How to paint plastic pieces.....
08-07-2010, 02:51 AM
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How to paint plastic pieces.....
I wrote this for FSC cause people were buggin the crap outta me. I taught myself how to spray this stuff cause I didnt know a painter. Now I know several and all that has been repainted just cause I could. But it would still be holding up.....
Maybe this will help some people out
I've been getting at least 4-5 PM's a week asking me what grit I use, how many coats of paint, etc. It's getting rediculous. I don't think people are searching, or if they are, they think they're project is special and requires special answers. Doesn't matter if it's a mirror, interior piece, under the hood piece, bumper cap, it's all the same and you go about sanding it the exact same way. Hopefully this guide will help a little bit and cut down on those excessive PM's. It's not that I don't want to help, but I also don't want to spend every waking moment on here writing mini-how-to's in PM's.
Obviously rattle can paint isn't car paint quality. BUT, when done right, with the right prepwork, it can come out show quality and be very durable too. So far I've rattle canned my bumper cap and valence, mirrors, tailgate handle, grille shell, bowtie, tailgate spoiler, and I've niteshaded the taillights. Everything on the exterior of my truck is holding up extremely well. Bug splats, pressure washers, nothing fazes it.
Please note that it's easy painting small things, even the bumper cap and tailgate spoiler were easy enough, but when you start getting into bigger pieces, such as your dash, it's not practical. When I start my interior, I'll smooth all the interior pieces myself, then have them sprayed at a body shop. I could do all the small pieces myself and have the dash sprayed, but then it wouldn't match perfectly and there is no room for error on this truck. Here are pics of all the products and tools I use to paint and sand my stuff.
Here are the steps I use when going about painting something. In this case I decided to do the Fuse box cover (electrical cover) because I needed pics step by step for this guide and it was small and easy. As you can see, I decided to delete the raised lettering on it, I like the smoothed look.
1. Remove the piece off the truck. This way you don't have to worry about taping off the rest of the truck, overspray, etc. It's just a lot easier to do it off the truck.
2. Clean it. Take some dawn dish detergent and get a rag soapy. This will help to remove the waxes, dirt, and whatever stuff is on it. Wash it good, rinse and dry. After its dry, take some sort of grease and wax remover, and rub all over it. This will help remove even more junk. This stuff will make it look shiny at first, but will eventually dry off.
3. Start sanding! I start usually with 120 grit. Sometimes I'll use 80 grit to knock the really coarse stuff off. Here's a tip. If you have some sort of sander, orbital or whatever, it takes a lot of the hard work out. Problem is, sanding discs for these can be expensive, and you can't always get a sander in all the cracks. You'll have to revert back to caveman and use elbow grease. I have a couple of Mouse sanders I use.
When you have it roughed up really good with 80-120, then you can move on to 220. Again, you want to get as much of the rough stuff off. Be sure that when you are sanding rounded corners, you sand with the curve, not straight across. This will insure you don't put grooves in the rounded edges. You want it smooth all the way around. This is a lot of hard work. Please don't PM me asking why it's taking so long.
Please note that you aren't going to get it perfectly smooth. This is where the filler primer comes in. It will fill the imperfections with every coat.
After you are done sanding with the 220, I skip to 400. Again, sand the whole piece, trying to smooth out all you can.
When I painted my tailgate spoiler, I used my buffer with an 80 grit sanding pad on it. This really worked well to remove the thick texture off the top of the pad, but be careful. This thing will gouge the crud out of it if you dont keep it at the right angle.
4. Ready for Primer. I used The Filler primer from Dupli-color like shown above. If you are painting your piece a light color, use a light primer. This will ensure that you dont have to spray so many coats to cover dark primer. You'll notice the tip/nozzle on these cans are quite good, better than the older nozzles. This is what enables you to give a good quality paint job. Shake the hell out of the can. The more you shake, the better the paint mixes.
On small pieces, I usually just drape a hand towel over my hand/arm and hold the thing I'm painting with my left hand and spray with the right. This way I can turn it whichever way I want it. Use sweeping motions, I go from right to left, left to right. Start the spray before you hit the piece. Think of it as a drive by. When Ole Tommy Knuckles does a drive by in his ford coupe he wants to insure he gets everyone. If you start the spray on the piece you are asking for runs.
On primer, it's not so important to get a nice even coverage, even though I like too. You are just going to wetsand it anyway. On your first coat of primer, It doesnt have to be thick. A good stopping point is when the piece is all gray, not black anymore. Let the thing dry for about 20 minutes before wetsanding. This is how the piece will look Before wet sanding. Notice all the roughness. The 400 grit will take that right out.
5. Wetsanding: If the piece is small enough, I like to use my kitchen sink for this. If not, use a water hose, or some people like to use a spray bottle. If its a big piece, I'll set out two saw horses, lay the piece across it, and use the water hose on trickle to wash away the primer dust.
I use 400 grit to wetsand. I like to stick the piece under the water trickle, and sand away. You want to check periodically up close and see where you aren't getting, It's better to get most of the imperfections out on the first few coats to save you time and having to spray more coats. After you are certain you have sanded enough, take a soapy rag and wash the thing again. Rinse and let dry for about 10 miutes.
Spray more filler primer, let dry 20 minutes, wetsand with 400 again. Do this until your piece is smooth as glass. Sometimes it takes 5 times for me. Usually 3-4 though. When you are satisfied that it is ready for paint, the wetsand with 600 grit. This is the best grit I've found to ready it for paint. Again, wash it and dry it. Let it dry about 20 minutes.
6. Ready for Paint! Make sure you have enough cans for the job. It might take more than 1 on bigger pieces. You want to pic a nice, well ventilated spot to paint. You dont want bugs or dirt blowing on your project. I found the best place is my garage. I open the door, and I have a large attic fan that I use to pull out the fumes.
If you are painting on a hot, humid day, it's best to let your piece dry in the atmosphere that you painted it in. In other words, don't paint it outside, then bring it inside in the A/C to let it dry. This will most likely cause the paint to glaze over with moisture, kind of like when someone who wears glasses goes form outside to in, they fog up. Find a place you can set your piece to dry outside, maybe inside a box, enclosure, something.
Again, if the piece is small enough, I hold it with my hand. If not I like to use my sawhorses. Shake the hell outta the can. If you are using a paint with flakes in it, like pewter, its harder to get the coverage color even because you have to be at the right distance and angle with every pass. With solid colors such as red or white, its not as hard. But that metallic will definetely show up if you don’t spray right.
Again, start the spray before you hit the piece. Use even sweeping motions, stopping often to wipe your finger across the nozzle. This removes the wet paint that builds up and could potentially ruin your project if a glob of it flings itself on your piece. Some people like a few light coats, I like to get a nice heavy one on first. Turn the piece to get at all the sides and try to keep the same distance all around. Shake the can frequently between passes.
After that first coat is done, I let it dry about 10 minutes or less, then I'll spray another one. I usually never spray more than 3 coats of paint. When you are satisfied with the paint coverage, let it dry for around an hour.
Some people wetsand before clear, I don’t, simply because my work is usually perfect the first time.
Maybe this will help some people out
I've been getting at least 4-5 PM's a week asking me what grit I use, how many coats of paint, etc. It's getting rediculous. I don't think people are searching, or if they are, they think they're project is special and requires special answers. Doesn't matter if it's a mirror, interior piece, under the hood piece, bumper cap, it's all the same and you go about sanding it the exact same way. Hopefully this guide will help a little bit and cut down on those excessive PM's. It's not that I don't want to help, but I also don't want to spend every waking moment on here writing mini-how-to's in PM's.
Obviously rattle can paint isn't car paint quality. BUT, when done right, with the right prepwork, it can come out show quality and be very durable too. So far I've rattle canned my bumper cap and valence, mirrors, tailgate handle, grille shell, bowtie, tailgate spoiler, and I've niteshaded the taillights. Everything on the exterior of my truck is holding up extremely well. Bug splats, pressure washers, nothing fazes it.
Please note that it's easy painting small things, even the bumper cap and tailgate spoiler were easy enough, but when you start getting into bigger pieces, such as your dash, it's not practical. When I start my interior, I'll smooth all the interior pieces myself, then have them sprayed at a body shop. I could do all the small pieces myself and have the dash sprayed, but then it wouldn't match perfectly and there is no room for error on this truck. Here are pics of all the products and tools I use to paint and sand my stuff.
Here are the steps I use when going about painting something. In this case I decided to do the Fuse box cover (electrical cover) because I needed pics step by step for this guide and it was small and easy. As you can see, I decided to delete the raised lettering on it, I like the smoothed look.
1. Remove the piece off the truck. This way you don't have to worry about taping off the rest of the truck, overspray, etc. It's just a lot easier to do it off the truck.
2. Clean it. Take some dawn dish detergent and get a rag soapy. This will help to remove the waxes, dirt, and whatever stuff is on it. Wash it good, rinse and dry. After its dry, take some sort of grease and wax remover, and rub all over it. This will help remove even more junk. This stuff will make it look shiny at first, but will eventually dry off.
3. Start sanding! I start usually with 120 grit. Sometimes I'll use 80 grit to knock the really coarse stuff off. Here's a tip. If you have some sort of sander, orbital or whatever, it takes a lot of the hard work out. Problem is, sanding discs for these can be expensive, and you can't always get a sander in all the cracks. You'll have to revert back to caveman and use elbow grease. I have a couple of Mouse sanders I use.
When you have it roughed up really good with 80-120, then you can move on to 220. Again, you want to get as much of the rough stuff off. Be sure that when you are sanding rounded corners, you sand with the curve, not straight across. This will insure you don't put grooves in the rounded edges. You want it smooth all the way around. This is a lot of hard work. Please don't PM me asking why it's taking so long.
Please note that you aren't going to get it perfectly smooth. This is where the filler primer comes in. It will fill the imperfections with every coat.
After you are done sanding with the 220, I skip to 400. Again, sand the whole piece, trying to smooth out all you can.
When I painted my tailgate spoiler, I used my buffer with an 80 grit sanding pad on it. This really worked well to remove the thick texture off the top of the pad, but be careful. This thing will gouge the crud out of it if you dont keep it at the right angle.
4. Ready for Primer. I used The Filler primer from Dupli-color like shown above. If you are painting your piece a light color, use a light primer. This will ensure that you dont have to spray so many coats to cover dark primer. You'll notice the tip/nozzle on these cans are quite good, better than the older nozzles. This is what enables you to give a good quality paint job. Shake the hell out of the can. The more you shake, the better the paint mixes.
On small pieces, I usually just drape a hand towel over my hand/arm and hold the thing I'm painting with my left hand and spray with the right. This way I can turn it whichever way I want it. Use sweeping motions, I go from right to left, left to right. Start the spray before you hit the piece. Think of it as a drive by. When Ole Tommy Knuckles does a drive by in his ford coupe he wants to insure he gets everyone. If you start the spray on the piece you are asking for runs.
On primer, it's not so important to get a nice even coverage, even though I like too. You are just going to wetsand it anyway. On your first coat of primer, It doesnt have to be thick. A good stopping point is when the piece is all gray, not black anymore. Let the thing dry for about 20 minutes before wetsanding. This is how the piece will look Before wet sanding. Notice all the roughness. The 400 grit will take that right out.
5. Wetsanding: If the piece is small enough, I like to use my kitchen sink for this. If not, use a water hose, or some people like to use a spray bottle. If its a big piece, I'll set out two saw horses, lay the piece across it, and use the water hose on trickle to wash away the primer dust.
I use 400 grit to wetsand. I like to stick the piece under the water trickle, and sand away. You want to check periodically up close and see where you aren't getting, It's better to get most of the imperfections out on the first few coats to save you time and having to spray more coats. After you are certain you have sanded enough, take a soapy rag and wash the thing again. Rinse and let dry for about 10 miutes.
Spray more filler primer, let dry 20 minutes, wetsand with 400 again. Do this until your piece is smooth as glass. Sometimes it takes 5 times for me. Usually 3-4 though. When you are satisfied that it is ready for paint, the wetsand with 600 grit. This is the best grit I've found to ready it for paint. Again, wash it and dry it. Let it dry about 20 minutes.
6. Ready for Paint! Make sure you have enough cans for the job. It might take more than 1 on bigger pieces. You want to pic a nice, well ventilated spot to paint. You dont want bugs or dirt blowing on your project. I found the best place is my garage. I open the door, and I have a large attic fan that I use to pull out the fumes.
If you are painting on a hot, humid day, it's best to let your piece dry in the atmosphere that you painted it in. In other words, don't paint it outside, then bring it inside in the A/C to let it dry. This will most likely cause the paint to glaze over with moisture, kind of like when someone who wears glasses goes form outside to in, they fog up. Find a place you can set your piece to dry outside, maybe inside a box, enclosure, something.
Again, if the piece is small enough, I hold it with my hand. If not I like to use my sawhorses. Shake the hell outta the can. If you are using a paint with flakes in it, like pewter, its harder to get the coverage color even because you have to be at the right distance and angle with every pass. With solid colors such as red or white, its not as hard. But that metallic will definetely show up if you don’t spray right.
Again, start the spray before you hit the piece. Use even sweeping motions, stopping often to wipe your finger across the nozzle. This removes the wet paint that builds up and could potentially ruin your project if a glob of it flings itself on your piece. Some people like a few light coats, I like to get a nice heavy one on first. Turn the piece to get at all the sides and try to keep the same distance all around. Shake the can frequently between passes.
After that first coat is done, I let it dry about 10 minutes or less, then I'll spray another one. I usually never spray more than 3 coats of paint. When you are satisfied with the paint coverage, let it dry for around an hour.
Some people wetsand before clear, I don’t, simply because my work is usually perfect the first time.
08-07-2010, 02:51 AM
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7. Spraying clear. Again, get your piece ready in the desired location. Shake the can good. Do a couple of quick test sprays to get it spraying good. Use the same method as spraying paint. You want a nice even coverage. Try to look at your piece in the light so you can see where you've covered. I do a nice thick coat, let it dry for 10 minutes, then another one. I've never done more than 3 coats simply because I never felt it needed it.
When you are happy with the clear coat, I like to let it dry overnight. This ensures proper drying time and also ensures you wont get fingerprints in it when installing it. Some like to buff, I've never really needed to.
Conclusion. This requires hard work but it's not hard to do. The main thing is patience, and if I can do it so can you. Plan out the whole thing before starting the project. It's 90% prep work, the rest is paint. Hope this helps.........
When you are happy with the clear coat, I like to let it dry overnight. This ensures proper drying time and also ensures you wont get fingerprints in it when installing it. Some like to buff, I've never really needed to.
Conclusion. This requires hard work but it's not hard to do. The main thing is patience, and if I can do it so can you. Plan out the whole thing before starting the project. It's 90% prep work, the rest is paint. Hope this helps.........
08-07-2010, 02:55 AM
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Dash smoothed in the above fashion ready for paint. Had my painter shoot it.
Calipers same way
Did these today...
Last edited by 1LOW4X4; 08-07-2010 at 03:12 AM.
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08-07-2010, 09:06 AM
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One thing that works great that anyone can do: Any pro shop has a paint booth that "bakes" the finish afterwards. This serves to harden the finish faster and also improves durability. What I do typically is paint in the shade, then lay the piece out in direct sunshine to "bake" (be careful about dust tho!) or on occasion under 100 watt bulb for a few hours if its small enuf. You'll find the finish ends up much harder faster. I also give the part overnite to cure as well if I can manage.
Another VERY important fact - PATIENCE!!!! Especially @ the prime and sand stages. Extra time here means the diff between an OK and spectacular job. Its always a great idea to let the primer shrink and its even more important if there's bondo or other putty involved. The longer you give it the better to avoid waves, cracks and extra work. This is why we often see guys driving around with primered panels (and u thot they just didnt have the time to finish yet!).
Next write up should cover masking and blending - like how to eliminate the ridges where the diff tones/designs meet...thats an art!
I keep looking at all my plastic and how crap it looks...just need motivation to get started! Great write-up!
Another VERY important fact - PATIENCE!!!! Especially @ the prime and sand stages. Extra time here means the diff between an OK and spectacular job. Its always a great idea to let the primer shrink and its even more important if there's bondo or other putty involved. The longer you give it the better to avoid waves, cracks and extra work. This is why we often see guys driving around with primered panels (and u thot they just didnt have the time to finish yet!).
Next write up should cover masking and blending - like how to eliminate the ridges where the diff tones/designs meet...thats an art!
I keep looking at all my plastic and how crap it looks...just need motivation to get started! Great write-up!
Last edited by dhpro; 08-07-2010 at 09:20 AM.
08-07-2010, 09:07 AM
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it's also a good thing too put some rubbing alcohol after you get done with all your sanding before you primer and after you wet sand before you paint. just in case your hands touch the part because your hands are greasy. *note to self*
08-07-2010, 09:13 AM
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No I don't do adhesion promoter because by the time I spray primer the surface has been sanded very well. Really the only time you need that it is you aren't going to sand.
My painters don't sand, they wipe it down with grease remover, then adhesion promoter, then they spray 4or 5 coats of primer with no sanding in between. Then when that dries they wetsand smooth.
It's however you wanna do it. With my way there's usually no room for error.
My painters don't sand, they wipe it down with grease remover, then adhesion promoter, then they spray 4or 5 coats of primer with no sanding in between. Then when that dries they wetsand smooth.
It's however you wanna do it. With my way there's usually no room for error.