Everyone's giving wonderful advice. I can't, I'm lousy at body work. What I
can do
though is give some advice on some bad things to do that I always seem to
manage to
do.
Don't expand the job. My latest mess was my attempt to fix the rust on the
seam of
my wifes pickup truck bed. A very small job that I expanded into several
inches of
width because of my over-enthusiasm and the hopes that if I kept expanding every
step that it would all blend nicely. Instead of a thin repaired seam, the
truck has
a hidious band around it several inches wide.
I would not recommend spray cans, simply because I use them. Well, at least
not the
spray cans that are supposed to match the color, and not cheap automotive
primer
spray cans. I can successfully paint rusty farm equipment with paint, but if I
attempt to "repair" a car panel with automotive paints, it looks bad from the
get
go, and the rust just pours through. Same steps on both (sand, clean, prime,
paint), but horrible results on a car. The only car repairs I've made that
look
sorta decent are those that I used generic non-automotive spray paints.
Use masking tape. There's this great technique that good bodymen use where they
allow the paint to spray onto adjoining areas and blend it all in to an
invisible
repair. When I try this, it ends up with a huge area of mismatched colors and
a
perminent mess. If I'd tape the area off, I'd have a small, clearly defined
"fix",
and not a whole lousy looking fender. I really need to quit trying to master
this
technique.
I don't know how I did it, but I've got rust coming through the fiberglass. I
am
impressed by that screwup! Maybe that ospho step is far more important that I
realise. Maybe I'll try that next time.
I think primer is a bad thing for me, or at least maybe it is the way I've done
it.
Those areas that I "fixed properly" spent some time in primer before getting
painted. Apparently my conviction that things must be ok under the primer
because
they looked ok when I got around to spraying auto paint on them just isn't
correct.
I have noticed that on those occassions when I did dumb things like gashing the
paint in other areas of the truck and immediately touch it up with anything,
those
spots don't rust. Hint, a small touch up with latex house paint looks better my
long term "repair" work does.
I think maybe I oversand the heck out of things. I don't know this for sure.
But I
am starting to catch on to the fact that those areas I sand to perfection, they
are
the ones that rust out first. Areas that were not sanded so well do better.
Well, there you have it. A sorta do not do list from a real clutz at bondo and
paint.
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