**NOTE** Due to having to upload the pics to the site i've given a link to another site that the article was written on, as it takes too much for me to re size all of the pictures (the size is really needed for the level of detail) But enjoy!
How-To: Body work for dummies - TriStateTuners.com :: Home of Tristate Auto Enthusiast
Ok all, time for a thread on the basics of painting, but if you were like me and had just a little experience doing body work, you probably had no idea where to start. Now keep in mind this is my first how-to article, so I will try to make it as painless as possible, and I will also include pictures along the way. So lets get started.
LIST OF PRODUCTS YOU WILL NEED:
-220 and 320 grit sanding disks
-Orbital Sander (not required, but recommended)
-1 Pint Duplicolor Self Primer
-1 Tack rag (can be found at local parts stores)
-1 Can of wax/grease remover (I used aerosol, but actual bottles are good too)
-Bag of clean rags (as many as you can find,
)
-1 Paint gun (HVLP is preferred, but not required)
-1 Gallon can of Paint or Lacquer thinner
-Air compressor (10 gal minimum or it wont even be worth painting)
-Spot putty or Body filler (2 part mix or 1, doesn't matter)
-putty knives (plastic preferably, as metal will damage the panel)
-1000 or better sand paper for finish sanding.
I started with a hood off of a 1997 Eagle Talon TSi. Not the hardest of hoods to do because of its curvature, but the little hump makes it a small challenge. First step is to pick yourself up an orbital sander; this will save you TONS of hours of trying to hand-sand. I also picked up 120 and 220 grit orbital sanding discs to kick it off. NOTE: some say to go 600 or higher, but in the body work interest we want to get as deep down to the metal as we possibly can so we can fill them in properly
Once you have sanded the clear coat down on whatever panel it is your working on, you should have something that kinda looks similar to the picture below. Now granted the hood and bumper were painted black, so mine has a darker gray tint to it as part of the base coat still remains. Now the important thing to remember when sanding, is any area that has a ding or a dent in it needs to be taken down as close to the metal as you can possibly get it, so that you can fill in the groves in the metal and allow the filler to properly bond.
Once youre done sanding, make sure you give the panels a GOOD wipe down with a degreasing agent. NOTE: DO NOT let the bare metal sit overnight unprotected, all it takes is one single water molecule to begin the oxidation process and ruin your hard work years down the road, protect it with a piece of plastic pressed onto the area or a clean terry-cloth.
I used a typical Grease and wax remover aerosol that dissolves quickly, and a clean rag. This is important if you want to get to filling in the same day as you did the sanding, as it will air dry in about 1-2 minutes. Once you have that finished, you can move on to the filling part. As you can see in the picture, the panel is going to look like a retarded tic-tac-toe board to an extent. Youll need body filler or something similar, I used a Bondo stage 3 brazing and filling putty simply because it cures quickly, and makes a noticeable color difference when its fully cured; but any body filler will do, just make sure you mix it correctly.
When you are filling in the dents or imperfections (those little rock chips you noticed at car shows? Nows the time to get em
) And simply work your way top to bottom I say this as because with paint, it will not cure right away, so leaning in it would be a bad thing. When you are filling in a dent lets say, its important to make sure you have JUST enough to fill in the dent and maybe ½ inch of area around it, too much and youll be sanding for hours trying to get the excess off.
Try to only put just a tad bit of pressure on the applicator when applying the body filler as you dont want to squeeze all of it out of the dent and around on the panel, but enough to smooth it all out and get a nice flat surface. This is one of those things that you need to actually do before you can get the hang of it, everyones technique is different.
This is one those times in this process that you should take great care and have a ton of patience for, because for anything you miss here (rock chips or other dents) youre going to notice it later after your done primering and/or painting and its a pain in the ass to go back and have to re-do it, so take your time. If it takes you all day to get all of it done, then so be it, the finished product will thank you; when your all set and done filling you should have something that looks like the picture below.
Now as stated above the bondo I was using was changing color, and Ill give you guys a shot of what that looks like as well. Youll start to notice it curing and with those of you that used 2 part mixes, youll be able to feel heat coming off of the patch (as it bonds using a chemical reaction) which will alert you that its beginning to dry. Its important to allow the FULL curing time before you begin sanding!! (if you dont youll ruin your sander by smearing semi-hard filler all over the place, it creates a HUGE mess) reference the back of the instructions on your filler to see what its average cure time is. This was a shot of mine after just 10 minutes, so it all depends.
Once youve let the filler cure, its time to sand. I broke out the 220 grit paper for this part. Remember when sanding body filler you do NOT want to press down too hard or you will create a divot in the work you just did. Let the sander sort of glide over the area, using your hand as sort of a guide for it, but do not apply any real pressure to it. The aim here is to feather the filler to match the contour of the panel youre working on, so by the time youre done you should only be able to see about ½ of the filler that you started with as most of it is just excess and sands off as you go. So with this just as with the last step, take your time and let the sander do the work. When youre finished, you should have something that resembles this.
So now your ready to primer your work. This is the moment of truth per say, as most imperfections if not caught before will show up now and I have an example of that as well. Primering is pretty straight forward; its the same aspect as painting, where dialing in your particular paint gun is half the battle. I picked up a Kawasaki HVLP gun for relatively cheap at my work (under $40) and put it to the test, but any type of gun should work for this. Start off by mixing up your primer, the primer I bought was a Dupli-color auto shop primer, which was already mixed so all I had to do was shake the hell out of it. Make sure you follow the manufacturers directions for this, or your primer coat will not turn out properly.
How your coating turns out is dependent on your painting technique, it simply takes practice. This was my first time spraying and I think I did pretty ok. After your first coat, it should look something similar to this. DO NOT spray it on too thick or it will cause runs and they are a bi*** to sand out, go slowly, and paint at your own pace, this is not a race 
And so on with your second and third coatings, enough to make any body filler not noticeable. I gave it a solid gray coat and dries something similar to this..
Then once youre done with the primering, allow the piece to fully cure. Most manufacturers suggest 10-15 mins to tack, which means 10-15 minutes until the surface becomes tacky to the touch. I would personally let it sit overnight just to be sure. Then once you finish that you can either choose to wet-sand or catch up on blemishes, or you can go straight to paint. Ill make another chapter once I can find my cars paint color in a 1 gallon size that I can actually get. As I mentioned prior, youll notice imperfections at the end of the primer stage, and here is an example.
You can choose to go back and tackle these now, as once you add paint and clear to the mix, you wont be able to get at something like this chip without destroying the paint job you just worked so hard to accomplish.
Thanks for checking out my how-to guys, it is my first so I hope it was somewhat informative. As usual Ill be available to answer any questions via the thread here, or you can PM me as well and Ill try to answer it as best I can. Stay tuned for my write up on painting! Thanks!
How-To: Body work for dummies - TriStateTuners.com :: Home of Tristate Auto Enthusiast
Ok all, time for a thread on the basics of painting, but if you were like me and had just a little experience doing body work, you probably had no idea where to start. Now keep in mind this is my first how-to article, so I will try to make it as painless as possible, and I will also include pictures along the way. So lets get started.
LIST OF PRODUCTS YOU WILL NEED:
-220 and 320 grit sanding disks
-Orbital Sander (not required, but recommended)
-1 Pint Duplicolor Self Primer
-1 Tack rag (can be found at local parts stores)
-1 Can of wax/grease remover (I used aerosol, but actual bottles are good too)
-Bag of clean rags (as many as you can find,
)-1 Paint gun (HVLP is preferred, but not required)
-1 Gallon can of Paint or Lacquer thinner
-Air compressor (10 gal minimum or it wont even be worth painting)
-Spot putty or Body filler (2 part mix or 1, doesn't matter)
-putty knives (plastic preferably, as metal will damage the panel)
-1000 or better sand paper for finish sanding.
I started with a hood off of a 1997 Eagle Talon TSi. Not the hardest of hoods to do because of its curvature, but the little hump makes it a small challenge. First step is to pick yourself up an orbital sander; this will save you TONS of hours of trying to hand-sand. I also picked up 120 and 220 grit orbital sanding discs to kick it off. NOTE: some say to go 600 or higher, but in the body work interest we want to get as deep down to the metal as we possibly can so we can fill them in properly
Once you have sanded the clear coat down on whatever panel it is your working on, you should have something that kinda looks similar to the picture below. Now granted the hood and bumper were painted black, so mine has a darker gray tint to it as part of the base coat still remains. Now the important thing to remember when sanding, is any area that has a ding or a dent in it needs to be taken down as close to the metal as you can possibly get it, so that you can fill in the groves in the metal and allow the filler to properly bond.
Once youre done sanding, make sure you give the panels a GOOD wipe down with a degreasing agent. NOTE: DO NOT let the bare metal sit overnight unprotected, all it takes is one single water molecule to begin the oxidation process and ruin your hard work years down the road, protect it with a piece of plastic pressed onto the area or a clean terry-cloth.
I used a typical Grease and wax remover aerosol that dissolves quickly, and a clean rag. This is important if you want to get to filling in the same day as you did the sanding, as it will air dry in about 1-2 minutes. Once you have that finished, you can move on to the filling part. As you can see in the picture, the panel is going to look like a retarded tic-tac-toe board to an extent. Youll need body filler or something similar, I used a Bondo stage 3 brazing and filling putty simply because it cures quickly, and makes a noticeable color difference when its fully cured; but any body filler will do, just make sure you mix it correctly.
When you are filling in the dents or imperfections (those little rock chips you noticed at car shows? Nows the time to get em
) And simply work your way top to bottom I say this as because with paint, it will not cure right away, so leaning in it would be a bad thing. When you are filling in a dent lets say, its important to make sure you have JUST enough to fill in the dent and maybe ½ inch of area around it, too much and youll be sanding for hours trying to get the excess off. Try to only put just a tad bit of pressure on the applicator when applying the body filler as you dont want to squeeze all of it out of the dent and around on the panel, but enough to smooth it all out and get a nice flat surface. This is one of those things that you need to actually do before you can get the hang of it, everyones technique is different.
This is one those times in this process that you should take great care and have a ton of patience for, because for anything you miss here (rock chips or other dents) youre going to notice it later after your done primering and/or painting and its a pain in the ass to go back and have to re-do it, so take your time. If it takes you all day to get all of it done, then so be it, the finished product will thank you; when your all set and done filling you should have something that looks like the picture below.
Now as stated above the bondo I was using was changing color, and Ill give you guys a shot of what that looks like as well. Youll start to notice it curing and with those of you that used 2 part mixes, youll be able to feel heat coming off of the patch (as it bonds using a chemical reaction) which will alert you that its beginning to dry. Its important to allow the FULL curing time before you begin sanding!! (if you dont youll ruin your sander by smearing semi-hard filler all over the place, it creates a HUGE mess) reference the back of the instructions on your filler to see what its average cure time is. This was a shot of mine after just 10 minutes, so it all depends.
Once youve let the filler cure, its time to sand. I broke out the 220 grit paper for this part. Remember when sanding body filler you do NOT want to press down too hard or you will create a divot in the work you just did. Let the sander sort of glide over the area, using your hand as sort of a guide for it, but do not apply any real pressure to it. The aim here is to feather the filler to match the contour of the panel youre working on, so by the time youre done you should only be able to see about ½ of the filler that you started with as most of it is just excess and sands off as you go. So with this just as with the last step, take your time and let the sander do the work. When youre finished, you should have something that resembles this.
So now your ready to primer your work. This is the moment of truth per say, as most imperfections if not caught before will show up now and I have an example of that as well. Primering is pretty straight forward; its the same aspect as painting, where dialing in your particular paint gun is half the battle. I picked up a Kawasaki HVLP gun for relatively cheap at my work (under $40) and put it to the test, but any type of gun should work for this. Start off by mixing up your primer, the primer I bought was a Dupli-color auto shop primer, which was already mixed so all I had to do was shake the hell out of it. Make sure you follow the manufacturers directions for this, or your primer coat will not turn out properly.
How your coating turns out is dependent on your painting technique, it simply takes practice. This was my first time spraying and I think I did pretty ok. After your first coat, it should look something similar to this. DO NOT spray it on too thick or it will cause runs and they are a bi*** to sand out, go slowly, and paint at your own pace, this is not a race 
And so on with your second and third coatings, enough to make any body filler not noticeable. I gave it a solid gray coat and dries something similar to this..
Then once youre done with the primering, allow the piece to fully cure. Most manufacturers suggest 10-15 mins to tack, which means 10-15 minutes until the surface becomes tacky to the touch. I would personally let it sit overnight just to be sure. Then once you finish that you can either choose to wet-sand or catch up on blemishes, or you can go straight to paint. Ill make another chapter once I can find my cars paint color in a 1 gallon size that I can actually get. As I mentioned prior, youll notice imperfections at the end of the primer stage, and here is an example.
You can choose to go back and tackle these now, as once you add paint and clear to the mix, you wont be able to get at something like this chip without destroying the paint job you just worked so hard to accomplish.
Thanks for checking out my how-to guys, it is my first so I hope it was somewhat informative. As usual Ill be available to answer any questions via the thread here, or you can PM me as well and Ill try to answer it as best I can. Stay tuned for my write up on painting! Thanks!
