Black Cat
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| posted on 20/7/08 at 07:11 AM |
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Spraying Fibreglass
After many hours of work re-shaping the rear arches on my Tiger Avon, altering the position of the scuttle, sanding out the mold marks and sanding the
body with 240 wet and dry I'm now ready to spray the fiberglass body.
I was thinking of doing the following but as I'm not a sprayer by profession I'm hoping that someone out there will confirm that my
proposals are sound and if not what is the best way to carry out this task?
As I've undertaken so much work on the body I am proposing to use filler primer (U-POLL 2020) with a hardener added, followed by a black
metallic base coat and finish off with several layers of lacquer.
Do I need to use an etching primer first or will the filler primer applied directly onto the fiberglass be OK?
I have searched this site for previous questions on this subject and the only one that I found who had used filler primer first was Avoneer a few
years ago, so was it successful?
Also there was mentioned an article that appeared in a magazine which gave a description of how to paint fiberglass, has anybody got a copy they can
send me.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Regards Steve
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worX
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| posted on 20/7/08 at 07:40 AM |
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I just found the following on a Mini Forum.
it is not really any different to painting metal
Key the surface of the fibreglass panels, use p600 wet and dry until you have no shiny surface left.
Clean the panel down with panel wipe, or similar
Then paint with etch primer
The secret to painting is patience. Don't try to cover the area in one coat. Spray on several light coats, perhaps six or more, to build up a
drip free primer coat that completely covers the old surface. Follow the directions on the paint can, especially those about shaking and mixing the
paint before and during use.
If you do get runs dont worry too much, leave it overnight to dry and then lightly sand them out with
p600 and use soapy water on the surface (stops the paper clogging)
You don't have to allow each coat to dry completely. You can recoat the primer as soon as the previous coat become tacky. If you spray light
coats, you can recoat in ten minutes. After about an hour of this, you should have the primer coat done. It should completely cover all the surface,
and it should have a uniform appearance.
This is when you find out how well your filling and sanding really worked. Any little imperfection in the surface will now be very visible. Now wait
24 hours for the primer to dry.
Give it a quick sand back with the 600 paper and lots of soapy water (washing up liquid is fine for this)
After that prime it using the same technique as above and a quick sand when it is all done
then clean the surface down and your ready for paint.
For metallics use similar technique as above for painting (just light coats) you dont want to get runs in it.
then clear laquer, keep the first 2 coats light as if they run it will show inthe metallic particles.
these 2 coats will seal the paint, then the subsequent coats you can apply the laquer a bit heavier so you just start to see a little bit of
reflection in it.
Once you have several coats on it, leave it a week to dry, you can then flat it down (look at my guide for getting the shine on your paint) and
polish
Click here
hope this helps
The only thing I would add is, if I were doing it myself I tend to put a small amount of colour in the first couple of lacquer coats. Say 20% in the
first and 10% in the second and that helps give most paintwork, especially metallics a really deep finish...
HTH
Steve
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Black Cat
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| posted on 21/7/08 at 06:22 PM |
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Thanks for the response Steve, But what I really need to know is do I need to use etching primer on fiberglass or can I just use the primmer
filler.
I have etching primer, if I use it on fiberglass will it cause me a problem?
Steve
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