Project: P5 Rescue! making a clean Daily from two cars.

Sanded off all the filler and sprayed a second coat of sealer. Getting more sealer tomorrow to finish the lip. Paint this weekend.
 
I do everything they teach you in autobody school but i learned most of it in my 8 years of wood finishing for excessively high end home renovations lol. we do renovations starting at like $30000 and go up to $250000 in my experience just for cabinetry install. exacting customers with money to burn and very particular taste.

autobody isnt that far off. we dont finish to the same gloss typically, but when you ahve 2200sqft of solid color to spray out consistantly, lots of opportunity to practice.

my limitation is the wood shop though. impossible to keep the shop clean with the amount of material im spraying in a given day. even at 68% efficiency the guns specify, you can see how much still ends up on the floor or on the walls.


I used valspar automotive products. I could get exact specifications next time im at the shop to read the labels. basically i used their 2k sealer surfacer, basecoat and ac2100 production clear coat. they have a faster snap dry clear but when working with a large panel, id rather give it the time and not have to worry about flashing while im still applying a thick coat.

I scuffed everything with my festool electric orbital with a well used 150grit pad. this took the caps off all the nicks and deep goudges ect. i filled with proform flowable 2k filler, sanded again with the orbital and a block with 150-320 grits. applied first sealer coat fairly wet to the rough surface and allowed to dry overnight. applied more filler where there were large dents. or chips that are difficult to see on the base part. wet sanded 400 grit with a block, applied second wet wet coat of sealer, let dry overnight, wet sanded entire bumper by hand with 400 wet/dry no block this time.

after that i went over the whole peice with a grey scotch pad to rough it up a bit and make sure i got everywhere. there was a little orange peel by the time i finished the 400 wet sand, but it was gonna be silver and i just stopped caring as most of it was gonna be covered by front splitter.
at this point i hade 7 ish hours in prep time on a bumper most body shops would chuck in the garbage.

after all the sanding is done, blow it all off really thoroughly, wipe it down with a alcohol paper tower to get rid of skin oils ect. tack rag.. apply 3 coats of color, focusing on even covering, 5-10 minutes between color coats at 15C shop temp. after last color coat i cleaned the gun and mixed up the clear. apply a medium wet coat of clear immediately after final paint. ie, the time it takes to swish out the gun and mix up the clear is about perfect. took a half hour nap and applied final wet coat of clear.

then leave and dont come back for a weekend lol.


I was using a devilbiss Tekna prolite for the entire project. A lot of body shop guys really like SATA for this... i own both brands in my shop; Satajet 4000RP and Two Tekna prolites.. the Jet 4000 is a beautifully german peice of kit. very nice chrome coating that cleans up super easily. devilbiss sprays exactly the same pattern, comes with 1.2, 1.3, 1.4 nozzle sets and its significantly lighter and more comfortable in hand. its also half the price...germans coating is nicer though.

anyway. One Tekna prolite with 1.4 nozzle for the sealer mixed 4:1:1 (base, catalyst, reducer) used the 1.2 nozzle for the base which is mized 1:1 with reducer and the clear which is also 4:1:1.

for everything ive painted so far, i spend $210 on material including the filler. to finish the front splitter and rear bumper im gonna have to buy a whole other kit. sealer, base, activator, clear. i have reducer left.

by the summer i might just go ahead and set my tent up and spray the passenger side with all the door handles attached ect. then the whole car will have fresh paint for under $500 lol.

i guess the short of all that, the secret is really just being able to put down a wet coat without getting runs. the sealer esp has to be put on wet to give you a nice surface to paint. ideally, you would be able to forgoe the entire wet sanding process with a wet enough final coat of sealer. all my small plastic parts were done this way. all i had to do with them was scuff and put on silver.
 
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after casing a few shops for available supplies, i got to making the new endlinks today. princess auto had m8 and m10 rod ends. i went with m10 - 1.25, and picked up some 3/8 steel rod and m10 nuts, washers and bolts. threaded my own rods as none were available.
you guys in the states dont really have this problem with slave priced next day shipping, but it takes me weeks to get anything specific heh.





low cost at $50 and low tech for sure.


I also got the msp exhaust installed. needs to be cut about 4" but ill live with it for now. i think i need a couple of new gaskets for the axle back mate as its leaking a little bit. sounds pretty good and deletes one of the cats.
 
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front bumper.. prob could have used a 4th coat. the metalic didnt sit sit super awesome but ill prob be the only one to notice. I made a bit of a sacrifice keeping the shittier bumper for myself. the silver car had a pretty good bumper on it. a parking scuff but not a lot of rock chips or other damage. there are chips in this one for srue but you have to be looking pretty close for them. some runs, but they will be covered by the msp lip, and fogs when i sell it.



the nicer bumper is getting painted black and stuck on here with the black cars side skirts which will need a good amount of repair someone side swiped a curb and there are deep scratches. too bad as they are already black lol.



msp muffler looks kinda rediculous but ill live with it for now. sounds pretty good. cant wait for boost though.



put my sedan lights on as ill have to take the bumper off again to properly install the msp lip when it is finished. no fogs. will promote swift completion lol. p5 lights unfortunately are too far gone to be polished so im gonna clear coat the lenses to bring them back. worked very well on my mx3 lights.



hard to imagine ive owned three additional cars in not even one year, and the total spent on them was under $1500... lol. mx3 i doubled my money on, and the two p5's came in under $1400 all together. after partouts and the profit on the mx3 ive basically spent none of my own money on cars this year.
 
hood and rear bumper to come but i might wait a few weeks. id like to get the wifes car looking better too. 271km but overall in pretty good condition. she doesn't care about how it looks but the protephile ive become DOES care lol.

besides.. i have an excuse. she is really trying to make the younique thing work, her car needs to attract some attention for the big ass decal on the back of it to work.
 
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Same as body panels. Valspar ac2100 2k clear. Won't chip any worse than the front bumper ect ect.
 
valspar makes all kinds of coatings. i know they make 1k clears in rattle bombs, but not sure about 2k. id assume so. you could use the cheap proform stuff im sure. I like this valspar cause it sprays like a high solids lacquer. you can put it on pretty thick and it doesnt really try to run. so nice.
it is however $65 cdn for a quart kit.
 
doop doop doop.




lenses on the headlights were pretty far gone. i could have made them a little better with some more sanding but i think ill just get some nicer lenses in the future.



 
small update.



front end completed. ill paint the nicer hood, but not for a bit. gonna start pulling turbo kit from msp.
 
they are eibach sportlines. but im not sure if they are regular sedan or msp version. they wouldn't fit the p5 struts at all. they might be for a sedan but they fit the msp strut perfectly so im pretty sure i got msp springs despite thinking i was buying sedan/p5 springs. ah well. that was 2011, doesn't really matter. just means ill have to buy msp rear struts. in the p5 it does sit pretty even though. the msp had a rake with them.
its gonna be better with new tires and spacers, but driving down a road in my neighboorhood with speedhumps made me think twice about 205/45.. ill prob stick to 205/50 on the 16s. keep a little meat.
 
was going to buy new tires for the 16's but ran into a bit of a roadblock with tire cost for decent 16s. i ended up buying 17" 215/45/17 that was on sale. they had 205/40/17 as well for like $25 less per tire but im glad i went with the extra width. turns out these are 17x7.5 and +43 offset. should fit pretty flush.

the color that came on them was a rattle job. pretty good rattle job actually. just no clearcoat. im not stripping them as the paint is pretty solid. gonna seal everywhere black, possibly only paint the face and mask the back to keep it black. ill have to see.





this is the color thats replacing. Toyota 4q3 Brown Graphite Mica. basically over black sealer its going to be a darker version of whats on there, but much higher gloss and smoother finish. I was really really tempted to paint them blazing yellow.. saw a subaru pic with yellow wheels i liked a lot. decided to play it safe. if i come across a set of really cheap usedeverywhere wheels/tires though i might give it a shot.

 

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