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Posted by Dan (NH) [173.9.49.14] on Friday, March 30, 2012 at 14:08:21 :
In Reply to: Price for a paintjob? posted by Gary D [50.44.247.117] on Friday, March 30, 2012 at 08:56:06 :
I think we have had this discussion before, and it has always been a hot topic. This time there are quite a few good points made, all about the extent of what you are looking for in your truck. If you want a beautiful paint job like Kevin in Ohio has with candy apple red, be prepared to spend some money! If it is a woods truck, a gallon of paint from Tractor Supply would work great. Even a grocery getter doesn't need to be perfect.
My suggestion would be do the best you can with what you got available. When you get into the Centari & Imron & Nason paints, the costs are high, but they stand up to time better. The costs all fluctuate between the systems and even colors too. A bright yellow, is more expensive than say a brown. My paint guy "supplier" has been trying to get me to switch to the Nason system now for about two years, as his store has phased out the Centari, which is made for me at another store then shipped to his.
As a quick look, I ran through the Centari "Dupont" purchases I have made recently for the tractors "Farmall Red" "close to candy apple but darker" and they break down like this: A gallon of Red ran me $286 bucks, plus the reducer $36 "gallon" and the activator "hardener" was $76 "pint?". It goes some thing like 8 parts color to 4 parts "max" reducer to 1 part hardener. Now this is just the Basecoat/Topcoat and doesn't include the 2 part epoxy primer or filler primer, just the color.
For the epoxy primer, I love to use the PPG DP90 with the lead free activator "numbers elude my memory right now" but they have increased in costs too, but are still worth it when dealing with bare metal. I think a gallon of the primer runs about $178 a gallon with hardener "found it PPG 402LF" a quart for $53.
The filler primers, I haven't purchased for a while, as tractors have less sheet metal than a truck, but they should run close to the epoxy primer in cost.
Buy a decent paint gun. I use a $60 dollar Home Depot gun to shoot the primers, and a better gun to shoot color and clear coats. There are different size nozzles on the guns, just to keep in mind, as it changes with what you are shooting. I don't know how much you would consume on a truck paint job, as it depends how many coats you do, but a gallon lasted my entire truck with about a pint left and I repainted the doors and hood twice because of those damn bugs.
You see the costs of 7k and up because painting is soooooo labor intense. It isn't laying a coat down and calling it good, although it does happen sometimes. It is ALLL THE PREP WORK that makes the difference. The taping of areas that don't need paint and countless primer coats to get that perfect smooth contour on the hood.
Now don't get me wrong, anyone can do this. My first real paint job was on my 1948 Chevy truck with the round cab and wavy fenders. I did a basecoat and then a clear coat on top after letting the color coat flash dry for the specified time. It came out good, but I learned to put a bug screen on the fresh air inlet next time, before I paint again. To this day I know for a fact there are still three mosquitoes trapped between the color and basecoat on the roof of that truck. There is also a good size paint run on the passenger door, that will probably be there as long as the bugs. In the end I was proud to do it myself, and if I wanted to be a stickler, nothing says you can't wet-sand it down a little and try again. Just might be a costly learning experience, but well worth it. Start small and work your way up, and don't rush it!