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I've been leaning towards the idea of painting it with the whole car together, doing the engine bay/under hood, trunk, door jams first, then comming back later and doing the body. I think I would have a lot tougher time putting everything together without damaging something, not to mention chipping up the paint on all the bolts for the hood, doors, trunk, etc. But I'm sure the pros have their ways around that too. The door jams and trunk I'm not as concerned about, but would you mask off the engine bay after it's painted to prevent getting overspray when going back to paint the body?

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Yes definately use something to protect it. I used a roll of thin painters plastic used by housepainters from lowes (or home depot) its very cheap and usefull for other things as well. The clear especially floats around for while in the air just waiting for a place to stick where it shouldn't. As far as doing the jambs first I actually added a stripe similar to the factory billboards after the car was already painted, with doors on for alignment of the stripe and masked the inside of the doors and jamb so no overspray would get in thier.

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I still have paint over the factory finish on most of the car, however there will be some sheet metal work and a small amount of filler needed. The car will go straight from body work to primer to paint fairly quickly, while being stored inside my dry garage.

I was planning on going with the PPG Omni system, I have a couple local autobody supply places that carry it. The omni MP182 2k urethane surfacer p-sheet indicates it is able to be applied over etch primed bare metal, scuffed oem finishes and body filler. "Sounds" like this would fit the bill perfectly for me, however I know the p-sheets are notorious for not vounteering the info about whether they are suitable to cover large areas of etch primed bare metal or large areas of oem finish. The two omni paints I was looking at, the MTK acrylic urethane single stage and the MBP acrylic urethane base coat both indicate they can be applied over the MP182. I just want to be sure I'm not taking an over-simplified idea out of what the p-sheets are saying.

Will a (mixed with reducer) gallon of single stage or base coat be enough or should I be buying enough to do 1.5-2 gallons(after mixing)? What about the surfacer if I wanted to be able to do 3-4 coats of surfacer?

Thanks all for the info so far.

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Omni Mp-182 is a great primer. I have used it on many projects over the years. If your going with a solid color, use single stage. If you have runs or orange peel its easy to fix with a wetsand and buff. Doing it in base clear will be more expensive and more time consuming, because you go around the car many more times. To do a complete like you talking, 1.5 gallons should do. Once you add hardner and reducer you end up with alot more sprayable material. Good luck