[Guest]

I've got myself about 90% talked into making the Mustang paint job a DIY affair. Bought a sprayer and a sander for my compressor and am thinking about where and how to shroud the paint booth I think I can cobble together out of $100 worth of PVC lawn irrigation pipe and painter's plastic sheeting.

I've never done this kind of thing before, though, and I don't want to over (or under) engineer it.

I have a 10-foot wide space between my garage and the neighbor's fence, or I can build a wider booth in the backyard.

Side of the garage is appealing because it's out of the way and already occupied by my toys; it's where I sand blast and weld stuff.

But it's a bit more difficult to get the car in and out, and it will dominate the yard for as long as the job takes.

So, my questions (for now; many more later, I'm sure):

a) is my plan/price estimate realistic?

b) is 10 feet of work space enough to paint the car (since car is 6 feet wide, leaves about 2 feet on each side) or should I go to the trouble of making a wider booth in the backyard? How far away from the surface should the sparyer be when I swing it? (Told you, I'm a rookie, and yes I will practice before shooting the Mustang...but need to know in advance how much space to allow.)

SWMBO's game for either location, so that's not a concern. And I'm in California; no rain/weather problems until fall, at the earliest.

What do you think I should do, boothwise?

 

[camachinist]

I can tell you how I painted the race car back in 1981...

Painted it in my parents garage with a bunch of 2x2's made into a frame which attached to the ceiling rafters...covered the whole thing with the plastic sheeting painters use for drop cloths...put a bank of AC filters into a framed opening at the front of the garage, by the window that went to the back yard and installed a swamp cooler, blowing out of the booth, into a framed opening at the swing up door opening of the garage....the cooler was fully functional with water and pads and served to both draw air into the booth and to scrub the air as it exited, so I wouldn't be painting the neighbors cars by proxy..*G*

I had everything except the 2x's and the plastic (stole some of my parent's AC filters) so, IIRC, the whole mess cost under 100.00 (closer to 50.00) back then...

It worked great....I shot 4 different colors plus clear over everything and it was hard to find any debris at all in the paint...
I used 2 500W Quartz lights plus the garage overhead lighting (minimal) for examining my work as I went...
Oh, before I started, I also wetted down the garage floor and let it evaporate at bit so as to keep floor dust down but not get too much moisture into the air...painted during spring days, primarily in the late morning and early evening...paint was 2 part epoxy paint...RM SuperMax for those OF paint guys..*G*

 

[johnpro]

Everything you talk about seems good, except I'd give more than 2 feet around the car. I'd leave at least 3 feet, even more if you can. Remember that you're going to be walking around the car with a paint gun and air hose and once wet paint goes on nothing can touch it or you get to do lots of it over again.

To answer the other question, your gun will be approximately 6-10 inches from the car when shooting.

Living in California actually poses problems for novice painters. We can no longer buy lacquer, which, IMHO, is by far the easiest paint to shoot. You'll probably end up doing a BC/CC job. Plan on your first BC/CC car comming out "less than perfect". There's a real art to doing it.

 

[Guest]

Lay a tape on the floor put the gun in your hand and make some sweeps side to side. whats the distance from your back to the tip of the gun, for me its apprx 3'6" factor in distance to the work surface and you will need 5'-6' around the car for a comfortable work space

 

[beechkid]

One recommendation, your home made booth will be fine for primer,but you can rent a real spray booth for $50-$100 for 4 hours. Your paint job will be much nicer in terms of dust, if you get in trouble, chances are there will be somebody around who can help you and.....

If ya get caught by the Air Quality folks (because a neighbor called in a complaint), you can talk your way out of a fine spraying primer, but paint, that's $1,000 fine, plus clean up costs & if your in Ca, up to 6 months in jail. Th booth rental is pretty cheap taking into consideration the time, etc.

 

[66conv6]

Isn't there some rule in Calif. where you can paint a 3 foot square area without those penalties? Hypothetically you could keep painting small areas. But I agree, you'd want to know who your "friends" are for neighbors.

 

[Guest]

Talking to a paint pro and to the paint store reps, you can paint one car a year as a hobbiest without any penalty. Of course, I've never seen any actual words on paper. But I figure, tow independant opinions from people I trust is a pretty good bet.

This is California BTW, but not in the LA basin. The rules may be different for different regions of the state.

 

[Guest]

I live in northwestern WI and my friend Richard was spraying his car in his garage with the grarage door open(probably not the best way for dust control but it still looks nice) anyway a cop rolls up and says you cannot paint in town. Richard says, the hell I cant, closes the door and opens all the windows and keeps on spraying with the cop looking in the window. Man was that cop pissed, He went to the cheif of police and he just laughed. Nothing ever came of it though.

 

[DENVER]

This sounds like a plan, But I would leave your self with more than 2 feet on a side. In our paint booths at work we have about 6 to 8 on a side. I think you would need at least 4. Denver

 

[whizco]

Here's a HOOP HOUSE that you can build to your size for a small fee I'm sure.

This one is used for gardening, but seems like it would be cheap enough to use as a temp paint booth as well.

http://www.rainyside.com/images/hoophouse/outside.jpg

I am going to purchase a R.V Tent at Costco which is 12x20 and has heavy duty tarps on all sides and steel poles for strength for $169 bucks. I have other uses for it when not in use as a paint booth.

 

[Shelby1308]

I wouldn't go the portable spray booth route. 2 feet is not enough space. Now sounds like a good time to clean the garage. You can hang plastic on the walls. Sweep the floor and wet it down slightly. What you need is a good crossflow of air moving through the garage. Boxfans work good as long as you have them push the fresh air into the garage. Heavy concentrations of overspray in the air is combustible! If you have a gas heater in the garage turn off the pilot light. I like to mask the car the night before and spray it the next morning (when the neighbors are at work and dew holds the dust down). My neighbors don't mind because I've been helping them with their car problems and body damage for years.

Just my .02 cents.

Good luck!