car paint help

[lasteclispe]

a few months ago i made a post asking about air compressors because i wanted to paint my own car. u guys told me i needed at least a 30 gallon. at that time u could not get them at a good price. but now homedepot has a 32 gallon one on sale. i just wanted to know if this one will be good to paint my car? http://www.homedepot.com/prel80/HDU...m2msn&cm_cat=shopping&cm_pla=prod&cm_ite=prod

 

[miteclgst]

what you will have to do is find the HVLP gun that you plan to buy and then match the compressor to that gun. The gun (gravity feed will be your best bet) will have a CFM rating at 10psi air cap pressure, this usually means about 35psi or so at the gun. Compressors usually have a cfm rating at 90psi and at 40psi, make sure the compressor's rating at 40psi is the same or better than the gun requires. Spray guns, as all air equipment, cost more as their efficiency rises. If you get a cheap gun that uses 15cfm at 40psi you will need a really big compressor to keep up with it. Rather if you find one that is more efficient you will be way better off.

I have to be honest with you, spraying your own car will take a lot of equipment. You need air driers, a spray gun, a compressor, a meticuliously cleaned garage. You will most importantly need experiance . Spraying base clear paint is no walk in the park. I mean you need to know about flash time, the correct way to mix the paint, the correct way to apply it. You will need to know what sort of thickness you will want to lay down on each coat, you will need to know how to reduce the paint due to your conditions. Spraying solvent based paints in garages without decent airflow will lead to solvent pops, overspray and so on. Gone are days of spraying laquer in your driveway and picking the bugs out while it's still wet. In my experiance you are probably way better off paying someone to do it. Now don't get all pissed at me because in all reality I'm only telling you this for your own good. I mean do you have enough light in this garage to see every square inch of every body panel on the car? More importantly does the garage have explosion proof lighting? My guess is no. Now there will be 20 people who come on here saying "I did my paint job in my garage and look how great it is". Pictures tell you nothing. Today's solvent based paints are super flammable, if you are spraying in an area with no air movement and something sparks (blown light, switch, fuse) there won't be anything left, not you not your car and not your brand new compressor, it will all be scattered around the neighborhood. In my experiance you will waste so much time and money on materials that getting a paintjob would have been super cheap. Painting can't be learned in a book, from a video, or on-line, it take years of practice. The painter that I work with has been painting for 15+ years and still to this day he is confronted with situations that stump him. Save yourself a hell of a lot of headaches and aggrivation and just pay to have it done.

 

[lasteclispe]

ok ive been looking for hvlp guns. but most of them give u the cfm for 40 psi. in the specs of the compressor i posted it only says the cfm of 90 psi. is there any way to know what the 40 psi is from the 90 psi numbers?

 

[lasteclispe]

anyone know how i can find the cfm at 40 psi? i really need to know. i already bought the compressor and i cant find that info anywhere.