SiMateoAko

This is the story of my car....

I bought this puppy because I wanted something with great gas mileage. Considering that EVERY Civic I followed up on in the newspapers was sold the instant it was posted, I gladly overpaid for this one.



The above picture is AFTER I replaced the badly rusted/cracked hood. Apparently the previous owner paid good money for a crappy Maaco (or equivilant) paint job. The paint cracked, and the hood rusted. It was horrible.

So I started replacing parts. This was my chance to have a little fun. I noticed the drivers fender was crinkled, so I replaced it.



And the passenger side rear door as well.



This left me to realize that the rear door wasn't the only one dented, the front one was as well. So I replaced it.

I also replaced the front driver's door, as it was loaded with a crazy amount of bondo which I found while stripping the paint. Oddly the door I bought to replace it ALSO had a lot of bondo in the same spot. It was too late however, so I just made it work.

I stripped paint, and primered.




After the car sat untouched for a while I went back and took the doors off to paint the door jams.



Oh, I should let you know. All of the primer and door jam paint is 100% rattle can. If I could do it over, I'd just get real primer as I ended up spending an arm and a leg to get enough primer for it to be thick enough to protect the bare metal underneath. Actually, if I could do it again I'd just really rough up the paint and skip the primer.... but what is done is done.

So here she sat for a few weeks... just like this:



I later went back and finished primering it, but I was a bit discouraged. A few weeks ago I was ready to paint, but as I go to open up the petcock valve on my new air compressor the valve broke. I had to wait over a week for a replacement part to come in the mail.

And the next week was hella windy. Besides, I still had a few little things to fix on the car. "Maybe next week."

Well, "next week" was yesterday. I bought a giant tent to use as my ghetto "paint booth," but the tent was still too small. I set up the tent in the backyard and decided to use it to paint the bumpers.

This morning I woke up and decided that I really had no more excuses to not paint it. The wind was going to be a factor, as was teh fact that I was painting it in my driveway (garage is WAY too small). I really didn't care though. I needed to get this done.

So I broke in the air compressor, and started painting. It was my first time ever using the paint gun/air compressor, but it seemed to work out okay.

This is how it looks now.







I still have some drips and orange peel to fix, but I need to wait for the paint to cure before I can do that.

Overall I'm happy with the result. it isn't perfect, and the black draws attention to imperfections. I'm fairly certain however that most of the problems will be able to be sanded/buffed out.

I used 4 coats of basecoat and 4 coats of clearcoat. I was able to do this on 2 quarts of each (with reducer).

Soon I'll be able to wetsand out the orange peel and put all of the new trim I ordered a few months ago. After that, the HX rims go on and I finally remove the ghetto tint in the rear window.

Of course, I'll post more pictures when my car is all together

Modified by SiMateoAko at 12:58 AM 10/4/2005


Modified by SiMateoAko at 10:51 PM 12/7/2005


Modified by SiMateoAko at 2:26 PM 7/6/2006

cSpEk

keep us updated

black cx

looks good

papito_85

looks good, Keep up the good work.

bokals

keep us up to date y0

ATS*RON

Looks good, Glad the neighbors didn't complain about you painting the car outside or you would've gotten a fat *** fine.

PostMASTER-S27

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by cSpEk &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> keep us updated </TD></TR></TABLE>

SiR-ed8

clean job bro

So did you get high?

Good ol' Screwtape

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by SSBPjdmEG &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Looks good, Glad the neighbors didn't complain about you painting the car outside or you would've gotten a fat *** fine. </TD></TR></TABLE>

Lol, true that. Looking good so far, keep us posted.

MenaceL.A.671

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by black cx &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">looks good</TD></TR></TABLE>

second edition

looks good

i got hvlp guns and a compressor as well...i only have the ***** to paint rims though

dreww..

nice, keep us posted

juice91si

subscribed

JDM INSPIRED

SiMateoAko

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by SSBPjdmEG &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Looks good, Glad the neighbors didn't complain about you painting the car outside or you would've gotten a fat *** fine. </TD></TR></TABLE>

We kind of have this understanding... My neighbors and us. I don't call the city on their 5 cars littering up their driveway and front lawn (you read that right) and they don't call the city on me for painting my car, amoung other things.

markwitdada9

RiceCakes4u

Looks pretty good. The car should look pretty nice when it's finished.

smithenhiven

That's awesome

for DIY paintjobs.

civic_tuned

too much bondo is not good. U should of gone with a good primer or sealer. Did u slightly sand the primer? Anways goodluck u got ***** for painting the car on the driveway.

intenseEK

lookin good

kingSfit

damn and i thought the end pix will be the car all painted... assemble haahha but cant wait

fw190bvi

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by intenseEK &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">lookin good</TD></TR></TABLE>

SiMateoAko

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by civic_type_r &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">too much bondo is not good. U should of gone with a good primer or sealer. Did u slightly sand the primer? Anways goodluck u got ***** for painting the car on the driveway. </TD></TR></TABLE>

Hindsight is 20/20. If I could do it over again, I'd just use a thick primer and wetsand it all down.

Oh well.

I did sand the primer though with 400 grit before I painted it. I want this stuff to stick.

accord95vtec

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by ItsAnEM1 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">nice, keep us posted </TD></TR></TABLE>

SiMateoAko

Finished product.... finally!





Modified by SiMateoAko at 11:04 PM 12/7/2005


Modified by SiMateoAko at 2:27 PM 7/6/2006