Spray painting questions/advice

[Old Colts in Oz]

Interesting points above. The compressor I've got now is capable of 120psi but I remember borrowing it about a year ago and used it without a regulator ( it didn't have one on it ). I thought this was strange but didn't know too much at the time. If I had to guess I think the gun was only capable for about 45psi so maybe it restricted the air flow? Not sure but somehow the job seemed to go ok although maybe that contributed to the downfall of that gun! When I bought the same compressor the other week I knew it wasn't regulated so I went and bought one on purpose . The reason I bought it was that I thought the pulsing issues were air related - I was using a cheap GMC compressor at the time so wanted something bigger. Unfortunately the problem continued with the bigger compressor so that's why my focus has turned to the gun.Hopefully my new gun comes this week and I will try the painting on Saturday. I'm going to test the gun with thinners, then start spraying at around 40psi and turn it up if need. Will update the thread with how I go .

 

[SilverVH]

Where did I say to spray the car un-regulated....wholey **** there are some morons here! If you read I said to check for the pulsating problem geezus lol.

Just off the record you can actually spray primer un-regulated and a lot of people do, so I don't see where you are pulling your information from regarding un-regulated air supply...

 

[Tom_1569]

Crank up the air compressor and run it un-regulated at full pelt, it should stop the pulsating problem.

Where did I say to spray the car un-regulated....wholey **** there are some morons here! If you read I said to check for the pulsating problem geezus lol.

Just off the record you can actually spray primer un-regulated and a lot of people do, so I don't see where you are pulling your information from regarding un-regulated air supply...

LMAO, Are you serious???? Im a moron for CORRECTING something you CLEARLY stated.

I dont know if you have ever sprayed before, but an air compressor will NOT hold one PSI, it will loose pressure before the motor kicks in. It will NEVER have an ever flow of air if it is UNREGULATED, yes it is possible to spray unregulated, but it makes things more difficult and you will never get an ever coat.

Sorry about the Dementia

 

[Old Colts in Oz]

So the new gun arrived on Thursday and the sun was temporarily shining Friday afternoon so I thought I'd test it out. I ran some thinners through the gun first and it all seemed good. Masked up the car's roof, mixed the paint, and had a go. ALL GOOD! I can't beleive I've managed to spray a couple of things in the past with my old set up. The gun was very responsive and the compressor had no trouble at all keeping up pressure ( only switched on 3 times ). My moisture trap/regulator that I bought the other week worked a treat and it maintained the pressure at about 40-45psi. Once done, I ran half a cup of thinners through the gun, then pulled off the cap needle etc, cleaned them in thinners, then ran another small amount of thinners through the gun again. I have 2 sheds - one where the cars are and a smaller "workshop" where the bench and supplies are. I thought it was crap having bought a bunnings spec compressor first so now I have 2. Turns out that isn't so bad. Instead of having to move the big comp to the small shed so I could clean the gun with air, I fired up my little comp for the task - worked sweet! I also went down the local salvage yard during the week and bought an old stainless steel laundry basin/cupboard as somewhere to clean up. I ran some pvc pipe from the sink drain into a big bucket. That worked really well too! I was able to place all the stuff I needed cleaning in there and point the spray gun into it while running thinners through the gun - it was cleaning the gun and the various mixers, pots etc at the same time! All up I'm really happy and can't wait for the next project to work on technique now that the set up is good. Thanks for everyone's advice

 

[SilverVH]

Bro, theres a difference between cranking up the compressor un-regulated to see if there is a pulsating problem compared to cranking up the compressor to completely spray a car...maybe I should have made it a bit more clear, I was referring to running it un-regulated to see if the pulsating problem stopped, therefore eliminating a possible cause of pulsating, I didn't mean for it to refer to spraying a car un-regulated...

For the record yes I have sprayed before (6 years I've been around it) I guess I should've gone more into depth instead of assuming people would use common-sense lol.

Sounds like your getting the hang of it Old Colts, its amazing the difference a new gun makes, even if its a ****ter, just be wary with cheaper guns as they wear out quicker. What mm nozzle are you spraying with and what type of paint did you use? Once you get the hang of things you can use a finer nozzle and the finish will be amazing. It really all comes down to technique/practice.

Make sure you have fun at the same time also!

 

[Old Colts in Oz]

Because I'm still a novice I went with acrylic and the gun has a 2mm nozzle. I've used Acrylic once before and I like the "rub back and fix mistakes" concept. I think as I get more confident I'll try 2 pac/Enamel and try out a 1.8mm nozzle

 

[Tom_1569]

Because I'm still a novice I went with acrylic and the gun has a 2mm nozzle. I've used Acrylic once before and I like the "rub back and fix mistakes" concept. I think as I get more confident I'll try 2 pac/Enamel and try out a 1.8mm nozzle

You bought the same gun as me yeah? If you did different size nozzles are available. Ask transquip they should sell you some, im going to email them soon and get a few different sizes.

Was the regular/water seperator one off ebay? I have one of them on their way to be used on my new compressor. I did buy one of their seperator/oil/reg for air tools but unfortunatly it leaks no matter how much thread tape is on it im hopeing the water seperator is a bit better.

best of luck with your spraying, post up some pics to.

 

[Old Colts in Oz]

Yeah, same gun from Transquip -they were really good. I will contact them regarding getting different size nozzles. Can you guys shed some light on that subject for me? I've heard that a smaller ( 1.8 ) gives a better finish but not really sure why. Would it be fair to say that with different size nozzles for the same gun you could use primer and paint with the same gun but with different results ie. use a 2mm for primer than 1.8 for the paint?

I looked at those Ebay water trap regulators and bid on a couple for around $25 plus postage. Got outbid as I wasn't sure what they were worth so didn't keep bidding. Then I went into Supercheap and they had them on special for $24.95 so I bought one. It works realy well. Before buying that I was just using a "last chance" trap on the gun ( see photo below ). This thing cost about $12 from bunnings. With the last job I used both the trap/regulator and the last chance one as I figured it couldn't hurt.

Here's a couple of pics of the project. I picked up this 67 Colt 1000 Sedan really cheap as it was on it's way to the wreckers. It's got a fair bit of rust but the main thing that needed attention was the roof. I haven't been able to find the original paint codes so a quick fix was decided on to paint the roof white for now. Because the rust was so bad I had to wire wheel it back to metal. In hindsight I wish I'd spent more time fixing the dents etc but my objective was to clean up the rust so I guess that was achieved.

Bare metal where the rust was:

In primer :

The gun set up with moisture trap attached :

Supercheap regulator/trap. I have cheap hose from tank to trap, then my good hose runs from tap to gun :

Quick photo after spraying :