Decent Paint Job

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Camar068

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86 K10 hunting truck, but a daily driver and needs to look decent.

Thoughts of Rustoleum 2x enamel? Wide spray pattern and appears to be easy. Too old to learn how to paint for one paint job....and it's a hunting truck so the ***** gonna get scratched. I don't mind spending time sanding/buffing orange peel.

Welding/auto paint is one thing I wish I'd spent time on growing up, but at 50 it's either pay someone to do it or it's gotta be cheap and easy.
 

Rusty Nail

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I painted a truck with spray paint once and I thought it kicked ass but it was flat paint *and I didn't get to see it long term result. The truck got smashed.
 
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yevgenievich

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Cheap gun and entry level paint might work better if there is any thought of redoing the paint later. At least that was what I went with on a beater backup daily
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bucket

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You can spend a lot of time with detail work on a spray bomb job and no matter how well you lay it down, it's going to look like poor quality paint. It's far too thin to buff out as well.
 

Poppy 87

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86 K10 hunting truck, but a daily driver and needs to look decent.

Thoughts of Rustoleum 2x enamel? Wide spray pattern and appears to be easy. Too old to learn how to paint for one paint job....and it's a hunting truck so the ***** gonna get scratched. I don't mind spending time sanding/buffing orange peel.

Welding/auto paint is one thing I wish I'd spent time on growing up, but at 50 it's either pay someone to do it or it's gotta be cheap and easy.
I'm with you on this! I know so much of a really good paint job is prep work. A friend of mine that paint's show quality cars said he would do my truck, but would need it for a year. He suggest Maaco if you can get a reference from a decent one, as those guys shoot lots of paint and it's usually good quality product like PPG as they are contractually obligated. They also have actual paint booths. You might want to talk to them and see about if you remove trim and do some prep work, getting a reasonable price. It won't be the $299 advertised special, but when I'm ready for paint on my truck am going to at least check them out. If not, my buddy gets the truck for a year!
 

Grit dog

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There’s about a 0% chance I’d waste my time painting a vehicle with spray cans. Aside from looking like you used spray cans, you’ll get the side benefit of it not lasting long.
Most of the work is prep for even a “decent” paint job so why flush all that effort down the toilet with a Rustoleum rebuild?

Depends on your perception of “decent” though I suppose. And you got too much into that truck to ruin it with a spray bomb job.

JMO.
If you won’t paint it, do all the prep that you’d have to do anyway and deliver it to a Maaco or Scheib place and let them squirt it with some real paint at least.
 

78C10BigTen

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I painted a truck with spray paint once and I thought it kicked ass but it was flat paint *and I didn't get to see it long term result. The truck got smashed.
I painted my s10 with spray paint, satin black and no clear over it.... didnt last too long.
 

SirRobyn0

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86 K10 hunting truck, but a daily driver and needs to look decent.

Thoughts of Rustoleum 2x enamel? Wide spray pattern and appears to be easy. Too old to learn how to paint for one paint job....and it's a hunting truck so the ***** gonna get scratched. I don't mind spending time sanding/buffing orange peel.

Welding/auto paint is one thing I wish I'd spent time on growing up, but at 50 it's either pay someone to do it or it's gotta be cheap and easy.

I knew last night when I saw this post there would be a ton of folks saying don't do it.

I have to admit to having done a few rattle can jobs, one the entire rig, went flat black and it looked like crap, but I was young and didn't do a very good job at all. The other was just the lower part of a two tone factory paint job on a Dodge that had pealed badly.

Look we all know at least the principle behind the right way to paint a truck, but sometimes that's just not feasible or the vehicle isn't worth it. Or you just don't have the cash. Take my 1992 Dodge Dakota for an example. It's a red truck with silver on the side like a two tone. In 2002 when I got it the silver was pealing badly. No money for a paint job, so I sanded it as best I could used a little body glaze where needed, taped and rattle canned. That paint is still on the side of the truck. Is it perfect of course not. Is it better than the pealing stuff that was there heck yea by about 1,000 times. Prep it right, know how to use spray paint and it'll be fine as long as your expectations are right.

Guys you have to remember he said hunting rig, daily driver, and it's going to get scratched.

The other great thing about spray paint is touch ups are easy.

Would I rattle can a restoration, of course not. But a work truck sure if the paint is shoot and I know I can do make it look better than it currently is. That's my 2 cents.
 

idahovette

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Helps a LOT when you have someone in your family that paints. My son, Tony put a bunch of effort in on Kooper's(his nephew) S10 and it shows, It
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came out great!!!!
 

Grit dog

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^True, I looked at all the $ he has in that truck. Plus it’s a daily and apparently in the winter salt belt too.
Spray bombing a truck of that value would be like building a custom home and putting linoleum on the floors. Sure it works but it actually detracts from the value more than it helped the cost.
 

bucket

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I knew last night when I saw this post there would be a ton of folks saying don't do it.

I have to admit to having done a few rattle can jobs, one the entire rig, went flat black and it looked like crap, but I was young and didn't do a very good job at all. The other was just the lower part of a two tone factory paint job on a Dodge that had pealed badly.

Look we all know at least the principle behind the right way to paint a truck, but sometimes that's just not feasible or the vehicle isn't worth it. Or you just don't have the cash. Take my 1992 Dodge Dakota for an example. It's a red truck with silver on the side like a two tone. In 2002 when I got it the silver was pealing badly. No money for a paint job, so I sanded it as best I could used a little body glaze where needed, taped and rattle canned. That paint is still on the side of the truck. Is it perfect of course not. Is it better than the pealing stuff that was there heck yea by about 1,000 times. Prep it right, know how to use spray paint and it'll be fine as long as your expectations are right.

Guys you have to remember he said hunting rig, daily driver, and it's going to get scratched.

The other great thing about spray paint is touch ups are easy.

Would I rattle can a restoration, of course not. But a work truck sure if the paint is shoot and I know I can do make it look better than it currently is. That's my 2 cents.

But it's not just a beater truck, he wants to improve the looks.

If something is patched together and several colors, I'm all for spray painting it to make it look better. I've done that myself a couple or several times. Imho, there's nothing wrong with that at all. But no matter what, there's no hiding the fact that it was spray painted and it will look like it too, especially if the goal is glossy.

Besides that, decent spray paint is expensive these days. Buying a cheapo paint gun and then getting cheap paint (like from Tractor Supply) will hardly cost anymore than spray paint and it will look nicer.
 

78C10BigTen

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I knew last night when I saw this post there would be a ton of folks saying don't do it.

I have to admit to having done a few rattle can jobs, one the entire rig, went flat black and it looked like crap, but I was young and didn't do a very good job at all. The other was just the lower part of a two tone factory paint job on a Dodge that had pealed badly.

Look we all know at least the principle behind the right way to paint a truck, but sometimes that's just not feasible or the vehicle isn't worth it. Or you just don't have the cash. Take my 1992 Dodge Dakota for an example. It's a red truck with silver on the side like a two tone. In 2002 when I got it the silver was pealing badly. No money for a paint job, so I sanded it as best I could used a little body glaze where needed, taped and rattle canned. That paint is still on the side of the truck. Is it perfect of course not. Is it better than the pealing stuff that was there heck yea by about 1,000 times. Prep it right, know how to use spray paint and it'll be fine as long as your expectations are right.

Guys you have to remember he said hunting rig, daily driver, and it's going to get scratched.

The other great thing about spray paint is touch ups are easy.

Would I rattle can a restoration, of course not. But a work truck sure if the paint is shoot and I know I can do make it look better than it currently is. That's my 2 cents.
I only canned mine to hide the primer i got it in. I didnt sand or reprime first, i just rattle blasted it! It was nice for a few months but the orange accent turned peach, the hood turned into little dings down to the primer. Next time ill sand and make it to better and maybe clear it. Heres a pic from a few months ago. Second one was about 2 weeks ago just for reference how it looks crappy. Its definately a 50 ft paint job. Last pic is how i got and im sorry its not a square! But it fits the post title.

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82sbshortbed

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Buddy at work went and got a compressor and gun and spent $500 on paint. Never 0ainted before. Him and his dad prepped it over about 2 weekends then sprayed it. It looked like a first time job. It's a year later and looks like total ****. Fir that money he should of just got the macco paint job and he'd have come out better.

My square has a macco paint job on it right now. I hit it with some compound and a buffer and it came back pretty good.

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I'm like you I don't really worry about having it perfect and won't spend a couple grand on a real good one. So I'd do like what was mentioned earlier. Prep it yourself and remove what trim and stuff you want to because they'll just tape around everything and spray it. Then have them paint it for less than what my buddy spent on his mustang and have it looking much better.

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As you can see they just tape **** off and do a poor job of that too. Lol

But, you can take off your side markers and tail lights and grill and other stuff so they don't just tape around everything. That's what I'd do if it was me. Then put all of it back on when you get it back.
 

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