Mis-haps in the paint booth

S

steve b

I was pretty sure everything that could go wrong in a paint booth has happened to me at some point, but recently i had the strangest, most unexpected thisng happen.
I had just finished taping, cleaning and tack-ragging my truck and was prepping to spray sealer.
I had the bed off of the truck on a stand so I decided to start spraying sealer on the bed. I made my first pass on the inner jamb of the bed (by the bulkhead), then squatted down to start spraying from the bottom up on the bedside.
As I squatted down and started spraying, I heard a loud WHOOOSHHHH!!! I stared at my gun for a couple seconds confused........then the booth started filling with a yellow powder:nightmare:

The guy that owned the shop had put a fire extinguisher in there (i didnt know) and when I squatted, I sat on the handle which discharged the extinguisher. Needless to say I was pissed, and had to stop and wait to clean the mess. It was a huge delay, but luckily there was no harm done. It is pretty funny to me now.

Anybody else have any crazy experiences to share?
 
hahah i was reading and waiting for you to say you squatted and the ass blew out of your spray suit or something lol.
 
I was painting a car and on my second coat of base and the whole car started fish eyeing. We also have horses and when I looked outside some genius was spraying showsheen a detangler for knots in manes and tails on a horse right by the fan intake. Rewashing with dawn, sanding, wax and grease remover, retaping and another day later it was done. Needless to say nobody has made that mistake around here since, but I did throw a realllyyy big fit that got the point across.
 
I had a dry powder extinguisher behind the seat of my 77 GMC peecup. It was back there with other stuff and over time the safety pin had fallen out, unknown to me. I went around the corner at the end of our street and it slid into the side of the cab and discharged. Wouldn't you know it, the nozzle was pointing up so all that crap shot up behind the seat into the ceiling and fell back down onto every surface. I couldn't get stopped and bail out fast enough as you sure in the hell can't breath in that situation LOL.
 
No, I had already blown the ass out of that suit because the professor at the paint supply sold me the wrong suit. I am 6'4" 220 and usually wear a 2xl Tyvek. The paint supply buys them in bulk and sells the indviusally with no packaging. I asked for a 2x and was surprised to find he gave me a medium. Brilliant. the second i tried to squeeze my shoulders in the suit I ripped the crotch right out lol
 
Many years ago I had to paint four cement mixers ( the large truck type). First truck I painted the cab and frame one color and let dry. I covered the entire cab and frame with a plastic sheeting so that I could paint the drum a differant color, no problem. Started the truck up and hit the control to spin the cement drum slowly so that I could stand on a ladder to paint the rotating drum. Completed the second color and let the drum continual to rotate to dry a little bit and of course stand back to admire the paint job:) Hit the control to stop the drum from turning and whitin a split second the entire plastic sheeting flew up in to the air and completly wrap around the cement mixer drum with of couse the paint was still wet. I freaked out and tried to pull the plastic off the drum but it was stuck snot tight. It took hours to remove the plastic sheeting scraping it with a razor blade and repaint. Talked to some paint "experts" and was told because of the material put in the drum to make cement that there is a high iron content and that when spinning will create a static magnetic field around the drum. I had to drive a post through the ground into a couple of feet of dirt to ground the truck. Took a battery jumper cable and clamp it on the truck frame and onto the ground post. Painted the next three without any problems but a nightmare I will never forget.
 
One of my first paint jobs while working at my first body shop, I was painting a side of a car and half way into the first coat the power went out.. Interesting painting by flash-light.. lol.. Wouldn't even know what to think if a fire extinguisher went off while painting.. lol.
 
inxs;35848 said:
Many years ago I had to paint four cement mixers ( the large truck type). First truck I painted the cab and frame one color and let dry. I covered the entire cab and frame with a plastic sheeting so that I could paint the drum a differant color, no problem. Started the truck up and hit the control to spin the cement drum slowly so that I could stand on a ladder to paint the rotating drum. Completed the second color and let the drum continual to rotate to dry a little bit and of course stand back to admire the paint job:) Hit the control to stop the drum from turning and whitin a split second the entire plastic sheeting flew up in to the air and completly wrap around the cement mixer drum with of couse the paint was still wet. I freaked out and tried to pull the plastic off the drum but it was stuck snot tight. It took hours to remove the plastic sheeting scraping it with a razor blade and repaint. Talked to some paint "experts" and was told because of the material put in the drum to make cement that there is a high iron content and that when spinning will create a static magnetic field around the drum. I had to drive a post through the ground into a couple of feet of dirt to ground the truck. Took a battery jumper cable and clamp it on the truck frame and onto the ground post. Painted the next three without any problems but a nightmare I will never forget.
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I helped my room mate paint some cement mixer trucks in the winter of 71-72. We did the same thing, let the drum rotate and we both started spraying from opposite sides of the drums.
 
We were really busy and I hadnt had time to clean or vacuum the booth in a few weeks. It was getting pretty bad, but I needed to focus on getting through the rush of cars we had gotten from a storm we had. So I'm painting the side of an Audi Q7 i finish my first coat of clear Im mixing up for my second coat and all I hear coming from the booth is a hissing. I go inside to find the air line had popped off the regulator and it was blowing 140 psi straight at the floor creating a large cloud of paint overspray and dirt from previous jobs. I just left the car as is and went home it was about 7pm. Came in the next morning and had half the shop in my booth looking at this car trying to figure out wth happened. luckily the dirt was just stuck on the surface was able to sand the side without going through and just reclear it. But the worse part was my boss asking me what happened to the metallics in the car, thats how dirty it was it looked like course flake was mixed with the clear.
 
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