.ok so i plan to work on my body a bit and give her a home garage paint job, looking for tips, tools i should get and most importantly how much paint i should plan on buying,

 

Justin, I think matt (mrl90) would be your best bet to ask! He seems to know quite a bit when it comes to paint and bodywork! glad you have the monte in a garage, can't wait to see it on the road to York, PA for the next Monte Nationals

 

What condition is your body in now? Do you need to do body work on it or do you just want to give the car a paint job? It will be hard to tell you EXACTLY what you need without being able to see the car in person but I could give you a general idea of what you will need for the project. I just need to know where you plan to start. Also, what is on the car as it sits. Is it in primer or does it have paint on it?

 

look into getting the paint from eather a mack truck dealership or tractor supply co. idk about in minnesota but out here we get ours from a mack dealership in NJ, good quality dupont paint, and a gallon costs about as much as a quart would from anywhere else. tractor supply co i have heard has great paint (forget the brand) for even cheaper than the mack dealership.

also, silver is a pain to get it to lay down right so i would avoid that, and if you do black make sure the body is super smooth, because it shows every imperfection. ( whoever did my buick's 1/4 panels must have not known that, you can see every spot of bondo on that car )

i'll try to add as i remember some of the other stuff my dad told me while we were doing his boss's pacer. we painted that one in a dusty, dirt lot next to my dad's shop, and it turned out pretty nice. never even laid a coat of clear on it!

 

Matt this is what lies beneath my spray bomb job some one was PISSED and keyed the hell out of it (long befor i owned it, i'm stripping thise area's down all the way and going to hit them with rust converter to stop them in there tracs as it's still pritty decent thickness wise skim coat those area's with bondo to fill in and remailing pits/defect i have one spot on the quarter that i need to replace as it has eaten throught but i will cut that out will have my buddy rick weld it a new peice as he had to do it on his 84mc

that is on both side from the door to the quarter, the paint is weather baked on the hood,roof and trunk(car was originally a tx car) i plan on taking down atleast some of the paint so it will be smooth when i get going on it i plan to obviously Prime , paint, clear i'm not looking for show room quality but just so it has a decent paint job on it

my main question is how much paint should i plan on buying?

 

I would get yourself a gallon of paint, you may not use all of it but you can use whats left over for any touch ups that you may need in the future. You will need surfacer primer as well as sealer primer. After you do the body work, I would spray the whole car with two coats of sealer primer to seal out any moisture. Then I would sand it down with 220 or 320 and then spray 3 coats of surfacer on the car. I would then wetsand that with 400 grit then 600 grit and then paint from there. Single state urethane would be the most economic choice and will still look good. Thats what I would do but you can still basecoat/clearcoat if you want. If you go single stage, I would get a gallon of paint and an appropriate amount of reducer and hardener to accomodate the gallon of paint. Get yourself some strainers and paint stirrers. They make stirrers with mixing scales on them so you can just use one cup and one stirrer instead of throwing them out every time you mix something up. Get some laquer thinner to clean the gun out as well. Make sure you have a good respirator as well. Where are you spraying it at? Is it well ventillated and do you have any kind of drier on the air line? Those are two things that will be essential in getting a good clean paint job. Also, you will need some prep solvent to clean the panel off with before you paint.

 

thanks matt that helps alot, i have only painted one other thing and that was a trailer where i didn't have to but paint,but i have a HVLP gun, 3m reperator, i'll have 2 driers on there one perminantly mounted off the outlet and i have some single use i'll put right at the gun i was just worried a gallon wouldn't cover the whole car... since it's a pritty big car

 

Remember, it will be a gallon of paint, but you will be reducing it and adding hardener so it will actually be more than a gallon of sprayable material. If you have a nice evenly colored base to spray over (the surfacer primer) a gallon should be plenty to paint the car.