PROJECT LAWN MOWER - the quest for the perfect inexpensive paintjob CONTINUES!

Okay, well, its gonna have to wait a little longer. As I mentioned earlier, I did the pep work today, a thorough wetsand (400 grit) over the existing paint which was still in pretty reasonable condition. I had bought some of the Penetrol and made the decision to try it out.

First thing I noticed was how thick the Penetrol was, almost like salad oil as described earlier. I thinned out the paint to nearly 50% but it was still thicker than my mineral spirits batch. Thinning any more I felt would be pointless as the mix was almost the same consistancy as the Penetrol right out of the can.

Got started and immediately was not liking what I was seeing. Bubbles, bubbles and more bubbles. But of more immediate concern was the fact that I could not blow out the bubbles like I was able to do with the mineral spirits batch. The paint did eventually spread out, but by no means any better than the mineral spirits batch, but it did take almost three times as long, and a frustrating amount of re-rollering to eliminate the bubbles. The more I worked with it, the less I liked it. I worked it and worked it and worked, and eventually got a decent coat down. But it was VERY labor intensive, and I was not wholey satisfied I'd gotten all the bubbles out.

After only doing the "bonnet" of the mower, I made the decision to can up the remainder of the Penetrol batch and park it on the shelf.

Mixed up a batch of mineral spirits thinned paint and had a go on the fenders and rear deck. What a WORLD of difference! The mineral spirits batch went of infinitely easier, the bubbles disipated with a mere puff of breath and the paint instantly started to "flow". I was able to cover the same amount of surface area as the bonnet in 1/4 of the time as the Penetrol batch, with virtually no trouble with bubbles.

I was sold, the remainder of the Penetrol will stay in the can and will heve to find a use for something else. After waiting a couple of hours, I went back to re-examine. I acutally tried to lay down a second coat of mineral spirit batch over the Penetrol batch, but it was still too tacky - paint started to pull up.

The Mineral Spirits coat I'm sure would have recieved a second coat with no trouble as it alreadfy felt dry - and it was laid down AFTER the Penetrol coat!

After another hour or so, I compared the two mixes and noted: Both flowed smoothly, and the Penetrol coat did eventually yield the same results of the mineral spirits coat, However, it took a considerable more amount of work to achieve this result, and the Penetrol coat stayed "wet" for much long. Longer enough, in fact, that it managed to attract considerably more dust and other debris than I was comfortable with. Granted, in doing a car I would spend considerably greater efforts to get the garage clean. On the flip side of this, the mineral spirits coat went on very nicely, but has a much narrower margin for error. You only have about 5 - 10 minutes to work with it before you have to stop, or risk pulling up paint.


My personal conclusion is that the Penetrol, although in the end producing a comparable coat, showed no advantages over the mineral spirits. In fact, to me it exhibited enough negative traits that I've chosen not to experiment any further with it, preferring the comparitive ease of the mineral spirits.