Paint in sections?

Is it best to paint the box, doors, fender, hood, and cab all seperate then put it together or leave some of it together and paint it?

If it is a solid color, no metallic or pearl etc. You can do seperate panels successfully. But any of the others is best to do the final paint on an assembled body.

Thanks, thats less work for me :)

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Originally posted by my61chevy
Thanks, thats less work for me :)

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I like painting em' seperate when possible, assembling and then shooting a complete coat or two to blend the panels. That way everything is painted even the hard to get at spots.

Good point, i need to get the back side of the cab but thats kinda hard with the box on, plus it wouldn't hurt to get the inside of the fenders to prevent rust from happening.

When a body shop does complete paint job, they'll paint the hard spots like the firewall, rear cab panel, front box panel (with the box off the truck) and interior, as well as edging stuff like the fenders, doors, tailgate, hood, etc. Once edged in the panels are reassembled and the entire truck is painted.

This guarantees the paint match on the exterior panels .

When I ReFinish a complete truck at my shop , I have the bed off setting on a bed dolly , and refinish the whole cab , and bed seperate.
When the bed is on the truck ,its pretty hard to mask of the gap between bed and cab, there for you have a paint line behind cab and bed. or rough over spray from not being able to mask it off well.

SprayTech

Why can't you do everything seperately with metallic or pearl colors? I can understand the layers being the same thickness but what if you throw them all down the same on every part? I am going to try and get into painting in a few weeks and starting with my golf cart putting on a metallic blue.

IF your REAL consistent in your spray patterns then MAYBE you'll get lucky and get it all to match up, maybe. But more times than not you won't, and it will look like rubiks cube.

It's nearly impossible to match metallics, etc. by panel painting ... too many variables. Paint mixture, Air pressure, How fast you move the gun and how far from the surface. how fast is dries. Watch as you paint metallic. The metallic particles move on the surface as the paint is laid down and starts to flash off. There's no way to perfectly match that .

This sounds like its gonna be harder than i thought i was going to be.

Yeah I never knew about this... So say you have a car stripped down to bare metal and you wan't to paint the whole thing a metallic or pearl color and all the door jams, etc... How can you do that and keep it evenly? Sorry I am not trying "take over" the thread so to say, I just have the same question and I don't think you will mind me asking too.

Well I will try replying to this 1 more time , as it seems when i click " Submit Reply" it tells me I'm not Logged in. ( which I am)

Ok you can refinish all parts seperate BUT you better have alot of room to be able to squirt all the parts at once. Usually if you have all the color mixed at one time you shouldnt have problems with a color match, that is if you have alot of gun time and can spray every panel alike.
once you have your gun set dont adjust it as you are spraying color!
If its just a metallic color it shouldnt be a real big deal, as I do it all the time, with no problems, but I dont use Single stage anymore base clear only. ( I shoot single stage black as I hate cleared black as it scratches white because of the clear)

This is how expensive paint jobs are done to eliminate tape lines in door jambs, trunk jamb, fender edges, ect...........
But if you know how to back tape in your door jambs ( jambs are pre painted) and mask you can eliminate a paint edge and bolt pieces on the car, and its easier to paint.
I wouldnt reccomend trying any TRI-Stage paint job in pieces if you havent had a paint gun in your hand for any length of time!
I spot repair Tri-stage Cadillacs all day long in pieces and know what I am doing as I have had a paint gun in my hand every day for 30 years .

SprayTech

Do you also SLEEP with yer gun too DW??? Hehehe

SHHHHHHHHHH Streets , You'll give my trade secrets away ;)

You guys have been really helpfull, Thanks when i paint my truck i will show you guys how it comes out.