When I say bumper paint, I mean like the flexible type of paint they would paint a bumper with, color matched and all. I painted my plastics about a year ago (black) with Krylon Fusion, but they've been out of the car for a while and have already gotten scratched, and chipping and peeling pretty bad. Granted it's more than likely due to poor prep, but Ive got a HVLP gun now, as well as a decent size shop, I was thinking about painting them like you would a bumper. It seems to me it would be a hella durable, look damn nice, and definitely liven-up the interior a bit. Im curious as well if the paint went on thick enough if it would cover up the textured surface and give it a real nice smooth finish. Just a thought, anyone tried it yet? I figured someone has had to have tried this before, if not then Ill be the guinea pig!

 

If you go to your local parts source and get the dupli-color spray can for vinyl in black and clean your panels with warm soap and water and spray them they will turn out great, and they will also have a shiny finish to them. I did my panels 2 years ago cause they were a little sun faded and havent had them peel or chip yet . I also picked up leather seats from a 95 trans am that were charcoal grey and hit them with the paint and they turned out great two.

 

How exactly do you want your interior to look? Like, do you want it to match the exterior color of the car and be shiny, or do you just want a color change.

If you want them to be smooth and like the outside of the car, you're going to have to do some sanding, quite a bit. It isn't going to flow out smooth if you just spray it.

If you just want to change the color, they sell interior paints that have a flex agent in them. Here's a few pictures of how mine turned out. I used Shirwin Williams interior paint, I only had to scotch brite and clean the panels.

 

I second the dupli-color. It works great.

 

I guess for me spray paint has always had a stigma of "the cheap way out". But from the way yall are talkin, Ill give it a shot. Is the paint yall used specifically for plastic auto interior panels? Or was it just an interior-grade plastic paint?

One more thing, what's the easiest way chemically to strip the paint off the old panels? Would regular paint thinner harm or eat the plastic at all? I had some aircraft stripper at work, but someone stole it, but I think that would have been too powerful anyways.

 

I would try a spray on paint remover, and when the paint starts to peel and curl up wash it off right away with warm water and some soap, if you wait to long it might eat into the plastic so wash it off right away as soon as it starts to work on the paint

 

I just turned my old gray interior plastic, black. I used 400 grit paper, soap and water. Hit it with some Semi-gloss dupli-color. Looks great, almost perfect match to the few original pieces of black trim.

 

The dupli-color is good stuff. i did on the back portion of my old red interior and it came out great. I also dont use the back much so i dont know how it would work on the front where you have more traffic.

 

I let the paint dry for 24 hrs and intentionally tried to scratch it with a screwdriver. It didn't scratch. I was wondering how it would hold up on the rocker panels. Time will tell how it holds up to the sun.

 

One thing to watch out for with the Vinyl duplicolour, is that the piece you're painting doesn't bend much while in your car, It will come off like a sunburn on your back if it does..

 

What kind of duplicolor are yall using, is it equivalent to Krylon Fusion specifically for plastics?

 

I used the dupli color for plastics, I'm sure they're about the same as krylon. The semi-gloss has some decent shine to it, I think the high gloss would look lame, too much shine.