So, my car needs teh paint/body work(would post pics but my main comp just shit the bed so no hard drive with pics!). I have 0 experience with this on cars. The biggest thing I've ever done was probably my old Warrior's frame. For now I'm just gonna do my hood and trunk cause they're the worst(they're faded down in a few spots to the primer).
I need to know a few things before i start experimenting:
-Any special sandpaper I should use/what grit
-How far down should it be sanded?
-When I begin the paint process, how many lairs of primer/paint/clearcoat should there be?
-Any special types of primer/paint/clearcoat I should use?
-Car is Grenada Black Pearl, so need to know what specific color primer I need
-What would be an ideal weather condition to do this in(would be in my garage with the hood off, but I know to much humidity or something will make the paint not stick)
Prep work is the most important step of any painting process. It should in no way be half-assed or rushed. Most important is to take your time if you want it to look nice. Humidity may affect it, makes sure to clean all the dust out of your garage first, and idealy tape plastic over everything so that there is no over spray, and so settled dust can't be kicked up and put on the car while it's drying.
If you want to start the paint properly, the paint should be sanded off all the way to the metal, but the easiest way to do that is to use paint remover to pull it all off, then use bondo to fix any dents and small dings in the metal. Run your hand over it for a long time. Your fingers are extremely sensitive to any change in a surface, and can detect a millionth of an inch difference, that cannot really be measured. So you feel that metal up until you are sure you have scarred it for life.
If not, sand the whole car down to a smooth surface and make sure there's nothing with wax or anything like that.
Use 2 coats of primer. 1 to do over the part, and the second to fill in anything you might have missed. The paint and clear depend. Some paints have clear coat integrated into them that evaporates onto the top, and is a popular thing for European car manufacturers, as it shortes the painting process and looks, and acts the same as a coat, coat, clear setup.
If you're using integrated clear coats, shoot 3 coats on it and it will be plenty. IF not, do 3 coats, and after the second, use a fine grit WET sandpaper to clean up any orange peel or flaking/ and it most likely will happen. There's always one little spot of orange peel. Spray your third, and if you want, a fourth coat after the final coat, check the whole part/car for runs/orange peel, etc, and get rid of it, polish up the part you sand to flex it to where it needs to be, don't use polish per-say but what I mentioned earlier.
Wait a while for it to dry. Depending on paint, the time will vary. If you spray clear too early, the clear will mix with the wet paint and turn into a gross mess that will cause you to start all over. Spray your two or three sets of clear coat, then go over the whole thing with REALLY REALLY FINE grit steel wool to take any abnormalities out, then clean it after it's fully dry with a soft sponge/terry and water. DO NOT USE SOAP!!!!! OR ANYTHING BESIDES WATER, and make sure you dry it with one of those leathery soft absorbant cloths.
After you finish painting, do not wash the car for 6 months, you can hose it off and wipe off dirt, but no washing, and no TOUCHING!!! You can move the dust around and cause little scratches.
As for GRITS on sand paper, always start from lowest number to highest, and make sure you have an orbital sander on hand, a pice of wood or straight-hand sander, to make smooth flat lines, and papers ranging from 80 to 320, and then the finest stuff you can find that's WET/DRY for cleaning up orange peel. As for steel wool, I think you will need #000 or something finer. Yes... wool has a 000 grit, basically. when you are sanding the car/part to begin with, go down to about 320, and after that you might as well just rub a piece of printer paper on the car, because after 320, the coats of paint are going to cover the last bits of unequality. MAKE SURE YOU FIX MOST, if NOT ALL IN THE PREP STAGE... AND BUY LOTS OF TAPE!!!!
I suggest you find a friend who has done it before (and did a good job) or take it to a professional. It's always better to have help.
Knowledge: 5 years car and boat painting experience.
Also, pearl based colors have different primers depending on effect. Usually it's a brown primer, and sometimes gray, you'd have to go to Honda, pick up a can of the color, and if you're lucky, ask them what the primer is that is necessary. Some Honda dealers are jack-asses and won't tell you what kind of primer so that it turns out just a little different (all car colors are copyrighted-Subaru blue and another blue may look the same, but they aren't), because they want you to take it to their body shop and have it done there.
If it's a black pearl, it's most likely a black or dark grey primer, but all car manufacturers are different.
