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More Body work

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Exterior    Interior

Ok, so you are ready to do the work yourself.  Cool.  You should grab a camera and take pictures of all of the areas that you are going to work on. 

After the photo shoot, start slow in one area, like say the bonnet.  Sand down to the bare metal.  Don't do so much sanding that you get caught by a rain storm.  Make sure that the temperature is above 65F and the humidity is below 50%.  If the humidity is above 50% you will have a problem of rust developing before putting on primer. 

On the subject of primer.  Always use a primer in which will not show through the final coat.  Use gray primer on light colors and use red primer on dark colors.  Don't put the primer on thick.  First do a light coat and let it dry.  Then sand off the rough spots in the primer.  Then apply a slightly heavier coat of primer.  "How many coats of primer can I put on"  As many as you want, but usually three is good.  Any more than that is a waste of primer.

If you can not finish a complete part like a fender, then rough coat primer it, to seal it up the metal until you can get back to it.  This will prevent rust.

"How many coats of paint can or should I put on?"  That is going to depend on what type of paint is used.  Powder coating produces an incredible shine.  But it can be expensive.  Acrylic enamel paint is reasonably priced and can be put on by anyone over 18.  With enamel, you will want to use at least 2 coats and possibly as many as 4.  Then follow up with 2 coats of Clear Acrylic enamel to seal the paint and to create a very shiny surface.

NEVER put 10 coats of paint over damaged body parts.  Use primer or touchup paint instead.

When painting always do it in a well ventilated area and somewhere in which the over spray will no effect anything else.  Painting your car 5 feet from your neighbor's fence and their brand new Lincoln is sitting there will not win friends but might get you a lawsuit!

When Painting or doing body work WATCH THE WEATHER, unless you are doing it inside.  Winds of less than 5 miles an hour are fine.  But it is very hard to paint and do a good job in a 25 MPH wind!  (I have done this before, and the paint job looked very bad and looked like a two year old did it!)

As far a manufacturer of paint, well that depends on the quality you want.  High quality paint such as Krylon or Rust-oleam are best but higher priced.  You can go down to your local dollar store and get cans of paint but the quality will be much lower and the paintjob will look like a kindergarten class painted it while getting high on the fumes!  Also paint manufacturers have different spray patterns, just be aware.  When buying paint make sure all of the paint numbers match on the cans and that they are from the same manufacturer.  If either or both of these are not done, then you will get a VW that looks like a rainbow that was put on by drunk chimps.

It takes about 25 cans of spray paint to do a Beetle and about 40 cans for a Bus (11- 12 ounce cans).  25 cans is only one good coat! This does not include the primer or clear final coats! 

So far I have been talking mostly about the outside of the VW. 

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