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How To: Paint With Tremclad The Right Way


Meph

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As requested by several people, so to save writing any more PM's I wanted to make a thread (hopefully sticky) on how its done to make it look good.

 

I'm only covering how to spray it on, the roller method is a waist of time. This works for more than just tremclad, any kinda of single stage paint applys

 

What you will 100% need to get good results (if your missing any of these, it wont come out well)

 

- Respirator, for paint. (less than $30)

- Lacquer Thinner or Acetone (not mineral spirits or anything else)

- A garage or similar

- Decent Lighting

- Compressor w/ water seperator

- Spray Gun (Cheap ones work fine)

- Paint

- Buffer (not and orbital)

- Polishing Compound

- Wetsand Sand Paper (400,600,800, higher if you want)

- Patience

- Paint thinner

- Latex gloves

- Foam sanding block

- Squirt bottle

 

 

Optional

 

- Primer

- Clear coat

- Pearl Pigments off ebay (25grams should be enough for your first job)

- Rubbing Compound

- Wax and grease remover

- Air brush

 

Steps

 

0. Do your body work, nows the time to put the primer on if your going to, sand it smooth with 300-400 grit

 

1. Get your current top coat ready for paint. Sand it all off or spray over top, it really wont make much difference in a tremclad paint job. Use 300-400 grid and get it smooth, take as much time as you can here if your paint is rough to start with, if its already smooth and nice you can do a quicker rub down.

 

2. Tape up the car, windows ect. Masking tape and newspaper or 3m and wax paper, again, up to you and your budget.

 

3. Wipe the car down, wax and grease remover would probably come in handy, but Ive never used it. You can use some solvents to wipe down (paint thinner), avoid using acetone or lacquer thinner as they may start to strip off your old paint and ruin your finish. If you skip this you'll probably end up with a lot of fish eyes, like i often do... so dont, take some time.

 

4. Mix your paint, I use a 4:1 ratio with lacquer thinner. Wear latex gloves from now on, the extra dollar for them is worth it.

 

5. Set your psi around 40-80 and do a spray test with your gun on something other than your car. You want to set the flow low to start with, increase it till your getting coverage without runs or dripping. Make sure you have a door open, leave the garage part way open to allow air flow.

 

note: if you decide to not listen to me and use paint thinner to thin it, you will 99% of the time get runs.

 

note: If you decide not to listen to me and use lacquer thinner but not wear a respirator and die, also, not my fault. Stick to the rules

 

6. Start painting! You don't want to lay it on to heavy, you probably wont get full coverage till the 2nd or 3rd coat, if you get it on the first, your applying it to heavy.

 

Note: If something falls onto your paint, hair, bugs, in-laws, ect. for the love of god just leave it, Ive tried in the past to remove the foreign objects, and i know you will want to too, but DONT things will end up worse. Sand it out later.

 

7. Let the paint get tacky between coat, 10-30 minutes. Touch your masking with your glove and if the paint sticks to your finger your ready for the next coat.

 

8. More coats, if your planing to use clear, 4 should be fine. If not, try 5-7 light-medium coats

 

9. Let the paint dry, days, months, years. It can take a while, but lucky you listen to me and used lacquer thinner so it wont take that long.

 

10. A few days later

 

11. Get that wet-sand sand paper out, grab your trusty 320 grit and a foam sanding block of sorts, not your hand

 

12. Sand the orange peel out. Use some soapy water to lube it up. If your lucky, you wont sand down too far exposing the origianl paint, if your think you might go down to far, stop and leave it... No-ones perfect right?

 

13. Hit it with 600, then maybe 800-1000

 

No Clear Coat

14. Grab your buffer and compound. Start with a cutting/rubbing compound or head straight to the polishing. Use a quarter sized amount per 2 ft^2. Dampen your buffing pad, smear the paste around at the low speed that crank it up, your goal is the buff away all the compound. Shoot a bit of water on the panel if you need to. Your done!

Clear Coat

 

14. Mix your clear to the instructions specs and spray it on, you can do light coats or heavier. Start off light and see how it feels, you will buff it to an even shine later or if its not uniform dont fret.

 

15. Sand the orange peel out. Use some soapy water to lube it up. If your lucky, you wont sand down too far exposing the original paint, if your think you might go down to far, stop and leave it... No-ones perfect right?

 

16. Hit it with 600, then maybe 800-1000

 

17. Grab your buffer and compound. Start with a cutting/rubbing compound or head straight to the polishing. Use a quater sized amount per 2 ft^2. Dampen your buffing pad, smear the paste around at the low speed that crank it up, your goal is the buff away all the compound. Shoot a bit of water on the panel if you need to. Your done!

 

 

Hope this helps you guys!

 

Blue Base, Pearl+Clear

32417760069_large.jpg

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I'm really curious as to why you would use tremclad (or rustoleum) if you have access to a sprayer? I thought the entire point of the "$50 paint job" was a decent job without needing a spray gun setup?

 

I understand that rustoleum is a lot cheaper than a decent automotive paint, but aren't there still cheap paints available that are made for cars, don't require intense amounts of wetsanding, and don't require the car to be completely stripped before repainting?

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I'm really curious as to why you would use tremclad (or rustoleum) if you have access to a sprayer? I thought the entire point of the "$50 paint job" was a decent job without needing a spray gun setup?

 

I understand that rustoleum is a lot cheaper than a decent automotive paint, but aren't there still cheap paints available that are made for cars, don't require intense amounts of wetsanding, and don't require the car to be completely stripped before repainting?

 

I've used cheap Duplicoulr paints and they are only dry slightly faster than tremcald. WIth the lacquer thinner used to thin tremclad will level out pretty nicely. It needs some sanding but it will come out killer as a base coat(were talking maybe 3 hours sanding tops).

 

 

And for me.

 

using tremclad as a base to spray my candy (pearl) clear onto its a big savings in the overall cost.

 

 

Tramclad base = $30

Automotive base = I was quoted at $350

Clear cloat = $115

Mixing peal pigments into my clear = $20

Buying premixed candy (peal ) clear = $Thousands$

 

Doing it Treamclad no clear = $30

Doing it Tremclad with clear : 30+115 = $145

Doing it Treamclad Pearl and Clear: 30+115+20 = $165

Ding it Real base and Clear + pearl: 350+115+20 = $485

Doing it all legit no candy coat : 350 + 115 = $465

Doing it all legit with candy coat : 350+1000 = $1350 Min! vs $165

 

By cutting out the expensive base coat you can drop the price from $485 to $165 and still protect your car with automotive finish.

 

 

Note: Im doing this all with a cheap compressor, 5 Gal 3 peak HP oil lube motor. 125 MAX PSI. 5.1 SCFM @ 40 PSI and 4.1 SCFM @ 90 PSI. Twin stack design

 

Go on kijiji and you can find compressors cheap, getting all you need is an investment, but pays for itself the first use. I think ive done 9-10 of these now

 

 

EDIT

 

Tremclad is also VERY forgiving to new painters. screw up, sand it to an even finish,your good, always. Many real automotive paints will contain pigments and flakes that are more, get it right the first time, no second chances

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Doing it all legit with candy coat : 350+1000 = $1350 Min! vs $165

 

Point taken.

 

So how happy are you with the results? The pictures look good, but it's not easy to tell the real quality of a paint job from just a relatively lo-res picture online. Is it just "good enough", or is it something that only you would ever know only cost $165?

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Point taken.

 

So how happy are you with the results? The pictures look good, but it's not easy to tell the real quality of a paint job from just a relatively lo-res picture online. Is it just "good enough", or is it something that only you would ever know only cost $165?

 

Tons of people tell me it looks amazing, Im the biggest critic and notice the faults right way. The only issue i have are a few fish eyes, and a tiger stripe effect from spraying the pearl on poorly, my mistake first time using a large amount of pigment, If i Had used less or had a darker base, it would not show, live and learn. Pearls and pearl selection is tricky and deserves a thread of its own . I Really like how i have a shift from blue to purple in low lighting conditions on all the contours .

 

Id say for $165 my paint job is in a another class... another galaxy than 95% of the attempted $50 roll on tremclad ones.

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  • 1 month later...

As I understand it, Tremclad is the same as the rustoleum brand we see in the states. Is this correct? I tried rolling Rustoleum on once, and I'll never try that method again. Also, I used mineral spirits to thin it. I wonder if that was part of my problem. I also noticed that paint took a long time to dry via that method.

 

My Z isn't something that'll ever end up on Barret Jackson; I just want something that looks decent from 20 feet away and doesn't get my car catagorized as a POS right away.

 

I would assume most of you would reccomend this method over a Maaco job...

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Yes, I think Home Depot carries the Rustoleum "Stop Rust" line but Lowe's carries the "Professional" line. Get the professional line. From what I have read spraying it on is just better and faster. Some people use mineral spirits and some use lacquer thinner. I'm going to use lacquer thinner. Anyways, good luck.

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Hey, Ill just quote step 5 on this one

 

5. Set your psi around 40-80 and do a spray test with your gun on something other than your car. You want to set the flow low to start with, increase it till your getting coverage without runs or dripping. Make sure you have a door open, leave the garage part way open to allow air flow.

 

note: if you decide to not listen to me and use paint thinner to thin it, you will 99% of the time get runs.

 

note: If you decide not to listen to me and use lacquer thinner but not wear a respirator and die, also, not my fault. Stick to the rules

Please, wear protection

 

Slownrusty, are you from barrie at one point? Its amazing, no snow at all yet. Last week was like 15-20 degrees C highs! I think its coming sooner or later sadly. Its actaully a st162 with part of a all-trac kit grafted on. Shes the DD

 

[url=http://%3Ca%20href=%22http://carphotos.cardomain.com/ride_images/3/613/1641/26530820185_large.jpg%22%20target=%22_blank%22%3Ehttp://carphotos.cardomain.com/ride_images/3/613/1641/26530820185_large.jpg%3C/a%3E][/url]http://carphotos.cardomain.com/ride_images/3/613/1641/26530820185_large.jpg

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  • 3 months later...

my final and mostly perfect tremclad with peal paintjob. FIannly got the body work like I wanted and didnt tiger stripe the pearl at all. ITs got purple pearl that reflects with the sun spots but u cant see it in the pics

 

32417760083_large.jpg

 

also, WAX AND GREASE REMOVER, its essential, things worked so much better with it, 10 bucks before would have saved me a lot of headache, use it before painting

Edited by Meph
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  • 2 weeks later...

yep, its basically the same thing. U can adjust the mixture but tis a rough starting point. Rememebr to wipe the body down with wax and grease remover fist, I sprayed it on with a squirt bottle then wiped off with a rag, works great, will make thing much better in the end!

 

Also, wear a respirator when you spray!

 

good luck

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