Denny, all I can tell you is that I asked the paint shop and they gave me the paint. It looks perfect to any original or repainted Mariner Blue I have seen. I do have the can and will check for numbers or formulas.
MJD and Mike G: I am a real rookie. (I sprayed airless years ago at a steel shop and that experience was detrimental to spraying vehicles. I tend to move too fast.) I decided to paint my truck myself in my garage. I started researching books and websites. I just jumped in. It seemed overwhelming at first. I have found that everyone has their advice and opinions. I will offer what I learned, but who knows if I am right about any of this. I think my truck turned out okay, and I have gotten a lot of compliments.
I ended up going with what I saw repeatedly as the current best way to paint a classic vehicle. Clean to bare metal, including wax and grease remover. Spray with two coats of epoxy primer. Filler used over epoxy. Seal filler areas with epoxy. Two coats of high build urethane primer. Guide coat and block sand. Any final filler. Seal coat of epoxy. Wet sand to 600. I then used 2 coats of SS urethane. I used SS stage for a couple reasons. One, I thought it would be easier and two, I wanted an original look to the truck. (I thought that BC/CC would have too much depth.) Most folks seem to say that shooting BC/CC is easier to get good results.
As to enamel, I really don't know about it other than our trucks were originally painted with it and everyone says it is old school. (Here is where I am going to get in trouble with folks that know what they are talking about.) Old school enamel was not activated with a catalyst that acts as a chemical reaction to cure the paint. It instead dried by evaporation of the reducer. That is why you have to wait weeks to wet sand or buff enamel. You can get enamel with a catalyst that acts as a hardener. I lot of venders sell un-catalyzed paint. I did use to paint my interior. I can tell you it is much more brittle (ie chips) than the urethane on the exterior.
I learned as I went. By the time I was done with the truck, I fell pretty confident that if I started over it would be close to great. I made a plastic paint booth in the garage with a blower (snagged from an old furnace) and filters. I still and continually had dust problems; I don't think there is a way around it in a homemade plastic booth. I didn't have any runs, but did get some orange peel in places and some dull spots. These were able to be wet sanded and buffed to a nice shine.
I did learn a few things. Expensive products generally seem worth the money. The DuPont paint was $270.00 a gallon and it sprayed really nice. Bought some cheap primer and it was crap. I tried to go with some cheap guns and never had great results. Ended up buying a nice gun and wished I had not wasted money on the cheap guns. Patience and prep is the key. Do not rush any step of the process. Block sanding and guide coats of paint are the only way to really prep a panel for paint. I tried to skip this in places early on and boy does it show. One rule I constantly heard was pick a product line and stick with it. This was a rule I repeatedly broke. I used PPG, SPI, Valspar, and DuPont products. It has been done two weeks and can't report any problems yet, (other than a dream the other night where the paint started peeling off in sheets.)
So other than a few nightmares, I am glad I did it myself. I learned a lot. Hope my experience might help. Good Luck.
