Painting A 1967 AMC Rambler On A Budget - Paint Your Car for $1,016

Up until this step, we had been dry block-sanding with either 150-grit to knock down primer or 320 to smooth transitions. The final step was wet-sanding the entire car with 400 and a palm-sanding block. The idea is to sand in a crosshatch pattern to scuff the surfaces so the topcoat will stick and take out sanding scratches from the 150 and 320 that could show up in the final finish. The water keeps the fine-grit paper from clogging and dragging.

Before taping the car and preparing it for the topcoat, we dragged it outside and thoroughly washed it to remove the sandpaper grit and slurry from the nooks and crannies.

In the past, we endorsed using cheapo tape to cover taillights and things we didn't want to spray in the trunk and under the hood. For the trim taping job, we recommend using 3M or a similar brand of yellow tape that will actually stick to the car and stay there. Our tape cost $2.44 per roll and stayed put when we blasted it with a gun full of color.

To get paint low on the quarter-panels, into the driprails, and onto the small edges, we were going to blast paint directly at portions of the car that we didn't want painted. To ensure there is a minimum of overspray where you don't want it, e.g., windshield, door glass, interior, a good tape job is critical. We bought a 100-foot roll of masking paper, taped the jambs inside the car, and used the metal Bondo spreader to tuck the tape underneath the weatherstripping.

After the car was washed and taped, we pulled it back indoors and cleaned the entire body with 3M general-purpose adhesive cleaner or wax and silicone remover. Silicone is what causes fisheyes in the topcoat. The final step is to remove any dust or fine fibers with a tack cloth.

Since we planned to repaint the wheelwells with black undercoating, we didn't worry about masking those areas. But to keep overspray off the chassis, we created a skirt around the bottom of the car. A good tape job will take about two hours with two people working on it.

The Nason brand is made by DuPont, and we've found it to be inexpensive and reliable. It needs an activator and a reducer and mixes at eight parts basecoat, four parts reducer, and 1/2 part activator. Because this job is large, we filled the mixing bucket to the top line so we could get a full cup on top of the gun.

We applied three coats with about 15 minutes between coats. We used a new DeVilbiss FinishLine HVLP gun that Eastwood sells in a kit with a primer gun included. We used a disposable filter and set the cheater valve regulator to 30 psi. We used slightly less than 1/2 gallon of basecoat to cover the car.

After the basecoat dried flat, we found a few dings we had missed. We hadn't yet sprayed the clear and bronzed our mistakes, so we decided to let the basecoat totally dry for at least 24 hours then fix the problems. At this point, dirt and fisheyes can be wet-sanded with 1,200-grit, and small repair areas can be repainted with a jamb gun. Had we used single-stage paint, we would have had to repaint the entire panel that needed repairs. Coming next, details to go from average to show car.