well i just did something so stupid last night parking my beetle in my garage, there is a step about 3-4" where the driveway meets the garage floor, and i was reversing really fast into the garage and the wheel just yanked out of my hands and the car hit the garage HARD, put a huge dent in the fender (about 1" deep x 6" long) . i never do things like this, smash my own car into my own garage, great....so 15 mins later the fender was off the car and i spent about an hour tapping out the dent with a set of autobody dollys and hammers, and then i prepped the fender with 200grit using a small palm sander, and off to paint. cracked a can of paint 6yrs old, and aside for a 1/2" skin that dried on the top the paint was fine. i put on 1 coat last night at about 10pm, then put another coat at 9am this morning, and just did another coat now (about 4pm) and the repair is almost gone, down to metal for where the dent was (which i had to repair) and straight to paint. the paint dried to a touch in about 2-3hr, and i painted about 8-10hrs apart, i might be able to do 1 more coat tonite, and wetsand tommorrow and go and do 2 more coats and final wetsand. here are the results so far:





that's 3 coats of paint, i did'nt bother thinning it down at all just to do a small fender, i used paint straight out of the can. i'm more concerned about coverage, and i'll sand the peel out, but there is practically none after 3 coats. the 2nd coat starts to hide the scratches from prep with the 200, and after the 3rd coat all is gone. i should have the fender back on the car by friday night. funny thing was that the paint was intact except for some scratching, which was quite deep, but not thru, but the only way to fix it perfect was to tap it out, that way i use no body filler, which is like the whole car. so long story short, don't crash your car into the garage!!!! i hit it about idle with the clutch out in reverse, about 3-5 mi/hr, i feel so stupid.

as for chucks expirence with the paint, i can only say that most of the people trying this method have not ever painted a car, and when things go wrong they blame the process. once you master the tequnique and learn the paint, it's really easy and quick, it takes me all of 2 mins to paint the fender in the pic. at least i can repaint the whole fender for free, and not have to take it to a body shop and get rapped. my paint has served me very well, if someone is to try this method, alot of practice and strict directions followed as to the proceedure is taken, the result is going to be great. also resist the urge to rush the process, it's fast, but is still alot of work, most people trying this method get all gung-ho and just go out to their car roller in hand and then realize it turned out like crap, the reality is it is alot of work, but the $ and bragging rights make it all worth the work, plus you can say "ya, i painted it with tremclad/rustoleum and a roller"....how often do you get to do that?