hunting them down and explaining my case, I moved my car the following morning to my friend's house. Thank goodness he was off the following days or else I would have been SOL. The car was looking good, but I don't recommend you stop on the fourth coat. Also since the paint was semi-sticky, dust and bugs got stuck on the paint while driving it. It was no problem because I had to sand down that coat anyways with 800 grit sandpaper. After that I rolled on the fifth coat. As for the rear bumper, that was done right in front of my house.. so HOA can't say jack. I rolled the fourth coat onto the bumper and it was looking damn good.





Day 6:
By this time, my car was in my friend's garage. With no time to spare, I rolled on the sixth and finally coat. As for the rear bumper, I wetsanded it with 800 grit sandpaper and rolled on the fifth coat.

Day 7:
The car was completely dry and I was able to drive it back home. I didn't get a chance to do a final wetsand with 1000 grit sandpaper, but I do like the results so far. Orange peel is noticeable since I didn't sand between every two coats, starting with 600->800->1000. As for the rear bumper, I had better results because I took my time and did the proper wetsanding between coats.

Final Touches

After week, I found some time to wetsand the entire car with 1000 grit sandpaper. This helped to remove most of the orange peel. Even though the car does have orange peel, its not really horrid and I've seen cars come from the factory with the same amount. Once I was done wetsanding I proceed to buff the car with an orbital buffer and liquid sandpaper. This part was rather tedious because of the properties of the paint. The paint was still "soft" so it "absorbs" the rubbing compound as I buff it. That meant I had to immediately wipe off any rubbing compound on the car before it becomes a real PITA. Also because of this I decided to hold off on using polishing compound. After using the buffer, the surface was smooth to the touch and had a nice reflection. The only downside is I can't used wax until three months after rolling on the sixth coat. It's oil-based paint, so it takes awhile to fully cure, so for now I have to wipe the car with mild soap to keep it clean.

No buff...

http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q7/Si...buff_1.jpg <-- large pic

With buff...



As for the door jambs, when I get time I will actually paint those with a Wagner electric gun. Yes, this means you can actually paint the entire car with a Wagner gun as oppose to rolling it. My friend actually tired this and yielded good results. However he's telling me that it sprays the paint really fast, so its still a good idea to have a roller to catch the runs.

My side mirrors were spray painted, and I can see a noticeable difference between spray paint and this enamel paint (enamel being "richer"). I plan to spray paint parts of the undercarriage with the same black spray paint to hide the runs caused by white enamel paint.

Some people have asked me..."Would you ever do this again?" my answer is "meh..I guess". Seriously I would do this again if and only if I had time on my side were I can remove every seal and pay more attention to detail (i.e. sanding between every two coats).

So its been a year since I painted my car...and the paint is holding up fine. Its just my lower front bumper that is beat the hell cause off all the road chips during various road trips (200+ miles each trip). Also scrapping a mound of ice and some curbs when parking can contribute to that. Then there are some spots here and there that the paint chipped during the very first week since the paint was so soft.

I moved to another place and its absolutely horrid environment for me to paint my sideskirts and rear valence. Once I get a garage i will tackle that...but when that happens...i don't know.

i've got a gun and comp so if you want the sideskirts and rear sprayed real quick this weekend i can do so. it takes about an hour from primer to clear if you don't wetsand primer. and about another hour to dry to the touch. if you want them done, bring them. i can get them painted this weekend or next maybe. but only place i can get paint right now is advace auto pre-mixed paint. $20/q and that should cover your skirts and rear. don't know if that would match, but it's white and free if you provide the supplies.

other than that, this is too much work for me. i don't have the patience for it ><

Thanks for the offer, but I will pass...as I think it will not match. No more mismatching paint >.< Also this paint doesn't fade over time.

Look really good, its just crazy how you able to do that in the parking lot, wish i can dp the same.

very descriptive with pictures to match the story progress and outcomes, Great post.