Thread: No More "DIYer Paint Jobs" after 2007

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Wow.... Don you are a smart cookie. That's all I gotta say. I forgot what your job is again (someone told me before) but geeze, you know all this stuff that I have no clue about. Looks like you paid attention in school and took a million science classes unlike me. haha Interesting information though.

FMX thanks, but I am slowing down at my age now. Actually the reason I am still fascinated by engines is that I always want to know how things work and that led me to take more science courses. My specialty became what is called Chemical-Physics. I recently attended my 50th High School Reunion and that really makes me feel old (I am!) but I still recall having a copy of Hot Rod inside my English book; that was when flatheads were the king of the road but right at the point of the '55 SBC 265 and that really was a revolution. We were used to Oldsmobiles and even Hudsons as threats to acceleration on the streets, but the '55 SBC 265 came out of nowhere and we really could not believe that "Chevys" could be that quick! Still a '54 Merc was a good ride in '55 but the writing was on the wall that OHV-V8s were much better than flatheads and then (!) the Ford Y-block was a step in the right direction (the '57 Y-block was pretty good) but by the early '60s the Ford 221 led to the 289 and they had the dreaded long water pump so that was when the SBC really became dominant. Well that's history now.

DennyW, thanks I knew about that site and have it bookmarked. I really like acrylic one-stage but these colors are a bit wild. The "burgundy metallic" is closest to what I want but it does look a bit much on the pink side of the color chart. Actually I would not mind having a purple-pink car but I will have to check with my wife. If she would allow I might go with that wild Burgundy-metallic. I like gaudy stuff but she is more conservative in her tastes and I have to respect her wishes, at least the stuff she knows about, but it would be pretty hard for her to not notice the color of the car! (Ha!) Has anyone used this cheap acrylic paint? Is it OK or another case of "you only get what you pay for"? Maybe since the paint is so cheap it might be worth adding a bit of black to darken it up some? I recall when the '40 Ford Mandarin Maroon was considered a "color" but it might as well be black because it was so dark. Here is a link to some cars with this Rayflex paint including one Jag painted with the Burgundy Metallic, not bad!

http://www.paintforcars.com/Merchant...r_testimonials

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Heh that sounds like a long time ago. I wish I were born back then to experience that kind of stuff. Also on the color, your wife may be right. I was taught that girls or women have an eye for color and they can tell what color is better or worse... Something to do with how their brain and eyes work, I don't know. They say that paint companies like PPG that mix paints, etc would rather have a women work for them than a guy because of that.

Don,

You discovered the paragraph!

This is a great thread, all good comments. But maybe I'm a little to bitter at over regulating stiff collars and greedy big business snobs because I seriously think that liscensing and certification is on the way. Then as most of you know there will be continuing education requirements to keep the liscense with riseing costs to that and every part of the industry. Result ? Many guys that do the work to just cover a few bills will say, " to expensive to fool with it ". And there are those in the industry that will love that. Who ? The struggling small shop thats just keeping its head above water because of the moonlighters that are taking their business. I've nothing against liscensing and certification. I've nothing against enviromental concerns. What I don't like is the greed that pushes these regulations because they are ' self-interest ' snobs that don't give a damn about the American way of life and your freedoms. Sorry if you don't like this but it smacks of communism I think!

FMX, you are correct. Deficient color vision is a related to male genes but women almost never have deficient color vision. Males (20% of the population??) can have varying degrees of deficiency in color vision and tests are available to determine the degree.

Henry/Jack, should I indent? It's not easy to defend Relativity AND Quantum Mechanics in a few sentences, I think you know what I mean!

DennyW, thanks for the Kirken links that is another source. Today I got my local paint shop to look at the Trinity-Rayflex site. Most of the nice GM two-stage colors like Saturn Cranberry-met are in the $280/gallon price range. Frankly I do not plan to do my own painting but maybe I can get a high gloss acrylic one-stage and save a little. The Burgundy MEtallic looks good to me but as you say even on the several sites it looks different on my screen. Still some sort of "plum-metallic" is what I am after. The time is near since I realize I have to get the firewall painted before I put on the body and so I may have to paint the body before the fender-floor. Thanks.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Don, I was not trying to be controversial, just merely stating an opinion. I have a reluctance to accept on face value those things which are not proven, just merely a theory.
I was fortunate to be on the team which applied electical power to the first DC-10, working closely with the engineers who desiged the system around Westinghouse's control boxes. Many of their theories were proven to be wrong and they were corrected on the go. These men were probably some of the finest Aviation Electrical Engineers of their time, but the system was far from flawless.

NTFDAY, no problem. As I said skepticism is healthy related to theory, but there is theory and then practitioners which may be different. The neat thing about computers is that you can test things. I used to require my students to check the computer output with a hand calculator and one of my best students told me there was something wrong in the 11th place of the computer output but we found his calculator was only a 10 digit calculator! How about those several failed Mars probes which crashed because engineers mixed up the units between metric and SAE! Again I recall discussions with NASA engineers who programmed satellites and once programs are burned in to ROM they better be EXACTLY correct because if just one symbol is wrong in the program the whole thing may malfunction. So what you say is correct in that the engineers have to be as exacting as the hardware to live up to the theory and that is not easy for analog humans. My point is that the level of theory is pretty good as far as accuracy (there is still a gap between quantum mechanics and gravitational theory) but THE HUMANS and COMPUTERS have to apply the theory correctly! There was an old story at the NASA-LRC wind tunnel that some Boeing engineers tested wing contours extensively and failed to meet their specs until an operator of the wind tunnel showed them how to doctor up the shape of the wing with a rubber mallet, but that may be just folklore. Still it means that there is always a conflict between new ideas and the broad experience of so-called "common sense"; I say compute it AND then test it (which is what is usually done these days)!

Then there is the problem of the generation gaps as when NASA goes through the whole Gemeni Program and the engineers and equipment get old, then a whole new crew has to start the next project with new equipment! This means there is an important link at the educational level which has to be done right or the next group has to reinvent the wheel all over again. To keep the discussion relative to automobiles on this Forum, I like the fact that Ford at least has a family member in the loop who knows and remembers the history of the company and with the recent problems GM is having, Ford may outlast GM?

Back to DIY painting. I realize I don't have the practice or skill to paint my car myself and although Brian did a great job on his yellow pickup he mentioned that he had done many previous paint jobs. The last time I did a home paint job in 1954 I spent about two weeks of afternoon sanding and leading in holes (with a BIG soldering iron, you may recall the Barris fad of "dechroming") and then got the paint job done by a moonlighting bodyshop man for $100 + about $30 for paint. I think the latest trend will mean that DIY/moonlight paint jobs will be less probable BUT my local shop charges $38/hour for the prep work so the next pattern may be for the DIY/hotrodder to do all the prep work and sanding and then let a shop do the painting in some "approved" paint booth. The more I think about the price and gloss of the Trinity-Rayflex acrylic the more I think I will go that way; they sure seem to have the outrageous colors that rodders like!

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder