billybunters - from a bmw z4 to a mx5 se

[billybunter]

DAY 8

not much on today-actually had to go out and do a bit of work but I did manage to put an hour in. removed the windscreen wipers and plastic sill surrounds and then over to the front left rear guard to do a bit more sanding. prior to that I use the daughters Honda delsol to dump all my spare parts in
at the moment she is thinking seriously about buying the new release type r civic so I don't think this delsol will go anywhere either



lot easier to rub back and do the painting once you remove all the fiddly bits





delsol fully loaded




end of the day

[bear2230]

Here is something to think about Billy. One of my mates is doing a full colour swap on his 1990 Porsche 911.
He has got Autohaus Hamilton to pull it all apart and prep it for the spray painter. We are talking about everything off the car here, everything.
They are quoting 1100 hours for the dismantle and reassemble. They are $100+/Hour.
This price doesn't include the painting which will be around 15K.

This is the high end of the market but if you would like to spend your time on some older Porsches you would do very, very well just with one or two a year and selling budgies. There are a heap of Porsches in desperate need of attention and all of the owners that I have met are even more fanatical than the most die hard MX-5 owner you will ever meet.

Just a thought.

Richard.

[bruce]

I cannot believe how high the hourly rate is in Australia. Panel beating is just grunt work.

[billybunter]

DAY 9

true, they certainly know how to charge, plus they probably get the apprentice to do all this type of pull down work to take full advantage of the extra $$$ involved- do you mean 1100 hours or 110 hours to pull it down and put it back together prior to the paint job


I decided to just put in an hour today on the wiper cowling area. might sound like a waste of time doing it but if you just go into these areas and wipe them out it makes the other areas pretty easy going





pretty tight area to work but in places you can still use a foam block using the 400 sandpaper -either flat or on its edge. after a while you don't really need the foam block at all its really all about pressure on the work area






slight error here. never closed the entrance to the vent and a bit of water sprayed in. too much would not be good for the ecu lurking below. shone the torch down and just a bit so out with the wife's hairdryer and so got rid of the H20 in no time at all





not to get caught again I immediately taped it up you can get side tracked easily and this is not the place to get caught with a new ecu and tune





check this out! harder rub 400 paper over the clear coat. no foam block and you can see my finger outline embedded in the clear and almost into the colour. demo purpose only if you can't see it- near those 3 dots centre of screen shots in the panel. that's how the trouble starts





now I've wrapped the 400 sandpaper in a foam block to try and rub out the damage. its working but I will have to take it right past the clear-which I would have to anyway and onto the colour. this is where using fingers or hand rubbing can have you back to metal very quick with aggressive one spot sanding.
wet sanding isn't hard. just use a foam block, plenty of water clean sandpaper and keep it moving over the work area.....well that's what I think
the only thing I can say about sandpaper there is good and bad. and its roughly $1.20 a sheet. you tear that into 4 so it 30 cents per rub out. its impossible to do a car with one sheet and I am not miserably with sandpaper
I cut and throw the sh*t. after-all you can tell if it cutting and doing the job why push paper for nothing just to save yourself 30 cents. the sandpaper will be the cheapest individual item you ever buy to re -spray a car but it's very important for a good job





that's it for the day/hour

[93_Clubman]

Crikey, your red repaint was very comprehensive!

[billybunter]

true -it wasn't just a visual. it was more pretty close to a full blown re-spray only the floor pan and I think the right side engine bay was left to complete it fully. later I went in and completed the engine bay.

not long after the spray when I thought about selling it- and it was wearing a really nice paint job- it really was an absolute bargain compared to when I once tried selling in when it was in white although I did get the sale twice and pulled out

since then I've had a lotus and I now which is the better car and I still have it. i'd say it will never come up for sale again and I think you will see a very good paint job on this car so I will not start any colour work till I am sure my prep work is up to scratch

so far all is going to plan

[billybunter]

DAY 10

after I removed the weather strip this is the door area I decided to clean up a bit today. I was going to show what I used to remove the strip but decided not too





while at it I also removed the passenger side door handle. an A4 inside to catch the nut or try to and it worked again ..or sort of. even found a socket on one of the door nuts from last years paint job





and the nut now at the bottom of the door sill but much easier to get





if you recall I painted the rear end of the mazda and never moved the mgf.it picked up a bit of drift spray but you can see from where I ran my fingers through it -no harm to the paint. if I was worried -i'd have moved it





so I first hit these doors in the RED with 180 wet and then went to 400. reson for the 180 a bit quicker to bit into it








my advise would be to any-one. take along the bottom of your windows first before you start playing with the sandpaper as it will scratch your windows. you have to be careful. I usually don't but I think you should





then it was over to the door handle where I spent more time there than in the other area




day over or about an hour in today. but later on I will get serious

[StanTheMan]

you know in the past you just went & did this.

but this time you are really showing how much work is actually involved. Or at least I'm seeing it.

100 hrs is not an over exaggeration either by the looks of it.

is it any surprise the pros would charge that much for a full respra? the amount of prep work required is insane

[billybunter]

I think if you want to do it like this it's more a full on job and 100 hours is close to the target and probably a waste of time too. BUT you could get away with not doing either the underside of the front and rear bar section and boot and the windscreen area - because who actually will see it once its covered so its a waste of time

you could actually just park an na or nb in front of you which had pretty good paint and panel and just rub the whole car back then mask it up and just spray it in probably a quarter of the time and it would still look pretty good - could look better

there would only be three detailed areas to do

1. remove the boot lid and sand out the area where the boot rubber seal fits
2. bonnet off and the same as the bonnet is a fair size to work plus you have to paint underneath. you have no choice
3. the doors and the door jams. so both door cards have to come off including mirrors and seals.

[billybunter]

DAY 11 YESTERDAY

started off with removing some of the drivers side door hardware








taped up the sill so water from the rubbing does not go inside the bottom door sill





this time rather than use an envelope I placed all the hardware inside a see through plastic ziplock seal bag





then over to the front of the car to do a quick mask up





followed by an etch prime as I had quite a few bare metal areas on show

[billybunter]

DAY 12

a few traces of missed clear coat showed up so it was back with the sandpaper for a re-rub and prime





wiper area was then masked up for etch priming








this area clean up with grease and wax remover and masked near the door





etch primed





so too the wiper bay





then went for a 90 minute run on the motor bike and once back hit it with the primer/filler








final coats and these are complete








overall the front end look pretty good now. now a show motor but a fast motor...

[Mr Morlock]

I was told by a professional painter that painting a car was +90% preparation and thats true. 100 hours is easy to gobble up and if there is body damage or rust etc it can end anyway. Guys spend a $100k on restoring rusty battered cars and the work that goes into making and welding in hand made panels- thankfully MX-5 you can get panels.

[billybunter]

DAY 13 -YESTERDAY

you might be wondering why a full bottle of wine is dangling a metre or so above the cement and hanging from a bit of strip of masking tape? well that's how much confidence I have in this new masking tape I am using on the job.




unlike the crap I've been using on and off. you know, the stuff you pull out and it tears in all directions and you have to pick at it and then tear it straight across to even it up- pull it out a bit and it stuffs up again.
you get it on the mask up job and once the pressure from the gun hits it the adhesion is poor and it lifts -the masking paper flips over your new spray and .............expression of words follow. this tape sticks like it use too - 10 or 15 years back
now if your wondering what if I had dropped the wine. well I get it for free and I don't drink the stuff or beer or smoke or eat or do anything else so I usually give the sh*t away so I guess I would have to clean up the mess with all the other mess....


this tape is about $5 a roll. made by 3m and called purple automotive masking tape. if you read this thread and paint. just looking at this has saved you more heartache than you can imagine...believe me as you have no idea how hard it is to get good friggin tape!





I rubbed back the drivers side door with the 400 and masked it all up. took a lot longer than you would think. lot of fiddly work involved. then I wiped the whole area over with grease and wax remover







first light coat primer








also ran it under the sill too





final coat primer and paper off










Day over

[billybunter]

DAY 14
drivers side door prime which required a final rub down with 400 wet. plus clean out the door handle area and the body line 0 just in case any stray clear coat was still about








again took a while to do as its a bit hard to work door handle areas but if not done an area where paint could peel first!





first coat primer





final coat




masking paper out and this side completely primed

[Boyracer]

So it’s going to be matt/undercoat grey... pretty trendy these days, I still prefer green