Journal Entry

In another thread I mentioned that I am painting my MG myself in my garage. I am fortunate to have a friend who has been painting cars professionally for 20 years to advise me (and loan me some of his equipment on occasion).


First is a picture of some of my supplies and equipment. I am sure I will be lambasted a bit for the body filler, but there are a lot of imperfections in the body (almost like a 5 year old with a golf club had batting practice on it), and I want it to look great.

Anyways:



From left to right:

Guide coat, Short hair fiberglas filler, body hammer and dolly (cheap Chinese crap), body filler (bondo), glazing putty, etching primer, filler board (these are AWESOME), 2K primer/surfacer with catalyst, wax & grease remover (behind) with spray bottle, Limco ps21nr Sealer, Limco 3 SSU color, reducer @ hardener. Equipment is a Sprayfine turbine unit with pressure-feed gun. I have a 1.3mm (topcoat) and 1.5 mm (primer) needle for it. Beneath the turbine are various sanding block and boards and pads I bought or made. At the bottom is a $40 detail gun, it's not real good for anything.



The most useful piece of equipment so far (borrowed):




When I paint, I wash and squeegee down the floor of the garage and use 2 mil plastic to drape everything. I run the fans with filters for at least an hour before I start on any finish coats and sometimes dampen the floor if it is a really dry day. I'd rather have long dry time than crap in the paint.


Also I use a VOC Organic face filter, goggles, paint sock, gloves and paint suit every time I paint.


Anyway, on to my 21st century filtering system. This goes in under the garage door on the intake side:






It's basically a couple of 8 foot 1x4 boards boxed with 17 3/4" lengths of 1x4's and a 2x4 in the middle for a little rigidity. I staple-gunned 4 20"x20" air filters (cheapies) to the boards and then ran duct tape to seal. I had a 18x20 filter laying around (because I can never remember the right size for the house) that fit in the last part, but I was planning on blocking it up with wood or cardboard if I hadn't had that 18x20 filter laying around. The 8' boards fit perfectly in the garage door slot, I couldn't have made it fit better if I'd tried.


The garage door closes:





and I seal the gap at the top of the door with some plastic and duct tape.


On to the air exhaust system:



When we built this house I specified a door at the back of the garage, I sure am glad I did.


I bought 2 $19 20 inch box fans and hammered up some wood I had laying around into this ridiculous contraption:





The fans are held in by pressure because I built the frame around them, also I built the frame so that it jams tightly into the doorframe. The filters are attached with tape and obviously need to be changed. They look beat up because a few times a wind gust has blown it over into the garage before I figured how to cram it in there.


Here's another shot of the exhaust fans from the outside:






I thought about putting hinges on it but it just seemed like a little too much effort. I think I am going to add one more fan to this thing, if nothing else it will make it lighter.


Anyways, I hope this helps.

http://www.mgexperience.net/phorum/read.php?1,684384