Advice on How to Prep Panels for Paint

[Daaave]

Hi All,

Can anyone point me to some good online articles explaining the best ways of preparing some panels to be painted? I've done a bit of Googling but not come up with anything that describes each step in detail with pics to help.

I have a plastic bumper, metal wing and plastic wing mirror that I need to paint, but rather than pay a bodyshop to do all the prep I'm happy to do it myself (if I can). The panels are all in the wrong colour and need a small amount of filling here and there for small scrapes. So ideally I'll have them stripped, filled, primed and sanded ready for the colour basecoat and lacquer.

I don't have an air compressor so I was hoping I could prime the panels using rattle cans, is this a stupid idea? The rest of the panels on the car are hardly a masterclass in paint finish so I'm not looking for a show car finish, just something reasonable.

Thanks.

[snuffle]

If you are going to get a bodyshop to apply the top coats then IMO let them do the prep and primer,
in 9 out of 10 cases I see it takes longer to get the panels back to a state that I'm happy to paint onto, than if I'd done them from scratch. IYKYIM.

[T350 Al]

In my experience (and I'm not a Professional sprayer in any way), prepping any panel from scratch is really time-consuming and laborious; even to get a 'reasonable' finish takes quite a lot of time and hard work. Doing it with spray cans is going to be even harder.

I recently re-sprayed the back end of our car using my compressor and guns (dinged it with the garage door, doh!) and I reckon I put about 20 hours (maybe more) prep into getting the surface as smooth as possible. It went Primer > guide coat > primer> guide coat etc.! Eventually got the colour on and, whilst I'm happy with the result, I have no doubt that a pro could do a far better job in far less time.

If you have an abundance of time on your hands and a willingness to learn the hard way then get your hands on a decent compressor and have a bash; there's no way I'd want to do it by spraycan!

[alsaautomotive]

A brief outline of the system & process we use, not sure if it's any help?
http://www.alsaautomotive.co.uk/resprays.html
Best wishes, Al.

[Daaave]

Hmm. Thanks for your advice all, I think the voice of reason my have convinced me to just let the pros do the lot. I'll get some quotes and see what the difference in price is (if any!).

[T350 Al]

alsaautomotive said:

A brief outline of the system & process we use, not sure if it's any help?
http://www.alsaautomotive.co.uk/resprays.html
Best wishes, Al.

Now that, is comprehensive! How many hours would you say go into a typical respray to that schedule?

Apologies for slight hijack!

[alsaautomotive]

T350 Al said:

alsaautomotive said:

A brief outline of the system & process we use, not sure if it's any help?
http://www.alsaautomotive.co.uk/resprays.html
Best wishes, Al.

Now that, is comprehensive! How many hours would you say go into a typical respray to that schedule?

Apologies for slight hijack!

An average condition 308/328 takes around 150/160hrs.
Cheers for the interest, best wishes, Al.