Hi gang. I am geting ready to prime out the truck, or so I thought. My question is this. Have you guys painted a truck, start to finish, or did you take it to a shop.

I keep reading about home paint booths, safety concerns, quality concerns, etc.

Have any of you built or constructed a temp. booth and if you did, how well did it work, and how did you do it?

Part of the problem is its the fire truck, cab is off and all taken apart, A lot of shops dont like the big trucks, not enough room.

In a real dilema as to what to do.

I have a shop. but not a dedicated space for painting.

As always, I appreciate any conversations on this.

Thanks guys

JimG 1098

 

You could build a temporary booth around the truck then tear it down. Painting is not as bar as what everyone makes it out to be. It takes practice but its not too bad. I've painted single stage and base clear, the toughest paint I ever painted was metallic blue on my lincoln ls. It Didnt cover well and getting the pearl to not get loaded up was tough, but for a fire truck you should be alright. I would personally paint base clear with a sealer before the base. Gives a nice finish and prevents the primer or bondo from soaking up any paint. I know there are a few extra steps for base clear but it is a lot tougher and i think it is easier to paint...

 

Thanks fifty two f-1. Mulling it over. What did you do to avoid crap setling in on the clear. The one I am thinking about has a 50 min to dust free>

Where did you paint and under what type of enviroment

 

You might want to try what I am doing. I took a body shop and paint class at the local community college. They let everyone work on their own projects. The school has all of the tools and state of the art spray booths that you would need and the cost is very minimal. Next semester I am taking a paint class, the cost os $170.00. for that they not only teach me the right was to do the job but I can work on the project when ever the school is open. I can't rent the shop space for what they charge.

 

Cool option. I did talk to a HS auto teck shop teacher. They have a $500,000 paint facility they teach auto painting out of, but they unfortunatly, will not take in any custom work. I will look into a class if one is give at the local CC.

 

I admire any of you guys who are willing to do the job yourself. If you're like me, you're not really interested in pleasing anybody but yourself. More importantly, I absolutely despise being at the mercy of a body shop who will look you straight in the eye and lie to you about when they'll paint your vehicle. All of the body/paint people around here are much more interested in the insurance jobs.

 

I built a temp paint booth in my garage to paint my truck.The booth was 16 feet long and 12 feet wide.I painted my truck in pieces.I had three box fans blowing in fresh air and two fans blowing out for exhaust to outside.Worked fairly well.I placed micro fiber furnace filters over the inlet fans.I don't remember what the filters were called for the exhaust fans but they were the type body shops use.I built 2x4 walls floor to ceiling and stapled 2 mil plastic to the 2x4's. I installed a six foot wide door with a 30 inch walk thru door built into that.We had paint suits with respiraters with fresh air hoses attached so we could breath.Everything needs to be sealed tight to have positive pressure.When the fans were turned on the plastic would blow out and look like a big bubble.I would change the plastic because it was so long in between painting pieces to keep dust down.I had fifteen two bulb four foot lights with daylight bulbs.I painted my truck torch red BC CC.It came out nice but I will never do it again.There is a couple of pics of the booth in my gallery.

 

I think that I have a wide variety of talents (maybe I'm wrong), but body work is not one of them. The only job that I was ever invited to leave was when I worked for a body shop as a kid. The guy that ran it tried to teach me the golden path but I never caught on so we parted as friends and I went back to the ford garage.

Thats why I have a body guy helping me on my project, I do all the grunt work and sheet metal repairs but he does the finish work and will do the painting, probably in a home built booth we put up when the time comes.

 

What about a roller paint job. There's a long running thread on MOPAR forum about doing this. Can use Rustoleum or marine paint. You do multiple coats of paint diluted with thiner and then wet sand. Rinse and repeat 3 or 4 times.

moparts: paint job on a budget!?

Also, Google roll on paint jobs from additional information.

 

I've painted a couple projects in the past, out of everything you do on a build in my opinion it is the most fun and rewarding part of it all. You get to see and make a project become a "real truck". It's not hard it just takes some know how. First and for most make sure you have a quality respirator made for auto paints, you don't want to breath any of that in.

I cleaned out my garage really well and then put down plastic on the sides and the ceiling. Then had an fan running out the window for exhaust.

It really doesn't take much to do, a little practice to get it right, some paints are more forgiving than others. And it really is my favorite part of a build, it's the moment it all comes together and becomes something else. I highly recommend giving it a shot for that experience alone.

 

Ain't that the truth....
At least the guy that agreed to do my truck said if he got insurance jobs in he would do them first. Well I took my truck to him July 1, 1998 and got it back painted August 1, 1999. I did all the parts searching and buying both NOS, repop and used. Thank goodness I had the internet then! I also put in the wiring harness to the front and rewired the tail and brake lights. I did the wood for the bed... In other words he did the sandblasting, body work, and painting. It only cost me $2000! SO I guess it was worth it.... I had to visit him often to get him moving on it!

 

Well being 18 and dirt poor, i painted it outside of my grandpas shop early in the morning with little wind and probably65-70 degrees. I sprayed everything down with water, the whole shop floor and outside everything! I still has some fine dust in it, which i sanded with 200 and buffed it. looks great. I also used chroma premier paints. (best on the market by dupont) My wallet felt that one too. thats why i had to paint it. i could not afford to have the best stuff and pay someone to do it too. Also get a good gun. I borrowed a 600 dollar gun of a body man friend of mine and its amazing how much a good gun will help you on coverage.

 

Here is what I built for my shop. It has a 1-1/2 HP blower that is mounted in the lower cabinet; sucks air in through the paint arrestor and fine particlulate filters mounted on the front of the lower cabinet. Air is forced up through 3 inches of activated carbon (removes vapor contaminents) and then exits through the upper cabinet filters back into the shop. This unit will recirculate every cubic foot of air in my 2-1/2 car shop 3 times a minute. No overspray and no spray/paint dust on anything in the shop. My buddy works in HVAC and had the cabinets built for me, I added all the rest.

 

I'm with Wayne, I'm going to build my own, temporary booth. I did all the priming either in the garage, or if the wind was blowing into the garage, in the dog pen on the north side of the house. Without the dogs present, or course. The base,clear of the cab and firewall were in the garage, the grill in the dog pen on a calm day. Both came out fine. You can make do with what you have if you're carefull. When I top coat the rest of the truck, we'll make a temp booth from clear plastic, like what Wayne posted. It's going to get painted in pieces then reassembled so it will get painted in stages.

 

Hello gang,
thanks everyone for all the good info CharlieLed nice air system, Wayne S, nice booth. I am still trying to put this together.

Went out to the shop and looked it over. 24 x 26, but the truck it self is almost front wall to back wall. I'm thinking prime it first, get it out side then go after all the parts. I might be tough rigging plastic but I will keep investigation. Welcome any and all coments.

Thinking mayby build 3 walls, back, 2 side and make the front wall just outside to clear the garage overhead door stuff.

I'll play some more tomorrow. But I like all I have heard so far

thanks

jimG 1098