Board Logo

Need help with compressor :)
Ducatiman - June 22nd, 2013 at 08:30 PM

Hi everyone long time reader first time poster here,
Iv been fixing up my 1966 beetle for the last 3 months all rust is now cut out and welded back up, its time to paint her iv got all the paint just need a compressor, my dad has a (2.5HP Direct Drive SPEAR & JACKSON) but im just wondering if itl do the job. whats everyones opinion on using it, or should i just goto supercheap and grab a diffrent one ?
any help would be appreciated.

Attached is a pic of when i first got the pink bug :)

vertex - June 23rd, 2013 at 07:19 AM

Look at the free air delivery on it and see if it is greater then gun requirement. If you need to have greater free air delivery you can couple 2 compressors together. I have done this with a couple of supercheap ones. Mainly because I didn't want to spend a fortune on a good compressor that would only be needed occasionally for high air delivery.

waveman1500 - June 23rd, 2013 at 12:04 PM

A 2.5hp compressor will be man enough to run a spray gun, but you will probably need an old-style high pressure gun, and not a HVLP gun with their higher air consumption. The main issue is making sure your air is dry and clean. Drain the tank frequently to get all the water and oil out, if the compressor is a bit old then it might be worth putting on an inline water/air separator. You can do without it, but if you start getting fisheyes in the paint then air contamination might be the cause. My cheap 2hp air compressor was fine for painting when I first got it, but it's worn now and puts out a fair bit of oil in the air, so I wouldn't use it for paint anymore.

h - June 23rd, 2013 at 12:10 PM

welcome aboard!
my old compressor is a 13 cube foot cap from memory and runs a spray out fit nicely
cheers pauly

nils - June 23rd, 2013 at 02:32 PM

OH MY GOD ITS PINK!!:crazy:

no wonder you need a respray :smilegrin:
welcome aboard. Like H I've always tried to stay 13CFM or more for spraying. think that's 360 litres ish per minute (rubbish at these conversions)

Ducatiman - June 23rd, 2013 at 06:10 PM

thankyou everyone for the help ill be painting the car in a few more week and ill upload some pics of the finished product, also ill make a build thread up, going to turn the car into a tuf baja :D

Aussie Dubbin - June 23rd, 2013 at 09:26 PM

How many litres is the tank,
If you could afford it you really want to paint in 2pak, including etch primer, proper air mask is ESSENTIAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Then you probably want a $400-$600 gun

So $2000 in gun paint and rubbing materials... Not trying to scare you off but there are many costs to assess

waveman1500 - June 23rd, 2013 at 10:22 PM

With respect Aussie Dubbin, you're talking rubbish. There is nothing wrong with acrylic paint. It should cost about $200 total for paint and thinners.

There is absolutely no point going straight for 2-pack with your first ever backyard paint job. I'm pretty sure it's not even legal to use it at home without a booth. You will make plenty of mistakes and need to rub them out, which is easier to do with acrylic anyway.

My tip is to make sure you don't choose a metallic paint! The first car I ever helped paint was a mate's ute, for some reason he had chosen the silver metallic colour from the VT Commodore. It was terrible! If you spray with the gun at a different angle, the metallic sits differently, so the car ended up with stripes. If you tried to rub back a run, it would rough up the metallic flakes and look hideous. That car looked okay from about 5 metres but if you looked any closer it was rough as guts.

For the bonnet of my beetle I used a solid orange acrylic and was happy with the results. I didn't use a clear coat, but the paint lasted a couple of years before it started to go dull, and even then it would have come up okay with a polish.

nils - June 24th, 2013 at 06:14 AM

Agreed, 2 pak is why too expensive to muck up.

Acrylic all the way, easy to work, easy to touch up

hell... My baja is painted in enamel :D

matberry - June 24th, 2013 at 08:12 AM

With all due respect your honour, even 13 cfm is a bit light on, even 17 cfm for that matter can work hard doing a full respray. Once hot the compressor will deliver water with the air so one or even two water traps would be a good idea. Really depends on where you are as ambient temperature and humidity are the big factors. I agree with using Acrylic for a first timer.

vertex - June 24th, 2013 at 03:54 PM

Maybe overkill, but after having to rub back an area due to water coming out I use a water trap off both the compressors. These compressors feed into another tank that also has a water trap then I use those throw away water traps attached to the gun. No real problem with water since just the skill of the painter is letting the job down. As for the question first asked, my supercheap compressor (2.5 hp) would run my air feed mask and primer gun. It couldn't do the sander but. Hence the double compressor system if needed I will place a third on the setup (when they come on special) but haven't at this stage. You get get some good second hand compressors as well if you live in the right area. I don't hence supercheap.

vlad01 - June 24th, 2013 at 07:08 PM

I got a McMillan 3Hp comp, 13CFM FAD 58L tank.

Model is AF16 and just under a K in price its real good value. One of the best investments I have made so far. When it comes to painting this comp hauls ass and its geared up for sandblasting when the time comes as well.

The tank is aussie made, motor is Taiwan I think? TECO motor anyway and the best bit is the pump is alloy and made in Italy and the pressure switch is German.

It works flawlessly and I can buy all the spares for it locally if I ever do need them.

Super happy with this one. :love:

vlad01 - June 24th, 2013 at 07:16 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by waveman1500
With respect Aussie Dubbin, you're talking rubbish. There is nothing wrong with acrylic paint. It should cost about $200 total for paint and thinners.

There is absolutely no point going straight for 2-pack with your first ever backyard paint job. I'm pretty sure it's not even legal to use it at home without a booth. You will make plenty of mistakes and need to rub them out, which is easier to do with acrylic anyway.

My tip is to make sure you don't choose a metallic paint! The first car I ever helped paint was a mate's ute, for some reason he had chosen the silver metallic colour from the VT Commodore. It was terrible! If you spray with the gun at a different angle, the metallic sits differently, so the car ended up with stripes. If you tried to rub back a run, it would rough up the metallic flakes and look hideous. That car looked okay from about 5 metres but if you looked any closer it was rough as guts.

For the bonnet of my beetle I used a solid orange acrylic and was happy with the results. I didn't use a clear coat, but the paint lasted a couple of years before it started to go dull, and even then it would have come up okay with a polish.


I agree, acrylic is great, its more forgiving and can easily be detailed and polished as required.

2 pak is ridiculously hard to use for a beginner and is much more toxic and shithouse when it does get chipped. Not to mention a absolute nightmare to remove existing 2 pak.

I also started with the hardest paint helping out a mate paint some bits on his car, silver from late commodore the paint was.

what was your silver? called quicksilver? Shithouse to paint but got a semi ok finish after several tries.

solid colors are the easiest to work with.

vlad01 - June 24th, 2013 at 07:21 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by nils
OH MY GOD ITS PINK!!:crazy:

no wonder you need a respray :smilegrin:
welcome aboard. Like H I've always tried to stay 13CFM or more for spraying. think that's 360 litres ish per minute (rubbish at these conversions)


close, about 350L/p

vlad01 - June 24th, 2013 at 07:27 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by matberry
With all due respect your honour, even 13 cfm is a bit light on, even 17 cfm for that matter can work hard doing a full respray. Once hot the compressor will deliver water with the air so one or even two water traps would be a good idea. Really depends on where you are as ambient temperature and humidity are the big factors. I agree with using Acrylic for a first timer.


the CFM depends on your power available. 13cfm is about the biggest you have go on single phase and thats with the big 15A industrial outlet.
any bigger needs 3 phase so 17 cfm more certainly need 3 phase.

but saying that, your numbers might be the pump rating and not the FAD rating. most comp manufactures use the pump rating as its a bigger number for marketing purposes. I always refer to FAD rating because its the true output you see at the air fitting.

Ducatiman - June 25th, 2013 at 03:16 PM

I just had a look and it's a 40ltr tank, Air Displacement 196LPM, Free Air Displacement 125LPM, so it might be a bit small, one of his mates has the same compressor so we were thinking about hooking them together via a T piece. And the paint ill be using is Acrylic, I'm not after a pro paint job just something to protect the metal, won't need to be shinny because I'm going to taking it to Cape York :D

nils - June 25th, 2013 at 05:49 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Ducatiman
, won't need to be shinny because I'm going to taking it to Cape York :D


If that trip comes to fruition, be sure to post on the forum in the months leading up to it. I'm really keen on doing a big trip like this in the next year or so. Thinking the cape, or maybe coast to coast?
If time lines come together, I would definatly add another dub to that trip

Ducatiman - June 25th, 2013 at 07:42 PM

sounds good to me, iv always wanted to goto the Cape and all my mates keep saying you need a 4x4 so i plan on proving them wrong in a VW, just gotu build the car up first :D

Ducatiman - June 25th, 2013 at 10:25 PM

ok good news i got a hold of a 8cfm belt driven with a twin cylinder compressor head from a mate :D

Aussie Dubbin - June 25th, 2013 at 10:59 PM

All the best. Sounds like acrylic will be more suited. Remember to spray wet on wet ie don't let it dry out in between paint laying paths.

vlad01 - June 27th, 2013 at 09:31 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Aussie Dubbin
All the best. Sounds like acrylic will be more suited. Remember to spray wet on wet ie don't let it dry out in between paint laying paths.


thats not true, you have several hours to about 24hrs depending on conditions, coat thickness and brand.

I leave at least 15min between coats to flash off and up to about 30 min seems best, but even same day is fine.

Wet on wet too quick can stuff the finish up, I found metallic base and clear does not work well at all wet on wet. The metallic goes crazy as its not dry enough. You can however do wet on wet for clear once the first few lights coat have dried enough and locked in so to speak. This applies to primer and solid colors too.

Anyway best to have lots of practice panels and crap to play with first as every person, equipment and paint vary.