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toolbox - anything that uses a catylist in my opinion won't work, a hardner is a different story, they accellerate the drying time, but with single stage paints, including enamels and laq, the reducers used are specific to spraying and have very fast flash times, barley enough time to roller anything before it starts drying. Typically anything with a recoat time of <1 hour, or after 5 days uses a catylist.

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Not sure we're on the same page... The hardener I'm talking about is a urethane catalyst that should be just about identical to the hardener used in automotive enamels. It doesn't just speed the drying time, it polymerizes the paint. It's got the same ugly isocyanate ingredients as "real" car paint hardener...which is why I said it's probably good that most people don't use it.

But...that's also why I think there's a good chance you can use "real" car paint for this. The reducers used in automotive paint are just solvents that evaporate at different rates depending on which "speed" you use. For this, I'd probably use a retarder instead, giving you maximum working time. Or, don't use a reducer at all...if you use a catalyst, the paint will cure just fine without it. It might not flow out very well, but that's another issue .

And there are still 1K acrylic enamel paints available that don't use any kind of catalyst at all...you just reduce and spray. Today this has really fallen out of favor...but people still shoot it. The one nice thing about it is since they don't have any iso's, you don't need any special respirator equipment. It's how everything from Chrysler and Ford was painted in the '50s and '60s (GM clung on to acrylic lacquer forever). OTOH, you're not supposed to touch it for a month so it can cure.

I think the answer to whether or not you could use real car paint for this is going to lie with whoever actually tries it. I'd love to see someone with more time on their hands than me do some experiments with a synthetic enamel, an acrylic enamel, and if you want to get really crazy--an acrylic urethane. Try using slow reducer, a retarder, or no reducer...try w/hardener and without. Try a brush, try a roller...see if it works. That's the only way we'll know. Maybe there's no way to make it work. Maybe there is . You can buy car paint in pints, and it's not very expensive.

If it did work...the color palate would be limitless. And the "value" lines from the major paint manufactures aren't that much more expensive than Rustoleum. More expensive yes, but it's really not bad if you look into it.

Anyway...I still think it's worth a shot. Any volunteers...