Air Compressor for painting

[jeff k.]

In my opinion it will cost you more to use rattle cans . Just pick up a cheap spray gun from any store get your paint / primmer and give it a go . It's not that hard. Then you will have it for the next project and trust me you will find the next project .

[nikster]

Go to You-Tube & on can spend a few hours watching clips in re; spray painting.

like; How to use a spray gun.
Painting a cub cadet, on & on & on.

good stuff.----> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xi_l_MSbJgw
Here are the guns that I bought from harbor freight for my project. I went cheap cause i'll never ever use them again after my cubbie project.

----->http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntURw1JxFQ8

Read a few comments & they do the job.

Why spend 200 $$ on a gun that i'll only use once?
These are like 14 bucks apiece & with a 20% discount coupon are cheap.
I bought 2 one for primer only & one for paint so far they work great. Can't wait to finish-up. Just a fun thing to do.

Nik,

[toyman]

Now that all the facts are in, I'll concur with the 2 posters above. Get yourself an inexpensive, gravity feed (cup on top) gun from harbor freight and go to town.

[CC1650Dave]

I just read this thread - and I'm wondering what SharkyOhio decided on.

I felt bad for the guy, where he said "OK, I'm going to do this for X dollars" and then gets more advice and says "I guess I'll go with the rattle can."

I can totally relate. When you're new to this stuff, it's all so much uncertainty, so many options, and it all gets intimidating.

Let us know how it worked out Sharky. I haven't started painting yet, but I read enough to get afraid, then want to quit, then make up my mind and bought a $15 HVLP gun from Harbor Freight and a just-big-enuff (re: 110 volt, $100) air compressor off Craigslist. I'm hoping to shoot soon, if the weather holds up for me...

[4SPEED]

I use a HF hvlp for epoxy and primer. my paint gun is a nice ingersoll rand finish gun.

but I use them all the time. I see nothing wrong with rattle cans , if you know how to paint. most try to get it all on in one coat and blame it on the can.

the one reason not to use a rattle can is because the paint will fade in a year. and look chalky and dull in 2 years.

and Id never use the martin senour paint like the kid in the video. it'll dull out in a few years. it has no UV protectant. and he used no hardener in it.

[CADplans]

The cool things about the HF HVLP $15 gun is;

1) it operates at low pressure

2) all compressors make LOTS more CFM at low pressure.

I have had great success with that gun and a relatively small compressor.

You just have to keep going even though the compressor never shuts off.

[litlmikeyl]

I feel for Sharky here. This is one of the worst decisions to make because of all the different equipment available & painting is something that is as much a skill of doing the job as the importance of the equipment being used. I'm curious what he goes with in the end.

The $15 (or $35 with the regulator & some other goodies) HF gun works great for what most of us ask of. I'm running a 60 gal. vertical IR & used the mentioned HF gun & the compressor didn't fire up until I was almost finished shooting my parts (think I had 17 pieces that time).

I doubt folks like us would be using a Devillbus, Sata or Iwata gun to shoot our stuff anytime soon, so a cheaper gun (that uses less air) will work fine. For these small projects you'll spend more time walking around to each part trying to position yourself to shoot vs. the actual time you'll have the trigger pulled on the gun.

Rattle cans are great for up-front ease of use though a trade off is quality of the material being used. A component-type paint system looks to be a nightmare at first and is quite a bit of work but the trade-off is a great finish that lasts & wears well.

[green 4 acres]

Before you spend 40-$100 on a paint gun I would spend $400- $1000 on a good solvent removing resperator ,suit ,paint booth,exhaust fan. Especially if using automotive paints as some are talking about. Tolulene ,xylene, MEK solents are not something you want to be around The stores that sell these chemicals are not suppose to sell to the public just qualified personel and shops. Just saying you can get more than you bargained for and Drying auto paints produce cyanide gas .

I spray canned my plane frame outside, up wind ,W googles ,mask and it got to me 2 days later .

[Matt G.]

Originally Posted by green 4 acres

Drying auto paints produce cyanide gas.

No, they don't. They give off isocyanates. Still good advice about the respirator though. When I painted my 100, I bought a fresh air hood system, which worked great. Yeah, it cost $300, but that's a lot cheaper than going to the hospital.

[green 4 acres]

Oh well I stand corrected, my point was to educate some that might not know or take seriously the hazards of these type of paints and the toxic chemicals used in them. Which I just don't think are worth the health risks for the average hobbyist painter I have seen a warning notice from a paint manufacture at work stating the danger of cyanide whoops ... methal isocyanide fumes to painters. Which by the way was what killed 6000 bhopal indians and seriously injured 200,000 in 1984 near the Dow factory in India when some water was indroduced into a tank of the stuff had a reaction. I will defer to the experts but isn't cyanide largly unnoticable no smell ,taste



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