My first go at painting my Jeep a few months ago didn't work. I was using an expensive batch color-matched spray paint on it outside and the wind was a b#$ch and most of the paint was getting pi#$ed away in to the air. Also, I didn't have a back-up vehicle to use while the Jeep dried out with each coat. And I didn't like the color of this black custom spray paint, either
. So in the end, it was a fiasco.
I've done the cheap auto paint places -- Maaco and Scheib -- on other cars. You can do a lot of the body-work, masking, sanding and trim removal to keep costs down. And they can prep it and give it a couple of coat of black for about $300 + tax. But the end result can be hit or miss.
Lately, I have seriously been looking at a roller job. Buy 3 quarts of some gloss black, Rustoleum marine paint -- which has supposedly decent UV protection and durability -- thin it out and do several coats with rollers and foam brushes.
Masking is less of an issue doing this, unlike spraying in the wind rolled on paint will actually make it on the intended surface, you can do one section at a time and come back to it as necessary, each coat dries in 5-6 hours if thinned, none of the spray paint odor or rattle cans to shake, work that I have seen (in photos) looks ok, its fairly cheap to do ($50-$100 plus your time), and if you damage the finish off road you can fix it yourself. I figure if you use a higher quality paint, you can probably get a finish that lasts more than the 2 or so years standard Rustoleum is supposed to give.
Yeah, sh#ts going to get in the paint if you do it outside and you are going to sand like crazy. But I think I'll end up doing a better job than the $300 Maaco deal.
