Did some painting today
 

It was...shall we say...a learning experience.

Cub Cadet paint is not oil-based. Must be some kind of epoxy paint. Neither naptha nor mineral spirits will thin it. I happened to have a quart of acetone on hand. Tried that. Thinned it beautifully. Figured I'd try it, since this will probably be the last chance I will get this year to paint. So much for all my preparations. The acetone was too fast as a thinner.

Also my first time trying HVLP. Finally got the paint thinned enough and the gun set fairly close, but the paint was drying so fast it was hard to get things covered before the paint kicked. Then I ended up with not enough acetone left over to clean things properly. Some parts turned out smooth as glass, others turned out too dry and rough.

Figure I'll just have to sand it this spring and try again.

Conclusions:
- Decided I like HVLP. Low overspray.
- I won't use Cub Cadet paint again. Not that it's bad paint, but it makes me angry that it is so expensive, yet they don't even bother to tell you what kind of paint it is and how to thin it. Nothing at all. I've never seen paint so poorly labeled before.
- Next time I'll go to an automitive paint store and get the help I need before I buy the stuff.

Frustrating. Thought I'd be able to start reassembling next week.

thenrie,

Sorry to hear about the Cub paint issues. I almost used it but had the same issue as you in finding what chemicals to use with it. I got lucky and fount a Sherwin Williams auto paint store that would match the Iron Gard paint prices and had the reducer and hardner that matched.

Paint prices
 

Well, at least your new gun worked out. But I'm thinking that when you visit the automotive paint store, you will see that the paint price was not so out of line. The enamel reducer (to thin the paint for spraying) comes in different "speeds" to match different temperature conditions: fast (for cold), medium, and slow (for hot).

I think I paid $36/qt for this CC paint. I paid $15/can for CC rattle cans. That's twice what it's worth. I know our suppliers need to make money, but that's a high markup on paint products, particularly when the labeling is so poor that you can't tell what it is or what to use for cleanup. A professional would never pay that much for this paint, yet you have to know what you are doing to use it. If they are selling to the general public, they need to do a better job with their labeling.

Not knowing what kind of paint it is makes it hard to know what kind of reducer to use. I had bought naptha, which is fairly fast, and mineral spirits, which is slower, since some on the forum had indicated the CC paint was oil-based and that they thinned with mineral spirits, so I could try both and see which was better for the temp/humidity. I only had a just over a half a pint of acetone on hand that I use for cleaning up epoxy. I tried that and it worked, but it turned out it was way too fast as a reducer.

I looked at it this morning and found it isn't a great paint job, but I've seen worse. I'll color sand it and it will be fine until I get a chance in a couple years to really do a restoration, rather than simply a rebuild. At least I can start getting it back together and get it working again.

That's pretty expensive. The PPG 'Shop Line' I used was only about $23-$25/quart depending on the color. There's an additional cost for the hardener, reducer, primer, etc, of course, but there would be with anything. The CC rattle cans are a pretty huge ripoff. I bought ONE once for small parts that had been repaired, and I'll never buy one again. The paint looks pretty good for awhile once it dries, but it takes a month to dry, and that's assuming you can get it sprayed on without making a mess. It runs and splatters and overall makes a huge mess.

I've been in your shoes with that CC paint as well. Nothing would thin it, it wouldn't dry for about 3 months, kept wrinkling, and I couldn't get it cleaned out of my gun either. I won't try to bash it or say it's bad, but I'll NEVER use it again. I'm not a professional painter by any means, but I've used a lot of different stuff and that's the only kind I've never had results with. I had over $100 just in the yellow trying to restore a 73 (painting 3 different times for wrinkling). Then I later found out it's not resistant against gas leaks. I later restored this 73 again with Van Sickle IH Yellow and it's holding up well for a work tractor. I know some people are against it, but I've had nothing but good results.

Again, not trying to criticize CC paint, but there's 1/2 quart on my bench now that will never even be used up because it isn't worth my time.

I just bought the CC yellow from NAPA.
1 Qt. was 75.00
The total for 1 qt white and 1 qt yellow was 113.00.
Still have to purchase thinner 45.00 gal and hardner 22.00.
:bigthink:

Most auto paint suppliers have two lines, one expensive one meant for professionals and another cheaper one. Sounds like you got the expensive one. As a comparison to my previous post, PPG's more expensive paint (Delstar, I think) was like $75/quart or something like that.

Ksanders-

Did you use hardener in it? No paint is going to be gas resistant without hardener, and even good paint with hardener isn't very gas resistant for quite awhile, probably 6 months to a year or so.

I tried the hardener I used for Van Sickle paint and later a hardener that a paint store said should work with it. I tried at least 3 different thinners that I remember. That's when I got fed up with it and just quit using it. I'm not saying that people can't use it or it's bad stuff (trying to avoid debating it's quality). I'm just saying that I've given it more than the time and money it deserves for what I do when I can just use Van Sickle paint, have colors custom mixed through them, and never have an issue and be reassembling parts the day after painting and parts being hard enough to use in a week or so.
This thread just kind of showed me I'm not the only one that ever experienced this and I've had these exact problems.

Thanks. I feel a little better...not quite so stupid. How do you tell what kind of hardener to use if you don't even know what kind of paint it is? All I know is that acetone thins it, but is too fast a thinner to spray it well. I had no problems with the paint drying. The acetone was so fast it was dry to the touch by the time I ran out of paint in my gun. I'm just going to have to sand it and try another brand of paint for a top coat.