I have been working on my little Nash Metropolitan I got my last coat of primer on A thinned out coat of restoration shop urethane primer. I’ll be painting with Speedokote jet gloss black My question, should the primer have a small amount of “texture” to it or should it be perfectly smooth. This is a driver quality paint job. But looking for the best results with the listed materials As always, thank you Scott
Typically, primer is smoothed out prior to paint. Many times, a final sealer coat of the same primer thinned out or a specific sealer is used. Read the directions on your product. If this is the TPC stuff, it is mentioned here. https://images.tcpglobal.com/SDS-SHEETS/CUS/CUSDTM-HB624_TDS.pdf On lighter colors, you are probably okay, but Black is unforgiving. Are you planning on laying down a heavy paint thickness then cutting and buffing? If so, just be aware that any surface roughness might be cut through to and show where the Black is thin.
The surface you are painting, should be as smooth as possible. Any texture in the primer will be magnified by the color. You may need to sand your primer surface prior to painting.
I'd check out what the black paint manufacturer says as far as surface prep and follow that. I would bet it recommends either 400 or 600 grit sand paper and wet sand the primer before painting the black. Whatever grit it recommends I would wet sand the primer and to make the most of it I would do a black guide coat on rhe primer then sand primer until the guide coat is gone then apply my black top coat. ...
Mfgr is lacking on this, it may be somewhere else. https://speedokote.com/smr-9705-high-gloss-jet-black-2k-acrylic-urethane/ The primer does say it can be tinted up to 10 % with the color. So, for best results, you might want to block the current primer with guide coat (current is a powder, watch Jack Builds It youtube), then shoot a sealer coat with the primer thinned and tinted, followed by the color coats. That's a lot of shooting, depending on how many coats you expect to lay down. Paint says 2. So with the sealer, that's 3 rounds in one day.
Read the Technical Data sheet. Is the primer listed as usable as a sealer? If it is then it should spray perfectly smooth just like a finish coat. There should be no texture. It also usually has a window that it needs to be top coated within without sanding. If there is texture it needs to be sanded. If it is the product that RodStRace linked to I see it is listed as a sealer but it also doesn't say if it can be top coated without sanding. I would call them but again if there is texture its a moot point as it needs to be sanded.
I mixed it as a sealer but still got some texture( surely my lack of skill) I tried some wet 500 and that seems to be smoothing it out
From experience, I can say that the dark colors like very dark blue, shades of black, dark reds, etc. are all very unforgiving when it comes to the topcoat. When you think you have it perfect (body/primer/sealer/ sanded) stand back and go hide for a week or so then come back and look at it again. An old trick is to wet it down with a hose on a bright day and look at it-pretty much shows what it'll be finished. No matter how good you get it, you will always know the areas that you wished you had worked better. ---and don't kid yourself, a high dollar gun is def. recommended, some say that's a crock but you're the one that has to live with it. Like the others above said, follow the instructions of the paint.
I took my PU to 600 wet before I liked where I was on my guide coat. I then roughed it back to 400 so the sealer would have something to bite to. Then base/clear.
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