E
earlysecond
Let me first say that I love to experiment with paint products and procedures. Over the last 7 years I have spent time exploring and experimenting so that I might create my very fisrt show quality paint job. I have really perfected some procedures and finally settled on SPI products (should have done this sooner)
I abuse products in my test. Most recently I cut a heavily rusted piece of the cowl panel out of my '70 Camaro, brushed off the scale and put 2 heavy coats of SPI epoxy primer on it then threw it outside to see what will happen.
I am re-restoring my 1970 Chevy Camaro base coupe. The first time I "restored" it, I could not weld so I made a very competent Duraglass Sculpture. At the sorry advice of a local supply house, I used lacquer primer. . . you can guess what problems that caused. The car, which is in my avatar, gained a lot of compliments but I knew what was underneath all that yellow paint.
I began experimenting with products from a company called paintwithpearls on the internet. They sell ghost and candy pigments which can be added to intercoat or clear coat. Before I discovered SPI I used Transtar Euroclear which I never learned to spray properly. I ran or sagged it a lot. I added ghost pearl dry additive to this clear and it came out OK. Finally, I discovered DBC500 then eventually SPI intercoat clear, added ghost pearl to an intercoat over a base and acheieved the desired effect. I did all of this practice for what I began to call "the big dance". . . a second attempt at restoring my Camaro.
I mentioned that I painted my car yellow, it also had black factory style Chevy stripes. I did this before the Transformers Movie came out and all the kids loved it. They would scream "Bumblebee" everytime they saw it. It became such a popular Camaro scheme that soon there were three second genertaions Camaros running around my small little town. . .far to common for me.
One day I was surfing this very forum and discovered an avatar that HANS had at the time. It was a car form spray out of a black. . .no wait, blue paint. I discovered that the closest production match was nacht bleu a modern Porche color which appeared black until you were right on top of it, a true midnight blue.
My car is not a Z, it is a mere basecoupe factory “runway” stripes were reserved for Z28’s. I like the stripes as they add a lot to the appearance. So I came up with another idea. . . .true ghost stripes, which are only visible at certain angles. I have practiced and nearly perfected this procedure on a spray out over the midnight blue. The only limitation of the PPG DBC midnight blue is the cost. I was quoted a non-discounted price of $650/ gallon. While this will yield 2 sprayable gallons which I will need it may be a deal breaker.
Here is my thought, I can create a custom color using SPI base, SPI reducer and dry candy paint pigments from paintwithpearls. I have used the pigments and have them on a truck that has sat outside for years with no fade. The true benefit to this approach is that I can make two sprayable gallons of very custom paint for less than $200. While I am confident that I can pull off a blue that will be striking, I may get bogged down creating the perfect color. I have 6 months until it will be time to spray the car.
Somebody or a couple of somebodys call me crazy and foolish. . . .often I am both of these and mess things up. I think I will at least try this, in fact I already have but have not yet created a “must have” color for my Camro. I will share the sprayouts that I will be able to pull off with the warm enough weather that is left.
Finally, has anybody ever tried this “cheapout” method of creating basecoat.
Thanks,
Brent
I abuse products in my test. Most recently I cut a heavily rusted piece of the cowl panel out of my '70 Camaro, brushed off the scale and put 2 heavy coats of SPI epoxy primer on it then threw it outside to see what will happen.
I am re-restoring my 1970 Chevy Camaro base coupe. The first time I "restored" it, I could not weld so I made a very competent Duraglass Sculpture. At the sorry advice of a local supply house, I used lacquer primer. . . you can guess what problems that caused. The car, which is in my avatar, gained a lot of compliments but I knew what was underneath all that yellow paint.
I began experimenting with products from a company called paintwithpearls on the internet. They sell ghost and candy pigments which can be added to intercoat or clear coat. Before I discovered SPI I used Transtar Euroclear which I never learned to spray properly. I ran or sagged it a lot. I added ghost pearl dry additive to this clear and it came out OK. Finally, I discovered DBC500 then eventually SPI intercoat clear, added ghost pearl to an intercoat over a base and acheieved the desired effect. I did all of this practice for what I began to call "the big dance". . . a second attempt at restoring my Camaro.
I mentioned that I painted my car yellow, it also had black factory style Chevy stripes. I did this before the Transformers Movie came out and all the kids loved it. They would scream "Bumblebee" everytime they saw it. It became such a popular Camaro scheme that soon there were three second genertaions Camaros running around my small little town. . .far to common for me.
One day I was surfing this very forum and discovered an avatar that HANS had at the time. It was a car form spray out of a black. . .no wait, blue paint. I discovered that the closest production match was nacht bleu a modern Porche color which appeared black until you were right on top of it, a true midnight blue.
My car is not a Z, it is a mere basecoupe factory “runway” stripes were reserved for Z28’s. I like the stripes as they add a lot to the appearance. So I came up with another idea. . . .true ghost stripes, which are only visible at certain angles. I have practiced and nearly perfected this procedure on a spray out over the midnight blue. The only limitation of the PPG DBC midnight blue is the cost. I was quoted a non-discounted price of $650/ gallon. While this will yield 2 sprayable gallons which I will need it may be a deal breaker.
Here is my thought, I can create a custom color using SPI base, SPI reducer and dry candy paint pigments from paintwithpearls. I have used the pigments and have them on a truck that has sat outside for years with no fade. The true benefit to this approach is that I can make two sprayable gallons of very custom paint for less than $200. While I am confident that I can pull off a blue that will be striking, I may get bogged down creating the perfect color. I have 6 months until it will be time to spray the car.
Somebody or a couple of somebodys call me crazy and foolish. . . .often I am both of these and mess things up. I think I will at least try this, in fact I already have but have not yet created a “must have” color for my Camro. I will share the sprayouts that I will be able to pull off with the warm enough weather that is left.
Finally, has anybody ever tried this “cheapout” method of creating basecoat.
Thanks,
Brent
