--- Imperial 59 <imperial59@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> That is the question.
>
> So tell me what you would do....
>
Go directly to Kerry's HOW TO PAINT narrative and do most
of the prep work yourself!! Ask if anyone on the list
lives near you that has done body work. I could show you
how to get through most of what you need in half a day with
the right tools, maybe less. My door is open, but I'm in
San Francisco.
Take all of the chrome off yourself. It's crazy to pay
somebody else to do it unless you really hate working on
cars. Tabulate the number of hours it takes. Double that
to include reassembly and then multiply that by the shop
rate of your local place ($50-100/hour?). Do it yourself
is a DEAL!
Now that your car is nude, get a compressor. What is the
best kind of comressor to have? Someone else's! You have
to be able to find comressed air somewhere, and borrowing
is the best way if you can finagle it and don't already
have it. If you have a house and a dryer in the garage
that is electric, you have the 220v outlet already, so
buying a medium one shouldn't be a big deal. You'll need
to do some research on the compressor subject, because I
don't want to get into it here.
Compressors can run orbital sanders (and are easy to deal
with) and they will take the paint and surface rust right
off, presenting you with bare metal that you can treat for
rust with rust killer or get patched. The rust killer will
allow you to prep the area yourself. You can get primer
for those areas in spray cans if you don't want to learn
how to use a comressor to spray. You can also scuff and
smooth the rest of the car, filling and sanding anything
that needs to be fixed using bondo (really easy - just try
it!).
Next, go to the local cheapo car painting shop. Miracle,
Maaco, and Earl Scheib (my personal favorite) are examples.
Tell them that you want your car painted but want to do
the prep. The local shop let me hang out and just watch
for a few hours. Nobody doing work spoke english, so I
couldn't bother them anyway, and I watched and learned.
The management were really happy to answer the "why did he
do that" questions.
People get really intimidated by body work. Get advice.
Practice on your car. It's metal and tough to hurt if you
just go for it. Most of it is just dumb hard work that you
can master in a few minutes. What's the worst that can
happen? Your prep work is inadequate and shows through a
shiny paint job that still looks good anyway from 10 feet
away.
So: Take 3 times longer than you think is needed and do a
little at a time. I rushed to paint and it hurt me the
first time. I get better each time. and turn out a decent
car now.
So: you spend plenty of time prepping your car. Use
masking tape to cover anything that should not be your
car's color such as glass and lights, leaving whatever you
need to drive to the paint place like lights and glass just
trimmed in tape for the edges, to be covered more easily
when you get to the paint place.
Pay for the premium paint job that the co. offers. It will
come out shiny but with orange peel texture in the surface
due to the cheaper paint used by these guys. You can also
buy your own "better" paint and have them spray the car
with it.
Tip the painter $40 BeFoRe he paints and let him know how
much you admire his skill.
When it comes out, let it cure and learn how to color sand.
This, too is easy but requires attention to detail. this
is why you got the premium paint job, cause it has more
coats and is thicker.
After that, you will want to get a buffer and learn how to
buff the car out. As Kerry said, he painted his 73 for
about $500 +/- plus sweat equity. If you can get a
workspace and air, you can cut out tremendous amounts of
labor $$ charges. On your $6k estimate, look at the amount
of labor. More time than money? Place to work on it?
DIY!!!
Connect with me off-list for more. My fingers are getting
tired, and this stuff just does not write down well. I'll
be happy to go into more detail, but Kerry's article must
come first!
Bottom line: an OK paint job will get you by for the years
that it takes to save up for a pro-job, and you may just be
happy enough to allow you to do every single other thing
before returning to the paint, AND have a sharp looking car
meanwhile.
Fear not! You have nowhere to go but up.
=====
Kenyon Wills
6o LeBaron - America's Most Carefully Built Car
73 LeBaron - Long Low & Luxurious
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