In the middle of a much larger project and thought I'd post....Maybe this will help somebody out.

I wanted to get as close to the OE 69 1/2 A12 hood paint as I could, without turning it into a lifelong pursuit, and without paying a shop $1000+, without going to the resto guru for $800 worth of paint, or anything like that.
I do realize they varied from car to car somewhat, but there was a certain texture I'd seen on show vehicles + untouched original cars that I was after.

SEM hot rod black, PN HR010 has good reviews on Amazon + a good shot of an an a12 style hood and that convinced me to try it.
(I got my best price somewhere other than Amazon. Shop carefully.)
It got me about as close as I will likely ever get.

This is 2k primer sanded to P320.
(You can go finer if you want, but the following steps more than hide any sanding scratches 2x over)

Sealed with one wet coat of black epoxy primer, reduced around 15%.

"Epoxy as sealer" sat for 2 hours.

Shot two wet coats of SEM hot rod black over that, per the instructions.

After overnight cure.

Side comment:
This is very close to the appearance of my untouched original '68 Charger tail panel (which is the only original example of Organisol that I've owned).
It was very slightly flatter than this and did not have any texture.

I stopped here for a day while deciding what to do. It looked pretty good to me, I could have stopped right here.

But it wasn't quite "the look".

Eventually I decided that the texture is kind of important to the look of an A12-type hood, and if that's what I am gonna do, I should experiment a little
and see if I can get there.

I mixed up a small quantity of SEM, and cheated the instructions slightly:
I added a small amount of SPI urethane reducer.

Previously I had run the spray gun wide open (both fan and fluid wide open).

First practicing on a disposable/different surface, I played with the adjustment and technique until I arrived at what I was shooting for (no pun intended).

On my particular spray gun, that ended up being fan wide open and fluid tip turned in about a turn and a half to reduce fluid volume,
and I also held the gun maybe twice the normal distance away from the panel (I would estimate about 12" away instead of the normal 5 to 6 inches).
Air pressure was in the mid to high 20s. (Your rig will work differently, but the general idea was to reduce fluid volume until it came out very slowly in discernably separate "dots"
rather than an atomized liquid). I used 1.4mm tip (but only because that's what was already in there from the previous shoot).

No specific overlap was used. I started with no overlap at all, then reversed direction, and then "dusted" it until the texture evened out across the panel.


....and here's what I got.

Closeup of the texture. I'm pretty happy with it.

An original. (Love this).

Another orignal.

Summary......

Overall mine is definitely on the heavier textured side, which I'd seen on alot of show vehicles and really loved.
Nice to figure out how to.....if not duplicate it, at least do my own version of it.

You have total control of how much texture you get in the last step. If you want a little less texture than this, I would suggest try increasing the distance
between the gun and the panel. The important thing is to practice until you get the gun and your technique where you want it, before shooting the actual hood.

Pretty satisfying.

Maybe this will help someone out.

All for now...

Thanks for posting this. Sometimes solutions come from nothing but trial and error.

I'm late seeing it, but nice work Rich!

Thanks Dave!

Alot more extensive work to the rest of the car is going on right now, I've been working on it quite a bit...the hood looks pretty good hanging on the wall.

And where is THAT build thread at?

It's an album on my Fakebook.

Not just pictures and text, but also video with verbal descriptions and so on.

Maybe someday I should diversify and dump some of the material here and on FBBO.

Been suggested I should start a youtube channel, but not sure if I have the energy to put into it.

I've sort of walked away from facebook for the time being.

I do follow a few folks on YouTube, but not a lot.

I'd love to see some of that content here on Moparts. In your spare time!