Charles Smith
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These are the feelings I have found when searching for feedback on these schools. He has been taking the Autobody course at the vocational school (high school) and I was sold on the idea thinking that it was going to be a lot more structured than what it is now. He has got to paint a few school buses while he has been there but he has learned alot more working up at the shop now. His first car was a 02 Maxima that we got from the insurance auction and he did 90% of the work on it himself. Unfortunately he will get to do it again, he had a slight mishap with a curve and a tree last weekend. We have two guys that I would love to pair him up with in the shop, one is the shop manager, does most of the big hits and the other is a guy that is 60 years old and has been doing this since he was 15, probably the best metalman I have ever seen, still has a file in his box to work out high spots.
Its definately cool to have a job that I can hang out with my kid at. The other guys in the shop look after him and wont let him get into anything that he cant handle so it works out real well.I used to paint for a guy in North Carolina that had a homemade booth that took a reddy heater and rigged up a section of duct work that ran off the heater and then took a 90 into the booth through the wall. This way you could run it while you were painting and not have that open flame with you in the booth. Once your overspray clears out you can cut the fans off and let the booth warm back up. Something else you can do is get one of those cheap electronic thermometers from harbor freight to check the temp of the panels before you start painting. I have also seen some guys run a gas heater from the ceiling in their booth. I just don’t know how crazy I would be about shooting a car with an open flame around. You could also see about wiring some type of switch so you could adjust the speed of your exhaust fan so you can keep some type of air moving to get some of the solvents out of the booth. You can also add accelerator to your clear to help things out. But be careful with that stuff, it can make buffing a little interesting if you don’t buff it within a reasonable amount of time.
Chuck
I looked at it today when it came back over to get the bumpers buffed and it didn’t look so bad in my shop, and it looked decent outside. I think I might look into another clear to have around when doing silvers and golds. We use pro air now because we don’t have the greatest booth in the world and it seems to do pretty decent for us. Anyone have any recommendations on a Sikkens clear that will perform without a bake booth and not the best airflow?
Thanks for the help
ChuckI looked at it again last night with the sun gun on it and it looks better that way, I am going to try buffing up the next panel a bit today to see if that changes anything. If not I might try a different clear, but I do think that it will look better in natural sunlight. I dont normally notice this issue in the booth or in the paint shop. It normally pops up in the bodyshop when the techs start putting it back together.
Thanks
thanks for the link and the tip, Jim. Any recomendations on clear that is more resistant to gas spills? I know that most reputable clears are resistant to chemicals once cured but have you found any that stick out to you as better than others?
Have you thought of looking into the local community college to see if they offer an autobody course? I know that many military posts have these classes on post or nearby. This way you could work on this without the huge investment in tools and a place to work on. That is how I got started in this to begin with.
Chuck
Yeah I checked on their today and it dont say anything about points requirements it just has training requirements for each role, and different levels for each. I couldnt find out anything on what you needed for gold or platinum points wise.
Thanks
Chuck
Have an 3000rp that we use for the community primer gun in the shop, all we have now is the full size cups for it. Was needing something that will allow us to spot prime without having to pull into the booth. Our jobber has offered us one of the 3m guns if we buy a case of the 3oz cups. Cleaning the cups with thinner really isn’t an issue cause we have a machine to bake it off and recycle it. Anyone have any opinions on the accuspray/3m primer guns?
Chuck
I can accelerate it. Will probably just do that from now on in my jambs. At least until it warms up a bit. Thanks for the tips. I have been lurking on this site for quite some time and it has helped me get back to speed. I have been away from painting for quite awhile, and I have found a lot of good info on this site.
I used the foam tape in the jamb and it lifted on the very outside edge of the tape, the door was sitting in a little more than normal due to not having the seals or hardware in it. I have not had this problem before but would definately like to avoid this in the future. The additional three hours it took to get this thing to behave really threw the day off.