Painting a car with your own hands

2024 Author: Erin Ralphs | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-19 11:41

Minor defects are inevitable during the operation of the car. The most common defect is damage to the paintwork of the car, which appear from small pebbles or tree branches falling on the car. Damage can lead to corrosion of the metal, so it is best to fix it right away, and not put it on the back burner. Nowadays, painting a car is not a problem, just contact the service station.

But what if the damage is minor, but still an eyesore? In this case, you can paint the car with your own hands.

Determine the type of work

Before you start painting, you should decide what exactly needs to be done, because scratches are different from each other. If the scratches are not deep and the anti-corrosion coating is not affected, then it will be enough to simply polish the coating. To do this, apply a polish with a large, then with a medium and at the end with a smallabrasive. The purpose of these manipulations is to remove a layer of enamel with a small layer of paint and remove a scratch. If the scratch is deep, then these actions will not be enough.

Preparation: cleaning up the damage site

Very often small areas need to be painted. To perform local painting of the car, it is necessary to carry out preparatory work.

To begin with, the places for future painting are cleaned of dust and dirt. After that, remove the layer of paint near the damage. To do this, use either a chisel or a screwdriver with a sharpened slot. Using sandpaper with different grits (from No. 60 to No. 100), the damage site is cleaned. This procedure is performed until there is a smooth transition from the cleaned metal to the car paintwork. This can be checked with your fingers: the skin should not feel the scratching of the paint - only a smooth and smooth transition.

Degreasing and puttying

After achieving the desired result, the painting area must be cleaned and degreased again. For this, white spirit is used. It is not recommended to use gasoline or other strong solvents for this procedure.

After degreasing, they begin to putty the damage site. To do this, you need the putty itself (you can take synthetic polyester), spatulas - metal and rubber. To connect the putty and the hardener that comes with the kit, a metal spatula is used. They stir the putty to the desired state. Please note that when connectingputty and hardener, a reaction begins with the release of heat, which will continue until the putty is completely cured.

Therefore, putty is applied quickly, but without fuss. When mixing the putty, care must be taken to ensure that no lumps form in it. The resulting solution is applied to the site of damage: a small amount of solution is collected on a spatula, and then applied to the site of damage with vigorous movements crosswise. At the same time, at the end of the movement with a spatula, a rotary movement is made at an angle of 90⁰. This is done in order to achieve a flat and smooth surface.

After the putty hardens at the place of application, and this will happen approximately 30-40 minutes after application, the surface should be brought to the desired state. To do this, excess putty is removed with sandpaper alternately with a grit from 120 to 600. This operation is carried out until the same smooth surface of the putty place is reached as the surface of the entire car. If necessary, you need to add an additional layer of putty to the damaged area. The quality of the grout can be checked with the palm of your hand - the surface should be smooth and uniform. When rubbing putty, it is not recommended to moisten the place of stripping with water - this worsens the quality of the putty itself.

Primer surface

After the desired smoothness of the surface has been achieved, it is necessary to clean it again from dust and wipe it with white spirit. The puttied surface is covered with a primer layer. For thisoperation, you can use a primer, which is available in the form of aerosols. After priming, you will be able to see all the defects that were made during puttying and grouting, you will need to correct them.

Before painting, the staining area must be separated from the rest of the surface. To do this, the unpainted surface is sealed with either masking tape or paper.

What to paint?

After completing the preparatory work, you can start painting. Here you need to make a reservation right away: painting can be done in two ways - using a spray gun and using an aerosol can. Each of the methods has its own advantages and disadvantages. The use of an aerosol can has the following advantages:

• simplicity and ease of application of paint;
• no need to use additional painting supplies;
• paint layer is even.

But these cans have a fair share of drawbacks:

• not always clear instructions for use;
• overpriced;
• it is not always possible to find the right color.

Before you start painting, you must first test the paint on a sheet of metal and compare with the tone of the car.

Shake the can vigorously before use. The surface is painted from a distance of 30 cm. First, a base layer is applied, then several more layers of paint (up to three). Between staining, it is necessary to let the paint harden, for this, betweenstaining make breaks for 15-20 minutes. In order to ensure that the area where the paint is applied does not differ much from the main color of the car, the border of painting should be slightly expanded each time the paint layer is applied.

When working with a spray gun, you must first prepare the paint. To do this, it is diluted with a solvent to the required consistency, then filtered through a fine mesh (you can use a nylon stocking) and pour the paint into the spray tank. After that, start painting. The optimal consistency of paint for painting a car can be determined as follows: a metal rod with a diameter of 1-2 mm is lowered into the diluted paint, and then the rate of flow of paint from the rod is observed. Optimal consistency - 3-4 drops of paint flow down per second.

After the paint has dried, the treated area must be covered with a layer of varnish. Varnishing is done in the same way as painting.

Painting individual parts

For a complete painting of the car door, it is removed. If necessary, you need to remove the door handles, and either remove the glass or completely seal it with a film or masking tape.

When painting a car door, it is completely matted - with the help of fine-grained sandpaper, the varnish layer is completely removed. After sanding, the car door is cleaned of dust and degreased - white spirit will come to the rescue.

After that, the priming of the car door begins. In this case, each subsequent layer should be applied in such a wayso that it half overlaps the previous one. It is necessary to monitor the thickness of the layer: it should not be too thick, otherwise streaks may appear on the surface to be painted.

After priming, the surface is treated with sandpaper (type P1000 or 1200). After that, it is necessary to blow off the dust and degrease again.

After all the procedures, you can start painting. Door painting is best done with a spray bottle.

The algorithm for painting a car element is about the same as when painting a door. The same actions are performed: clean, dust, degrease, prime, paint in three layers.

Whole car painting

Full painting is a difficult task, where manual labor is inferior to mechanical. Instead of using sandpaper to remove the varnish layer, special tools are used.

Before you start painting work, you must carefully inspect the car. To do this, you need to take care of good lighting in advance, or drive the car out of the garage into the street. After inspecting, cleaning and identifying defects, they begin to eliminate them. At this stage, the necessary places are puttied, and after that the car is completely primed.

Then start painting the car. In this case, a simple rule must be observed: painting must be carried out in a respirator, in a well-ventilated area or in the open air.

Some useful tips

When paintingcar follow the following rules:

1. The spray gun should be kept at a distance of 20-30 cm from the surface to be painted.
2. The first layer is applied from top to bottom, and subsequent layers are applied horizontally.
3. Stripes should overlap each other by at least half.
4. The spray nozzle must be held at an angle of 90⁰ to the surface, it is advisable not to allow a deviation of more than 5⁰.
5. There should be a time between coats of paint - about 15-20 minutes.
6. The ambient temperature should be at 20 ⁰С.
7. It is advisable to start painting a car from the roof.

The main thing - remember that the real shade of the paint will show only after it is completely dry. And this usually happens a day and a half after painting the car.