Any one do body work or repainting?

Wondering if any of you guys are into auto body work or painting?

I'm pretty new to both but from a few feet away my work looks pretty darn good.
just trying to learn more thats why i asked.

Ive done some , both on my 75 LTD and my 89 f150 - panels came out straight, color match was horrible- LOL ! Its a pain to do as a job- serious amount of dust ( wear a mask) , always dirty.

I stripped a couple of my tractors down to near bare metal n repainted em- oddly the .99 cent paint job looks and has lasted longer then the $7 can of paint job.

I plan on using my HVLP air gun set sometime soon- my 86GT should be the first one as a test- then the 85 LT11 will get a fresh coat of silver as well.

Bondo shouldnt be more then 1/8" thick - its ment to fill shallow dents, itll crack and split if any thicker- spot putty will shrink as well .

Cool.., i have a husky spray gun that came with my air compressior when i bought it.
Today i painted the fender to my 87 mazda b2000 that i just got done puttying.
The first coat of paint looked perfect but the final has some orange peel.

If its not tooo bad, it can be wet sanded with like 1000 or higher wet sand paper- keep the water flowing to keep the paper clean- dont sand too much or youll need to repaint it - or try rubbing compound. Then should be able to buff it out again after wards with wax after the paint cures.

dangeroustoys56 wrote:

If its not tooo bad, it can be wet sanded with like 1000 or higher wet sand paper- keep the water flowing to keep the paper clean- dont sand too much or youll need to repaint it - or try rubbing compound. Then should be able to buff it out again after wards with wax after the paint cures.

After i put it on the truck, it's not as bad as i thought.
It's just a old truck it's fine.

The door on my LTD looked almost purple ( was a maroon car) - paint didnt match the cap color- lol! The 89 f150 was bright red and dark grey - truck needed so much work , ended up spray painting the whole thing grey - i didnt feel like painting the red section again.

Truck was a mess- thing had been in a couple accidents before i got it - door, front fender and rear fender on drivers side were all fixed at least twice- door had 3" of bondo slapped on it after a replacement panel had been welded on the first time- i wasnt happy to see someone had hob jobbed it together. it ran great till the rust and salt eventually destroyed the EFI wiring harness , rendering the truck non running.

dangeroustoys56 wrote:

The door on my LTD looked almost purple ( was a maroon car) - paint didnt match the cap color- lol! The 89 f150 was bright red and dark grey - truck needed so much work , ended up spray painting the whole thing grey - i didnt feel like painting the red section again.

Truck was a mess- thing had been in a couple accidents before i got it - door, front fender and rear fender on drivers side were all fixed at least twice- door had 3" of bondo slapped on it after a replacement panel had been welded on the first time- i wasnt happy to see someone had hob jobbed it together. it ran great till the rust and salt eventually destroyed the EFI wiring harness , rendering the truck non running.

Yeah one of things i hate is when people do half you know what jobs when fixing stuff, i'd rather have to fix the original problems it's self instead of having to re do peoples crappy work.

Like dangeroustoys56 said use Bondo sparingly. the banging a lawn tractor gets if the bondo is too thick or is not prepped right it will come right off. and make sure its applied to bare rough metal. unless you are going to make it a show tractor use cheap paint b/c a pant job will get messed up fast. repainting a lawn tractor is good practice anyways. I use Rustolem/ Trimclad in spray cans b/c if you need to do a quick patch its easily done. i just redone the Murat last week and i sanded all the cobalt blue off of it b/c after i did the trailer i decided to match the tractor also. that and i was bored with the old color.

MSTEELE wrote:

Like dangeroustoys56 said use Bondo sparingly. the banging a lawn tractor gets if the bondo is too thick or is not prepped right it will come right off. and make sure its applied to bare rough metal. unless you are going to make it a show tractor use cheap paint b/c a pant job will get messed up fast. repainting a lawn tractor is good practice anyways. I use Rustolem/ Trimclad in spray cans b/c if you need to do a quick patch its easily done. i just redone the Murat last week and i sanded all the cobalt blue off of it b/c after i did the trailer i decided to match the tractor also. that and i was bored with the old color.

Nice, i see your new pic!

Yeah i try to use as much steel as possible, but you always need a little bondo to blend the new steel to the old.

I do some body work on my car (fill in rust holes and dings with putty, and paint over them... actually painting my whole truck atm). It's pretty fun

The finished product will only be as good as the time and money you are willing to put in it. If you use rattle can paint get the best. the cheap stuff will not cover good and will fade in a few months

Yeah i enjoy it pretty good.
Time is the biggest thing though while doing it.

rat88 wrote:

The finished product will only be as good as the time and money you are willing to put in it. If you use rattle can paint get the best. the cheap stuff will not cover good and will fade in a few months

yeah painting is 90% prep work, When I painted my landrover I spend a month sanding and smoothing the body, masking was a pain!!

I used a spray guy with a compressor which worked really well, but you have to know what you are doing, for example thinning out the first coats.

I guess it is not as important for a tractor though