Painting motorhome
- Thread starter cgmartin
- Start date
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zmotorsports
Well-known member
cgmartin said:
Our first motorhome was a 30' 1984 Travelcraft and the front and rear end caps were faided and the bottom section/compartment doors had some scratches from the previous owner. I opted to paint them myself, yes it was lot of work. Took me about a week to prep and paint the end caps and then another week to prep and paint the bottom section. I used PPG basecoat/clearcoat and it turned out absolutely fantastic. Looked like it just rolled off the factory floor even up until the day we sold it in 2000.
I also had to repaint the end caps on our 38' 1991 Beaver Contessa from rock chips on the front and clearcoat peeling on the rear cap. I also didn't care for the textured bumpers that Beaver had on that era of coach so I smoothed the bumpers and painted/clearcoated them body color. I will have to have my son scan some pictures from when we did the Beaver and I will post them up.
I have to repaint most of the street side of our Dynasty this spring due to the fantastic Monaco paint job and the clear coat peeling. I will definately post up pics of when I do that.
As far as a complete paint job, I have gotten bids of the $18-20k for a 40' with the slide end walls painted. I am hoping to touch up the street side on our Dynasty and at least hold off on having the entire thing painted for a few more years.
I wish I had a place large enough to paint the entire thing and that would be my winter project but I don't have that option.
On a side note, I have quite a bit of painting background as I have built/painted several street rods/musclecars/Harleys to show quality finish. It is a hell of a lot of work to do it right.
Mike.
O
Oscar Mike
Guest
zmotorsports said:
My first business in 1975 was a fiberglass boat repair and paint shop in Richmond, CA...to say it is a lot of work is an understatement. As Jeff stated, the amount of hard work is noted in the price at $300.00 to $450.00 per foot. I remember charging a guy close to $400.00/foot in 1975 for a flat bottom race boat...and I lost money on the deal.
zmotorsports
Well-known member
Yes, definitely expensive. I have never painted a coach for anyone (just ours) but the several street rods have been in the $8-10k range. The supplies alone are so expensive that is one reason I got out of doing it for other people. I will wrench and do fabrication work all day long but I don't have anywhere to do paint/body work any longer and I don't want to make a mess out of my home shop.
I repaired/painted a 25' Maxum boat for my brother about ten/twelve years ago that he bought wrecked (fell of the trailer) and I know enough to not do another one. ;D
The sections on our Dynasty that I need to paint will be done just as that, in sections and I will just do them outside as weather permits.
Mike.
I repaired/painted a 25' Maxum boat for my brother about ten/twelve years ago that he bought wrecked (fell of the trailer) and I know enough to not do another one. ;D
The sections on our Dynasty that I need to paint will be done just as that, in sections and I will just do them outside as weather permits.
Mike.
I guess having my motorhome painted at a professional paint shop is out of the question due to price. Since those areas I would like to see painted primarily consist of small brush marks, which cannot be buffed out, I am thinking of buying the appropriate touch up paint and using one of those small air brushes to touch up those miniscule areas, since they are not deep scratches which penetrate the top layer of paint. I would think that this air brushing method would probably be better to apply the paint more evenly that using a finely tipped brush. Has anyone on this forum used this method to go over relatively small areas?
zmotorsports
Well-known member
I don't think an air brush is going to give you enough volume and fan pattern to do the job. A small touch up gun sometimes referred to as a detail gun may would work well. Personally, I use a standard full size gravity feed gun and just turn the volume down a bit and the fan appropriately for the size of the area.
If you cannot go to a definite edge or a graphic edge and have to blend I use the "two gun method" of blending. One gun has the paint at full strength, the second gun has a 50/50 overreduced mixture to "melt" the edges of where you blend.
When it comes to the clearcoat, I use the two gun method as well but have straight reducer in the second gun to melt the edge. This keeps the "dry look" of the edge melted in which results in much less polishing afterwards to eliminate the blended area.
I know it sounds complicated but it is actually quite easy, just time consuming. The prep is hands down the most time consuming.
Mike.
If you cannot go to a definite edge or a graphic edge and have to blend I use the "two gun method" of blending. One gun has the paint at full strength, the second gun has a 50/50 overreduced mixture to "melt" the edges of where you blend.
When it comes to the clearcoat, I use the two gun method as well but have straight reducer in the second gun to melt the edge. This keeps the "dry look" of the edge melted in which results in much less polishing afterwards to eliminate the blended area.
I know it sounds complicated but it is actually quite easy, just time consuming. The prep is hands down the most time consuming.
Mike.
