Well, clearly I've set the wagon aside and distracted myself with a number of other projects, both car and home, but this weekend, thanks to some uncharacteristic warm weather, the Commuter is in primer.
Earlier this year I purchased supplies to prime it, and about 6 weeks ago, an inflatable spray booth. After waiting a couple of months for a hood scoop, it arrived and was complete junk. So, I will have to make my own at this point, but decided to move forward with applying the Ultimate 2K primer.
I've never sprayed before, and got the help from a buddy who has done very limited spraying. It took a little bit to get the gun set up right, but once it was, the primer went down nicely, and I was able to get everything covered with just under a gallon of primer.
Things learned:
1) The booth has a greenhouse affect, and with it being a sunny day, it was about 15 degrees warmer inside than outside. I will be able to better adjust for this next time.
2) I used a fast catalyst, and probably should have had a normal one. I think this resulted in a more pebbly finish and overspray dusting.
3) There was a bit of wind. While I did tie down the booth using the D-rings, and had the good idea to clip them on with snap clips (carabiners) instead of tying and untying, the wind would blow under the booth and lift the floor. Adding a couple of landscape blocks to the inside corners helped with this, but so did having the fresh air blower running to create positive pressure in the booth.
4) Be sure to remove the filter covers in the "prep room" before spraying. The fresh air is fed through this room and into the booth through the filters.
5) a 6' folding table fit nicely at a slight angle in the prep room. This was very nice for mixing, and left the other side of the mixing room open for any other supplies, trash, and easy egress.
6) I love the booth. It was expensive ($1,300 off of eBay), and one of the blowers arrive broken, but I tested them the day they arrived, so I was able to have a replacement sent out right away, and the seller was easy to work with. For painting my full size wagon, I'm so glad I spent the extra money for the larger booth. Knowing what I know now, even if I was only painting something smaller like a Mustang, I would still spend the extra money and get the larger booth without hesitation. BUT...make sure you have the space to set this up and get air and power to it. This thing is huge! The ladder was REQUIRED to unzip the front as it's 33' long, 16' wide, and 13' tall. The basketball court is 30' long so we actually had to have the booth hang off the edge a bit on the front and the back, and make sure we kept if from hitting the gutters or the rim on the backboard since it is taller than both, and I have 12' ceilings in my outbuilding!
This was fun, and I can't wait to touch up a couple of imperfections we notice in the bodywork (really, not bad at all given where this started) and put it into paint, but that will have to wait for next year when the weather warms up again.
Next up, upholstering the '67 bucket seats I purchased to replace the '68s!
