Was thinking of painting an old grocery getter I bought. Low mileage 97 Camry that mechanically is great and gets like 30 miles a gallon but the paint is peeling and mismatched from some old body work
Looks like a total mad max vehicle right now
I haven’t but boy am i intrigued to follow along.
I have done a bunch of spraying at house with smaller Wagner units. If I was going to do it I would likely try a similar approach with different paints and finishes.
I imagine the prep work is crucial like any painting jobs.
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Plasti dip to the rescue!
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Yes, I did. In college I brush-painted my Ford Fairlane powder blue, bought some beer and hot dogs, and invited a mess of people to paint whatever they wanted over that base in a bunch of different colors. There were a lot of aquatic, pastoral, flower child type scenes, while one Vietnam vet, who had part of one leg removed, scattered a few black tombstones throughout those scenes. Those were the days…
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That’s awesome. Hope you have alot of pics
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Did two different cars 40yrs ago.
Lots of sanding/buffering down. Added bondo where needed, taped the hell out of it and spray painted…that is all I got.
Second one was a 73fleetwood Caddy. Bought it in the Pink Cadillac days, welded the doors shut, cut off the roof and painted it pink. So much fun, WLAV road rally cheated like crazy, exhaust burnt through thhe floorboards. Didn’t win but used the SPlice free bottles to keep the flames out, couldn’t use the beer.
Then had a mechanic look at it for something else and he put in on a hoist…oops didn’t end well. Snap goes the caddy…
Aahh the memories…
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I’ve done everything but the paint. First car was 67 Mustang and I did the rust removal, body work, welding, sanding, priming, masking. I had Maaco do the paint though. It was pretty cheap and they did a reasonable job if not perfect.
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I did have one. Not sure if I still do. I’d have to dig into the photo albums with the sticky clear sheets. Old school. Pictures were always an afterthought for me, even with cell phones, though recently I’ve trained myself to snap a few.
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I struggle just washing em…
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I already bought the paint from a local auto paint specialist. I called Maaco to see if they would use that paint and what they would charge if I did all the prep. They said they couldn’t use outside paint. Already in the paint for a few hundy so that’s not going to work
Called another place that advertised paint jobs starting at 400. They said they would use my paint and if Indid all the prep work they would charge me ‘only’ 900. WTF. What do they do for 400 then? your pinewood derby car?
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Mine was probably painted around 1990, so the prices have gone up a little. I miss that car. Sold it and replaced it with a 2 year old Pontiac Grand Am. What was I thinking?
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lol. Back around 1998 I was about to buy a 1968 mint convertible Cutlass. It was show worthy, black with black top and interior. New 455 V8 engine with the original engine crated up with it. Dude was buying a house and needed money to close. He was asking 8k
My dad convinced me to buy a teal 1995 Grand Am instead. I regret that often
Right now that cutlass would be worth probably 20k and that Grand Am about 20 dollars
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Looking back on it, it made sense at the time. I needed a car for winter driving and the Mustang wasn’t really cut out for that. It wasn’t the driving that concerned me but the rust. But now its just a really high end amateur restore of a muscle car legend vs a 90s Grand Am. So that doesn’t sound like a good trade.
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I have but not in decades-and it’s very time consuming with wet-sanding taking your time to do that correctly.
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You can get some pretty incredible results with the proper prep, and the newer spray cans that mimic a spray gun.
Just a matter of how much time, effort and money you feel the car deserves. Lol
The cut and buff process is by far the most labor intensive, if you want the car to look great. And lighter colors are going to be easier to get a result with, for obvious reasons.
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The paint is kind of a dark red that really looks black. The original faded paint is maroon. So just darkening it up a little
my body guy who was going to paint the car for me and can’t can loan me the spraygun I need, but I’m wondering whether I should sand off the existing paint or get a chemical stripper
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My motto was always that I didn’t want a car so awesome that I didn’t want to drive it. I’m not interested in show cars that I keep in my garage and trailer to shows. I buy em to drive the wheels off. I can’t imagine spending a week painting a car and then you just know some douchebag with off-road tires and no flaps is going to throw a rock at it.
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I just want it to be all one color. When I get my Chevy back I might trade it for a motorcycle