Painting. Options

[dabbill]

I am getting ready to do some body work to fix, a few dents / scratches. Around the first of the year I am going to try for a body kit. I am going to repaint it the same color, cause for one I like teal, and two there is like no teal ones where I live. My question is should I just shoot the car, or should i sand it all down, and primer it then shoot it. I would think I could just shoot over the old paint, sence I am not changing the color.

[flipside97LTD]

Well if you've done body work, and you just prime the areas you've worked in with 3 coats, then those areas are going to be three coats taller than the areas you don't paint. Think of it like a pyramid. In fact, do this: Put the first coat of primer on the area you fixed only. Then the second coat spread it out over a wider area. The third, spread it out even further. If the whole car isn't primered, it's okay, because you've smoothed the 3 layers into your current paint. That's what i did to my car. In fact I didn't prime the top because of not doing body work there. So techically you don't have to prime the whole car.

As far as sandblasting goes, I know you can blast a car with like baking soda, or walnut shells, but I do a lot of sandblasting myself and sand gets very hot and will warp metal. At any rate, there's no need to sandblast your car I don't think.

If it's staying the same color and not having any body work done, then yea you don't need to prime it.

Ryan