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What’s everyone painting there tucks with at home? Enamel or Urethane? I have read the urethanes holds up longer and is easier to correct than enamel? But is far more dangerous because of isocyanates. Thoughts? I have 2, 12” exposition proof fans, my wife insisted. But nothing else as far as a temp booth or PPE.

Shade Baby

First time painter so mistakes will need to be corrected.

Rust-Oleum rattle cans.

If you're painting the whole truck, I can recommend PPG ALK200 Acrylic Enamel. It's easy to spray and can be touched up fairly easily. Available in original colors from Jim Carter.
Also if you're looking for a spray gun, I went with a 3M Accuspray with disposable cups. Makes cleanup a breeze.
I painted my truck in a tent I set up outside the garage door.

I used Eastwood 3:1 Urethane single stage paint with a 3M Accuspray gun.

I made a paint booth setup in my garage using a furnace blower fan pushing air in with filters before and after the blower and filters on the discharge from the area. It was tight space wise and lighting can be a challange but it worked for my needs.

Looks like my window for painting the truck will be in the spring or fall of next year. Because two things we have in abundance in SW Fla. are bugs and humidity. The pollen from the pines in the spring is so bad you can tell every time someone has driven on the blacktop easy to track em. One good thing from your recommendation's are I have already purchased a 3M Accuspray gun and assorted heads. Think maybe that will give me some time to get a little practice with body work and painting. Gonna look for a small hood from a local scrap yard.

Thanks
Shade Baby

I'll throw in my 2 cents. I am very pleased with the ease and final finish of PPG ShopLine Acrylic Urethane Direct Gloss. It's a single stage but you can use clear over it if you desire. The Direct gloss is amazing without a clear. I used it with an air brush and a conventional siphon feed Binks model 7. I did not do a full vehicle paint job, two different projects, my Vette needed some stone chip and minor panel painting, a jet ski had some fiberglass damage and paint work.

Urethane. In a tent with not much in fans. Devilbiss 1.3 for primer, Black Widow for color/clear. CTW disposable cups. 4-5 am for no bugs and no wind, late spring through early fall. Paper coveralls with hood, black surgical gloves. Safety glasses. Was using Tamco for paint, now using Revolt.

I like MAE Omni. Easy to spray and quick drying. Acrylic enamel with hardener. Also inexpensive. I painted my truck with it and it is doing fine. Nicely resistant to chipping and still can be sanded/polished. Touch ups are easy. I expect it will be fine for 10 or more years. I've even used it for running boards and bed strips. 3 coats are good with this paint.

40+ years ago I painted it with Imron (hardened polyurethane originally created by Du Pont in the early 70s). 2 coats. That stuff is not as easy to spray (it is thicker) but will last a very long time. Also more expensive...especially red colors. But in truth any hard paint will chip easily.

Good luck!

Acrylic enamel with hardener was always my "go-to", still use it for many items. The Acrylic Urethane is just as easy to apply and covers in 2-3 coats, it is a thinner product than the AE but you get used to it pretty quickly.

I used PPG single-stage polyurethane enamel, mixed at four parts paint, one part hardener, and one part activator. Covers in two coats and I added an extra so I could sand any imperfections and rub it out. Outstanding shine and depth.

This is a lot to digest, but what I am picking up here is paint seems to be something that a learned experience, that comes with practice, Like what works well for some and does not work well for others.

Thanks

Shade Baby

Yes, it does take practice. I didn't see anyone say "don't use XXX", just what has worked well for them.

Regardless of what paint you use, the key to getting a good paint job without runs, is the first coat. You want that to be the adhesion coat, not total coverage, but a light see thru coat that will give the next coat something to latch on to. Let the first coat get tacky (about ten minutes) then lay on a medium wet coat. That coat should give you complete coverage, but don't fret of you can still see thru in a few spots. Just give it enough time to tack up (usually ten-fifteen minutes) then give it another medium wet coat.

I would definitely practice on that junk yard hood a few times, both in a horizontal and vertical position.

Also there is no such thing as too much light when you’re painting, so get as many lights as you can, not just overhead, but also on the sides.

On a side note about light, get as much as possible like Phil said above. I painted my '37 a dark green metallic, the paint store told me, I had one hour to decide if I wanted to clear coat or wait, if I waited, I would have to apply one more coat of green then the final coats of clear, but it would have to be a few days later for the first coats of green to cure. This was base coat / clear coat paint with a slow cure clear that flowed out for a no buff finish. It's also a hard brittle clear that doesn't sand well.

The first coats looked good, so I went ahead and applied the clear. It looks really good, flowed out smooth and really shined. The next morning I rolled it out into the sun to get a good look at it. Right off I could see it looked like a green striped zebra, I could see every swipe of the gun I made. The spray pattern was to tight, so the metallic was concentrated in the center of each spray. If I had better lights, I could have adjusted the gun for a wider spray pattern. I ended up doing a lot of sanding, then had to buy a lot more paint and do the whole thing over.

Buy more lights!

Aahhh! Your story makes me sick to my stomach, Joe!

I think about a story my dad told me. When he was in high school, he also painted his 1933 Plymouth dark green. He used a brush and painted it out in the street in front of his house in the middle of summer.

He said the sun's heat made the paint flow out so smoothly after application, you couldn't see any brush marks. He said it it looked so good, that people thought he had it professionally done or that he had bought a new car!