Picture of the Hood Area in the Evening After Paintwork;
Another Picture
Painting this car turned out to be a relatively daunting task. On the one hand, I wanted a beautiful paint job; on the other hand, I didn't want to spend a lot of money to do so. My family owns and operates an industrial painting facility, Image Industries, and although painting cars is not what this company does . . . my father very generously offered to have his staff champion the project. During this process, we learned a great deal about what it took to paint this vehicle, and I've attempted to chronicle this below. Hopefully others will enjoy or learn from our experience.
When I received the car, as I was warned by the seller, it needed new paint very badly. Below is a quick shot of an example of the paint on the car before . . . it was inconsistent, cracking, spiderwebbing, and was completely dead in many places on the car.
Paint Quality Before Paint Job
First thing we decided was that we were going to tape off all parts instead of remove the parts. We decided on this because we didn't want to be tearing gaskets, stripping/breaking bolts, or opening up Pandora's box to more costly mechanical repairs due to the disassembly. But, we didn't want this paint job to have the quality of a standard "tape & spray" job. A lot of time was spent masking with razor blade accuracy in order to ensure the appearance of a full paint job with disassembly.
The next step in all of this was the sanding work. We had to get most of the existing paint off or at least get the surface to be consistently smooth before we could get started.
The Sanding Process, Left Driver's Side
During the sanding process, bondo was also applied where necessary to fill in small dents and other similar imperfections. There were a couple of spots that showed rust, but luckily . . . it was only surface rust and was eliminated during this process.
Front Right Side
The sanding process went quite well, but since we did not go all the way to the bare metal to spray, we decided that full primer was necessary. This brings us to the next step . . . the primer process.
Front Overview During the Primer Process
We applied primer uniformly to the entire surface to be painted, but again, we had to sand the surface after the primer application to ensure a smooth finish.
Passenger Side During the Primer Process
Now, we finally got to the point that we were ready to paint. We had custom paint mixed at Ellis Color Supply, Inc. Instead of going with the old style paint used on the car originally, we decided to go with a more modern paint. The paint most closely resembles the 2007 Mercedes-Benz Bordeaux Red with extra metallic flake in it. Since the original color was so close to this, opening the doors and engine bay, revealing the original color; it is still difficult to tell that the car has been painted. The new color looks wonderful.
Car with 2 Base Coats & 7 Clear Coats
We made several mistakes during this process . . . which created far more work later on. The base coat went on perfectly, and there was no issue there. Regrettably, I didn't get to take any pictures right after the basecoats, but before the clearcoats. The first mistake we made was to use a nozzle that was too large when applying the clearcoat . . . thus too much got applied at once. Next, we simply applied too much clearcoat. Thus, in the picture below, especially where the light hits the trunk, you can see the excessive "Orange Peel" that resulted from our mistakes.
Side of Car w/ 2 Base Coats & 7 Clear Coats - With Visible "Orange
Peel" Effect
The next step was to colorsand the car in order to eliminate the "orange peel" effect and smooth out the finish.
In The Middle of Color Sanding
Colorsanded Hood (Picture
of Side of Car Colorsanded)
After the Colorsanding process, we simply needed to buff the entire car.
J. Puente from Ellis Color Supply, Inc. Buffing
the Car
After buffing the car, we washed the car, and then I began driving it, again. :)
The Finished Product
We accomplished the goal of a world class paint job done with as little money as possible. The only costs we incurred were the materials (Invoices: Original, Supplemental), overtime labor for those who worked on the car, and J. Puente's portion for the after-paint finishing. We still need to glaze & handglaze the car to remove some of the swirl marks from the buffing. After that, the final step is to add the pinstripe back to the car. :)
Make sure to come back by periodically to see the progress on this project, and thanks for stopping by!