guys all i have to tell you is that i first painted a 85 honda crx at my cottage in 1 day, i had no money, i did like 3 coats with no sanding and it looked great, i should scan that old pic and show you!!!. The job only looks as good as the time and effort that you put into it. the paint is extreemly durable, think about it, it's used to paint over rusted metal on things like tractors, metal railings, ect... and stand the elements. it is formulated to do just that. the tequnique is critical, u have to have a "feel" for how much to thin the paint and u have to use mineral spirits, not paint thinner like varsol. I could not even imagine how well it would turn out if you sprayed it with a HVLP gun and wet sanded and polished. It does "self Level" on the sides just as it does on the flat level surfaces. Like i said before it is critical on how you thin the paint and how you apply it. i did the charger in about 3 days. i got sick of going to body shops and them telling me either they don't do classic cars and if they did want to do the car i need at least $5000 even though the car was stripped and prepped!!!! the auto painting industry is in my opinion a total rip off so if you want it done right and cheep, do it yourself!!! when the paint is thinned your barley putting on any paint with each coat, so you really need to do about 6 coats to get enough of a base so you can wet sand and polish. it took me a long time to figure out what steps to take to get awesome results. my 74 bug looks awesome even after 6 years the paint is still mint. looks like the day i did it. that paint dries FAST, so literally you can wetsand overnight. Keep in mind i know a little about painting, i've shoot a few cars with single stage enamel with professional results, but it's expensive and tedious. I used duplicolor paint, primer, reducer and primer sealer on this car:
http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d13/69martin/DSC00194.jpg
it looked like this before paint:
http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d13/69martin/Picture1.jpg
that car was painted midnight metalic blue, and flips awesome in the sun. a very hard color to do cause it's almost black and shows every imperfection. but as you can see in the pic it came out awesome. but the materials alone (paint, reducer, primer, primer sealer) cost about $250 CDN, which was alot, never mind the work.
the "tremclad" paint is really a awesome alternetive, since your rollering it on there's no dust and you get a really clean paint job if you do it in your garage, where if you spray theres a battle with dust.
when i painted with the Tremclad i just use the paint, no primer, nothing, just the paint, right over bondo. like i mentioned before after wetsanding use a random orbit polisher and the cheapest POLISHING COMPOUND made by turtle wax, it comes in a paste in a small round flat container and it's white, allmost looks like hand cream and smells good too!!! I find that after thinning the paint with mineral spirits the paint "flashes" or dries really quickly, and after a overnight period it is completely dry, unlike automotive paint which takes up to 6 months to fully "cure" so litterally the next day you can sand, buff, polish, and wax the paint. on the charger the paint looks really good, i did not take a huge amount of time to perfect it because i really really wanted to drive it!!!. in the spring i plan on wetsanding and polishing it more, but yes it looks like the pics, really good. considering that it cost me about $50 i love it and i'm not paranoid about juicing it on a dirt road and going sideways worring about my precious paint job, i drive the car, hard and alot, after all is'nt that what they're made for? for $50 and a few days of work i can paint it again in a few years!!!! If your not good with your hands, and not a real detail person let someone else paint your car cause it can get ugly really fast!!!! if i had a shop, made a little paint booth and sprayed this stuff on and wetsanded and polished it, i'm sure i could paint show quality cars with $30 worth of paint. keep in mind this paint is really good, like i said bofore i bought a can 3 yrs later to repaint a fender on my 74 beatle and it was dead on for color match, that must tell you about the quality of the paint, i'd give you $100 if you could tell me which fender i painted on this car in person, and its' right out of the can:
http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d13/69martin/DSC00164.jpg
keep in mind that you must still prep the car as you would with any other paint job, prepping is all the work and reflects the overall result.
i did not block sand the car just wetsand progressivly finer paper by HAND, no machine, no block nothing. using any "block" to sand i found the paper got dirty fast and got all plugged up, so do it by hand and keep it really wet, using a spray bottle in one hand and a clean bucket of water and a shammy (dollar store!!!)to clean it off to see how it looks. i prepped the car with 80, then 100, then 200, finished with a 400, did all my body work, and painted. after 2 coats (about 4hrs work for the whole car) i wetsanded with a 600, then did 2 more coats, wetsand with 800, 2 more coats and sand with a 1000-1500 and polish, followed by wax, done......