Have you checked the prices on '74-'79 Trans Ams lately? I don't know if the camaro's have gone up, but the T/As have gone through the roof.

Not saying they were the best cars ever, I've had several and they definitely had their problems, but the collector market has found them.

Also, for the ultimate rustoleum paintjob, in the words of Brad Paisley "this is pretty good, but it could get better than this":
https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/memb...te-ruiner.html

 

This picture shows it all. The coverage appears to be good, and it looks run free without any obvious spray marks (it's a nice monocolor, no weird offcolorings like you see with a lot of spray can jobs). But look at the paint itself. It's flat, it has no depth, and it has very little shine. It looks like a piece of lawn furniture, not an automotive paint job. Without hours, and hours, and hours of buffing (done on an annual basis as the cheap paint continually fades and oxidizes), it will continue to look even worse. The guy that posted the black trans am is one of the few I've seen that actually looks really good, but how many hours does he take to keep it looking good vs just using a quality paint to begin with? Time is money.

I'm sorry, but whatever you did with the headlight buckets and grille looks terrible. You can clearly see the spray can markings in the picture you posted. I don't know about the stripes because of the angle, but I hope they don't have the same markings. If I were you, I would go back and do them right, and then never mention to anyone you spraypainted your car. They might not notice, and just think it's a really bad factory job instead. I'm sure your car looks better than before, but you could have done so much better with just a little more.

-cal30sniper[/quote]

Hey hows it going guys..i love reading all these funny comments ...
Cal Sniper your right..the paint has no reflection and no depth.. LO3 maniac...you can do a whole lot better than this...a WHOLE LOT.... i honestly wouldnt have rattle canned it because your going to need some paint to work with when you're polishing it. Only thing i spray painted was the hatch light... You have to sand sand sand with atleast 2500 grit till you have no orange peel...and polish polish polish....

I started this project only because the car was parked in the yard for 13 years just rotting away.. once i noticed the quarter panel was rusting i sanded it all off and rattle canned it. BUT i had alot of time so i decided to take on this project and make it look better. i Rolled it on though....I KNEW IT WOULD FADE... I KNEW I WOULD HAVE TO SPRAY WAX IT ATLEAST ONCE EVERY 2 WEEKS.. I KNEW I WOULD HAVE TO REPOLISH IT ONCE IT FADED .( RECENTLY DID..TOOK ME 1 HOUR FOR A QUICK POLISH WITH A BUFFER) the paint is shiny again with some refection or atleast i think it is.

PUMA....nice pics hadnt seen those

here is a picture of the only thing i rattle canned on the car..i had to sand very lightly or i would go through black paint. the hatch is originally red. Thats y rolled would have been better if your attempting this.

honestly this has more reflection than yours and this is no sanding..check out the orange peel on the reflection


Here it is with a 2000 grit sand..sanded very light or i would go through it and expose the red paint under. You can seee i left some orange peel on the bottom left, i didnt want to sand through it.


and here it is after i polished it...theres some reflection i believe

 

here is a pic of the reflection it has now ..kinda dirty different angles

 

My $50 paint job... tractor enamel.
My advice to you, get a HVLP turbine (paint gun that supplies it's own air), Harbor Freight has one for only $99. Get a cheap water trap, also from harbor freight...

try doing the same thing again... Even with the rustoleum you will be able to sand and buff more...

mine is tractor enamel, waited a few days for it to fully cure... wetsanded all the bugs and imperfections out... hit it with 4 coats of clear.

Here it is w/o clear

 

I don't expect my paint job to last forever, in a year or so.... I will change it anyway.

 

Actually, you made a much better choice for longevity. The Valspar Tractor enamel is designed to hold up day in day out in the elements on a vehicle. It's not show quality, but it's much more durable than rustolecrap. IMO, Valspar is in the same class as good military drab paints. They aren't the prettiest, but they should wear like iron.

-cal30sniper

 

There's nothing special about military drab paint. It's just regular flat paint. I know. I worked at the motorpool for 183rd Maintainance under 43rd ASG (Area Support Group) back in the early 2000's.

 

I was referring more to some of the better grades that you see offroading guys use. It's not pretty, but it's easy to lay down and wears like iron. The stuff the military uses is so-so. It fades pretty fast, but they aren't really concerned with looks at all, and it's easy to keep repainting things in that case.

 

The only problem with the I will re-do it in a year is the amount of material built up on the car. Like I said better to use a single stage paint and a gun rather than rattle cans, good luck

 

Looks great

 

IDid not know you had to be s big boy to own a Camaro what does that require maneuver a man Well teenagers can own camaros what's wrong with that to many it's. Better the a teenager owning a import and thinking they owning something special

 

Uuhhhhh English please.

 

The point is, if you are a teenager doing shady mods on a broke down old Camaro, don't expect to post on a forum with the big boys and get a load of compliments and attaboys. You are very likely to experience just what the OP did. If you want something to be proud of, and for other people to respect, then take the time (money comes with time, it requires SAVING), and do it right. End of story.

 

Sorry auto spell on my phone

 

I ain't even mad at you OP. Your car, your choices. I used similar spray paint when I did digi camo on my $600 beater s10 blazer. My camaro is in terrible condition in just about every way possible...for 5 years I've said I would wait and save up cash to do a real paint job but it would cost enormous amounts of cash..frame machine, nearly every body panel replaced, etc etc etc. Then I realize I should spend the cash on other stuff instead...like every year when this tpi crap starts to act up again...so it will stay in it's ugly half primered state.

I'm glad you like your car, I would give you props if I saw it to be honest.

 

the car looks fine man...dont let all the criticism get to ya im all for rattle ca paint jobs...plus by looking at the car the hod/fender aint 100% perfect

if the body was pretty much perfect yeah i can see the argumentabout rattle canning your car but if you were like me? i paid $500 for my 91 it was 4 or 5 different colors and the body was rough...i just wantd it one color so i bout cheapy 97 cent cans of satin black and went to town...sold the car a month later for 1500



as long as the car is one color thats all i care about! plus it was just a Daily beater.....my nice car...(79 mustang) had a real paintjob

 

I use a rattle can to paint stuff and I can lay some some nice paint with them, but I only paint stuff like model cars, maybe a crappy set of wheels if they are to be used for winter, some odds and ends car parts that will not really be seen, oh and a few demo derby cars LOL! I would never paint a whole car with a rattle can as the paint just does not hold up and like was said it take so much work to remove it. Sure my paint is far from perfect, but it's almost 26 years old, but guess what? I'm not going to do a crappy respay on it just so it looks new from 50 feet away-hell is already looks great form 50 feet away. I'm all for saving money when you can and understand not everyone can afford a 5-10K paint job-I know I can't right now so that is why my car is left alone. I'm not going to cheap out just to do it. It's the OP's car and he can do what he want's, but yeah 3rd gen's will never get the respect when people keep going the cheap route and half a**ing them.

 

blackbetty ur car came out amazing.i never did finish my rustoleum job , car is getting a real paint job this winter, that and i never had the time to finish mine

to the op dont worry what ppl have to say i caught alot of flak for doing mine too, i did mine just to protect the body on my pretty rust free car for the time being

my hood had some surface rust and the paint was crap




its been a year and ive nevr wetsanded buffed or polished/waxed the paint and it still looks this good

reflection of some trees off in the distance


while i dont suggest painting like me and blackbetty did , ur spray on paint will give u some time to save up for some real paint.

look into summitracings single stage paint or bc/cc paint
for 118 bucks u can get everything needed for 1 gallon of single stage and have macco spray it on for 200 bucks
or for 200 bucks u can get the same in bc/cc paint

 

Can I ask why you didn't paint it white to match the car?

 

LOL Yeah, I thought the color match was a little off. But that shine, man that looks better than factory! This stuff is encouraging me to put some color on mine if I ever even get to prime it due to bad weather we've had for days.

EDIT: I'll be spraying with a gun, but it will be outside. I'm practicing on my truck first.

 

because i was going to do the entire car black

 

if u have the ability to spray dont waste ur time with rustoleum, but a single stage kit form summit for 118$'s and spray that instead

the rustoleum took countless hours of labor to get it to look that good,if i wetsanded and buffed it it would be flawless, but the paint wont hold up for long so its not really worth it if u can do it the "right way"

 

Don't worry, I won't be using Rustoleum, I'm stepping up to Valspar. Just kidding. Right now, my goal is to just strip and seal the areas where the paint is flaking badly. I was planning to just shoot it in epoxy primer, but I'm starting to get ideas about putting some color on the roof and deck lid just to see how it goes. If it doesn't look absolutely pitiful, I'll shoot the hood with color too. Otherwise I'll strip it back to the epoxy and try again if it seems worthwhile. I'm practicing on my '66 GMC right now before I spray the epoxy on the camaro. Tomorrow looks like epoxy paint day as long as the wind cooperates.

Your hood looks great, nobody would know the difference especially from a photo.

 

Your car looks so good, I can't wait until I can paint mine with hot rod black primer!

 

A good fried of mine is a painter... I must say, he has done some great work with rattlecans. If you know how to paint and prep...

The paint all go's on the same, but some will not last and others will. You all are referring to to quality of the paint used. for $40 it looks fine.

The problem is not the quality of the paint (they will all look shiny at first), it's that rattlecan paint go's on too thin. To spray an amount equal to HVLP via rattlecan would cost too much. Most ppl do this not realizing that they could buy a few quarts or automotive paint for cheaper.

Also keep in mind that you can have spray cans mixed up with real paint... Dose not matter if you use an old school paint gun, hvlp, rattlecan or roller... Your end result will always reflect the prep work and wetsanding.

 

Man that wasn't very nice. Why don't you post up some pics of your ride so we can make fun of it? Doesn't that sound like fun?

 

JUST WRAP IT IN VINYL

 

JUST WRAP IT IN VINYL! it's way easier then you think!

 

Really it makes no differance on what or how you apply paint, its all in the prep and wet sanding?

 

To some degree yes, that's true. End result is the only thing that matters.

No paint last forever my friend (no matter how much you spend)... and if you wanna just look good for the moment (and I'm guessing that is the case for $40)... then no, application makes no difference... roll it on, wetsand and buff it out... it'll be fine, just not as good as some others. If he plans to paint the car again later... I would take it to bare metal instead of sanding off the Rustoleum. if I where OP.

 

Please try to refrain from giving any "advise" please. Thanks.

 

You could not be more wrong, you roll your paint on and keep telling yourself that, good luck

 

What happened to this place? It's one thing to offer up an actual technical argument, but quite another to just be mean spirited. I admit that I haven't been around for the last couple of years, but man I don't remember so much antagonism amongst the members.

Given that 9 out of 10 of every thirdgen you see on the street is trashed beyond repair, I'm shocked at how strongly opinionated so many owners are about "doing it right". But that's all a matter of perspective, there is no absolute right way to do it. It's all about compromises.

Here you go, a rolled on rustoleum paint job complete with updates on how the paint held up over the years.
http://www.rickwrench.com/index79mas...llarpaint.html

 

I was being serious, I think it looks great, and I'm planning on painting my car in primer and keeping it that way.

 

I apologize then. I misunderstood you and thought you were making fun of his car.

 

I've seen it done in every way... rattle can, hvlp, roll on... you name it... if your going to paint it for $40 they will all be fine. One method is not going to be better than the next. Don't worry about what the non-believers say or think. it's your car.

 

They will all be bad, this is just bad advice from some one who knows little about automotive finish. It has nothing to do with Non- Believers, it has to do with the proper way and the wrong way. I am just trying too steer people in the correct direction, Rustoleum is used for old patio furniture and swing sets not as an automotive finish.

 

I don't know how big a difference you think spraying rustoleum will make vs rolling it on. have you tried it??? THEY LOOK THE SAME AND ONE WILL NOT LAST LONGER THAN THE OTHER. I have seen it done.. rolled on, brushed on, rattlecan... you name it!

Is it really so hard to believe that not everyone is going to have a few thousand (or hundred in some cases) to have it done the right way.

Some of you have the wrong idea here. This is not meant to be a show quality job nor is it suppose to last forever. He just wants the car to be 1 single uniform color, I know what that's like.

Bottom line
If you are going to paint the car for $40 with rustoleum, it will not make a significant enough difference if you spray, roll or rattlecan. Don't worry about it, just be happy with the car.

 

I will when you have something constructive to say. How much further would YOU get with $40? Most of the ppl participating in this convo never did a "cheap" paint job... never will, and that's fine.

BUT I DID.

Don't bash the rest of us for trying. Rustolem is going to look like hell no matter how you slice it... it's not automotive paint. Nor is the Tractor paint that I used on my car. Just get it on the car however.

 

That's true. I agree, I know enough about automotive finishes not to spend too much time with rustol. If your doing this you already know that it's the wrong way, so why stress about it.

 

I could care less if it is sprayed or not, the point is don't us Rusoleum!!!! use a single stage ready to spray paint. You can get enough from Summit or Duplicolor and a decent gun for around $400 total. I know that may be a lot for people, but save up even if it takes a year at least you will do it correctly. The point being is get an automotive finish and spray it on, you can wet sand out the inperfections and have the proper product on the car, not a nightmare to remove later.

 

There is no $40 paint job. I tried it and it ended up being over $200.00 to do it right with quality thinner, etc, etc. The job ended up nickel & dimming' me to over $200. PLUS my budds supplied all the masking paper, tape, sanding pads (a ton). Now I'm counting the work and materials to get the old paint off too.

For fun, I made a video of the event. Check it:

 

I guess my point here is, do not advocate for something you know is wrong!! people here read this and think well other people have done it so I guess its okay. I am trying to steer new people and those just learning in the proper direction, what people do whith their money is up to them. I just do not agree that rattle canning your car is a good idea under any circumstace.

 

I here ya, but my friend didn't like his car 10 different colors. he has 4 kids and a house to pay for. car would have NEVER been painted. $50 problem solved.

It looked like flat red paint in 8 mos tho! lol!

I told him the same thing I told you... for that price, it's not going to matter! the flat red still looks better than how it was to start.

 

I'm chock full of constructive criticism...when I see somebody trying to do it correctly, or close to correctly. I have all the time in the world for somebody dedicated to do their homework and willing to spend the money necessary for a quality finish. Conversely, I have no time, nor respect, for somebody that cuts corners and is generally uneducated with respect to the process; your example of the application of paint not having a bearing on the outcome is simply and unequivocally wrong. You couldn't possibly be more wrong. Anybody with a general knowledge of painting would agree. Yet you're giving "advice". Unbelievable.

 

sorry but rustoleum in a spray can, versus rolling it on will not have the same results period

 

yall are sadly mistaken if you think your $40 rustoleum job would have been too much better than this one... I don't know what you ppl expect to see coming into threads like this.

I'm not giving advice, it's fact. If your going to use rustol, your already on the wrong path. It should be obvious that the person posting cannot do it the right way for whatever reason. In this case it's not about doing things "the best way", it's about doing it for $40. Just rattlecan it on. If you cant do that for whatever reason, then roll it on. I have seen a rollon and rattlecan rustoleum job IN PERSON and could not tell the difference after wetsanding.

If you think you can make it look better using the same paint for $40... by all means give it a try. roll, rattle, spray whatever... Post your results. I want to see.

 

Nobody here is claiming that they could do better with $40. All people are saying is if you only have $40, it's probably better spent on something other than a terrible paint job.

By the way, this isn't even a $40 paint job. The OP added up the cost of paint cans and bondo. What about sandpaper and masking tape? He said he had the scrapers laying around already, but where did the other stuff come from? All of that factors into the "cost", even on rattle can paint job.

Also, the rattle can will never match the roll-on method. The rattle can method lays down extremely thin layers (as has already been mentioned in this thread if you had read it). That leads to problems with cosmetics and durability. At least when you roll it on you are getting a nice thick coat of sub-quality paint instead of an extremely thin coat of it.

It's probably cheaper to roll it on too. Spray cans cost more for the same amount of paint as liquid paint does. You can buy a lot more paint and supplies to do proper body work (which the OP clearly did not do, just look at his hood). Rolling it on is a bit more difficult, and you've got to get the paint consistency just right, but you will get better results.

The question still remains why would you do it anyways? It doesn't make economic sense any way you cut it. If it's a beater that you don't care about, maybe, but if you are planning on keeping the car and doing anything with it, you're shooting yourself in the foot. I'm betting it ends up in the scrap pile by the end of the decade. Some mistakes just cost too much to undo.

 

i already did post mine as did blackbetty
the difference between mine and his is his was wetsanded and buffed, mine has no wetsanding or buffing on the final coat at all

u would not get that out of a rattle can no matter how much u prep, i know ive ratle canned a few of my friends beaters for him, and by beaters i mean 50-100$ cars we would buy to go take out in the woods to kill just for fun

and no crap its the wrong way but i did mine for a reason, this winter my car is getting a 2 tone silver and blue metallic bc/cc paint job, the rustoleum did its job and protected the hood and other parts of the body for the year till i could actually get my car sprayed

 

who knows why he did it.

We did it because my friend got a car that was wrecked. we put it back together with parts from a few donor cars. The end result was a functional car that was like 30 different colors.

He came to the conclusion that he would never be able to get a proper paint job. Not to mention that the car was only $300 to begin with. He still wanted it to look a uniform color.... so we did a rustol job, then after that his jeep got rolled on paint (it was lucky to be painted at all).

We thinned the paint for the roll on job. I agree rattle cans add up fast and you will notice that you could just buy real paint after you lay down the 20 coats it will take to = 3 coats of hvlp (this is one of the first points I made).

Maybe my eyes are bad, there was not a dramatic difference. Both cars where painted with the same paint. The first rattle cans and the other roll on (because he spent too much money on the rattle cans).

Again, I don't know what some of you expect to see in these types of threads. It's about as good as it could be given the situation.