I'm wondering is which company has the best tri-coat candy systems if anyone has sprayed them b4.

 

House of Kolor is probably the best that i have used. Sprays easy, and they have some wicked colors. I'm still trying out the DuPont hot hues colors but havent decided on them.

 

I am not a big fan of the House Of Kolor, as it is a dye based candy & seems to fade in my opinion over time. And I have never had luck repairing and getting a good color match, even with left over product.

I do like the Carrizma from BASF, but I do not have long term experiences with it.

 

Hi-end collision centers often spray "drop down" panels for tri-color matching.
Its a technigue were you adjust various spray and coverage items on
notebook size or larger test panels. It would take a bunch of ink to explain
in words but just a few minutes for someone to demo the concept for you.

If you could get the concept under your belt and spray a couple of panels
it would get you into the "art" of tri-color control. This is especialy true
cause of the cost of materials in this area. A friend of mine just paid
490 big ones for a gallon of some type of crazyness.

 

fordpilot,

If your post was referring to mine, I do not normally have a problem with tri coat color matching, which is just really a function of proper blending in my opinion. I have plenty of experience with this, and know exactly what you are referring to with the sprayouts. What I was referring to is the House Of Kolors candy product, and the fact that it is a dye based product that is more succeptible to fading from what I have experienced on the vehicles I have painted over the years. No ammount of blending in the world will make up for that fading to an experienced eye. Even if it is blended, I can still see the difference and those who know what they are looking at, can do the same. I have taken classes from John Kosmowski who developed the House Of Kolor product, and even he will tell you the same thing, it is not a product that was designed for daily drivers. That, and he will tell you to use the House of Kolors clear, as that will "help' LOL We all know where his paycheck comes from. And yes, I have sprayed it using their clears, and still have seen fading over time on vehicles that are in the sun more often than say a museum piece or a trailer queen show car.

 

Rocket..sorry I was not referring to your post. I was just making
an effort to give 385 serieshemi a heads-up or insight onto tri-color
work.

To put it another way..the finished product is going to depend a lot more on
painter knowledge and skills than single stage or b/c.

I was kind of curious as to what they mean by a "dye based" product.
Sorry to kind of go off thread but kind of got me scratching my head.

 

Southern Polyurethanes has just somewhat recently come out with a intercoat clear. The guys that have used it really seem to like it from what they are posted, and many of them have used hok stuff Just thought I would let you know in case someone wanted to try it. For what I do, I don't normally use an intercoat, so haven't tried it. But maybe it would save some money on intercoat vs hok's stuff. I haven't painted tri coat since a 90's probe and that was a bitch. Spent all day trying to get the red basecoat(dupont chromabase factory pack) to cover the buff primer the shop manager wanted to paint over. And then add the candy coats till match on top of that. Wasn't real fun to do that one, at least a kid fresh out of school and not a ton of gun time and never spraying a tri stage. Least it turned out even though spent a good part of the day in the booth
There are dye based candys (think sort of like ink) and also basecoat candys (tints,pigment), to give a candy look. The dye based/regular clear like used in early candy jobs are suppose to be tougher to spray. Some people mix the candy(or pearls, flake depending on what you aer doing) in true clear, and others mix into a clear basecoat-or in other words, intercoat clear , pretty much the same as basecoat, but without pigment. Adding tint to an intercoat clear would be much like what a basecoat paint is, although more transparent making it even more critical to spray evenly, so you see the underlying basecoat color through. Some colors in the cheaper lines of basecoat I swear, you could practically call them a basecoat candy how they are for coverage.

 

Yeah i get what you guys are saying, thanks for the information about this Ive been sprayin basecoats n enamels since i was a sophomore on highschool so tri-coats are just another step in perfecting my painting experience. If you think 490 bucks is alot dont even bother looking into the high end comelion and such types, they sometimes run between $1,000 to $4,000 a QUART!!!! now that is spendy!

 

Depends on if you are matching original three stage paints, or going for a custom color. I have sprayed PPG three stage and it came out okay. If you are blending in to an existing paint, it is a major pain to get the exact color matched. Its never perfect. But if going custon color, just use the brand you are more familiar with. Dupont, PPG, Autocolor, House of Kolor, 3M all make good paints, its just based on personal preference. I will always use PPG because that is what I am used to. A friend of mine only uses Dupont. Another friend of mine uses another manuf (forget the name). I have sprayed other brands (Autocolor, 3M) and got good results.
The end color also depends on what primer color you are using. I stopped using just the red oxide and gray colors. I started using primers that are close in color to the final color.

 

What kind of candy effect are you looking for?

 

I'm not really lookin for a candy effect im just askin to see what its like to spray tri-coat systems. I can spray anything else besides these because I havent even tried tri-coats.
I plan to open my custom shop one day, so im just askin what experience people have so i know what to expect when I do choose to paint this type of system. The majority of my bodywork skills are self taught by just doing it, and some from my cousin while I worked with him.

 

Here's a multi-stage candy, I used on my car. Same thing goes for pearls. Just that too much pearl will become cloudy. Check theses pics out.
http://www.carpron.com/multisite/v/Upload/zanny/

 

Since when did 3M start making paint?