welding project Juular's Scandi Noir. Volvo C70, 240 &122. Coach paint(ed).. almost.

[juular]

I avoided thinking about sanding and painting things by going on holiday to Wales in the Trafic.

I played with a large guinea pig.

And pottered around on small trains.

On the half finished door I made the silly decision to dust on some pound shop rattle can black to use as a guide coat.

It certainly highlights the low spots, but aside from that all it did was clog up the sandpaper.

Nevertheless I eventually got here.

It almost seems a shame to paint this.

I reached the point where I ran my hand over it with my eyes shut to feel the flaws and was happy with it. It's not perfect but I'm not sure it ever will be.

On to the high build primer.

Then colour.

Despite being the worst door it's turned out one of the smoothest. 

On to sorting the rusty bits and some more paint.

Finally a bit of sound deadening to replace the knackered stuff.

Then back to the car to sort the door frame.

In other news a tin of Volvo pearl white coach enamel has arrived, so I guess I have no more excuses. Next stage will be to see how badly I can mess up the art of coach painting.

[juular]

Let's have a crack at something completely different then.

I've never been good with rattlecans.  No matter how much prep I do, and we're talking endless hours sanding away scratches using stopper and fine sandpaper with an angled light, as soon as the base coat goes on it looks like a cobbled street.

Not to mention the cost of decent aerosols, and the way it feels like 70% of the paint just fucks off into the atmosphere.

Slowly brush painting the old fashioned way feels like it's right up my street.

Before starting this I made an attempt to sort the rest of the door by taking some areas back to the metal where the paint was cracked or blown.

Then some acid and zinc primer.

High build primer.

Then here we go..

First impressions are that there's definitely a nack to it that took me half a panel to get into.

Not letting the brush go dry was the main thing. In the corner where I started I've missed a few bits due to an empty brush, so I will have to do a second coat.  I was planning this anyway so no big deal.

Secondly, the paint does seem to go a long way. I was worried that I didn't buy enough, but it's quite milky and the brush doesn't lift a lot when you dip it.  So I think I will have plenty.

It does seem to build up very well and I can't see any of the scratches and flaws that rattlecans seem to highlight.

Also, bloody hell it's shiny! 

After my first coat I could see brush marks galore. I did lay off the paint with vertical strokes, but as it was drying I could clearly see them.  It's supposed to self level as it dries, so we will see.

The shine on the finish is incredible, much better than I have ever achieved with rattle cans and clear.

Definitely a more enjoyable experience so far. I'm sure as I get some practice in the results will start to improve too.

The downside is the drying time - 24 hours between coats. It might be worth getting the wings off and perhaps another door, and get them all painted at the same time.

At least the paint supplier sent me something to read while I wait.

[juular]

The results this morning:

It's not awful.

The brush marks have largely disappeared although the finish is quite uneven.

Entirely user error in this case as I hadn't kept the brush properly loaded.

I'm hoping a wet sand and a second coat will improve things.

To think I had a look at one of my doors back in early March and thought, I'll vactan and fill that while it's on the car..

[warninglight]

That's a transformation!

I spent a weekend hastily brush and roller painting our van a couple of weeks back with military paint and it looks so much better - however up close there are plenty of flaws.

A good enamel coach finish on a car of this era just looks right.

[Zelandeth]

One thing I will say to you (and anyone) is that for the love of dog, do NOT paint a car matt black unless you never intend to ever attempt to use it between the months of May and October.  A friend painted their car matt black and my observation was that all it did (aside from looking like utter crap as it had been done with the cheapest aerosols they could find and they were too lazy for prep or proper masking) was make the interior the hottest place in the known universe on an even vaguely sunny day.

[Missy Charm]

Silly question: have you ever tried spray painting things with a proper HVLP gun and compressor?  It's a damn sight easier than using spray cans, as long as one masters the art of mixing the paint and cleans the gun properly at the end of the day.  

I've spray painted various things, various ways for both artistic and DIY projects.  Best, by far, was an air-driven spray gun.  Unlike the tins, one isn't dealing with the vagaries of propellant gas pressure fluctuating and a 1/2 pence bit of plastic creating the spray pattern.  

Once you've got your eye in, spraying is a wonderful process.  Painting by hand, in contrast, is time consuming and frustrating.  Having said that, however, you could probably speed things up with the enamel paint by using a foam roller rather than a brush.  

[juular]

19 hours ago, Missy Charm said:

Silly question: have you ever tried spray painting things with a proper HVLP gun and compressor?  It's a damn sight easier than using spray cans, as long as one masters the art of mixing the paint and cleans the gun properly at the end of the day.  

I've spray painted various things, various ways for both artistic and DIY projects.  Best, by far, was an air-driven spray gun.  Unlike the tins, one isn't dealing with the vagaries of propellant gas pressure fluctuating and a 1/2 pence bit of plastic creating the spray pattern.  

Once you've got your eye in, spraying is a wonderful process.  Painting by hand, in contrast, is time consuming and frustrating.  Having said that, however, you could probably speed things up with the enamel paint by using a foam roller rather than a brush.  

This is no place for such common sense and in hindsight far superior options. 😁

The original plan with this car was to wait until I had a detached workshop built that I could strip and paint it entirely indoors. Then I could take my time and do it all properly with a compressor and some decent 2k clear coat and primer.

The doors falling to bits every time I shut them kind of changed the priority from 'make it nice' to 'make it work'.

I don't really have the space to run a compressor and gubbins in my current workshop and I don't want to go to all the effort and expense just to have to do a half job - spraying things outside and getting them covered in flies anyway.

Since some of the fumes creep into my house I didn't think spraying 2k in this current setup would be a brilliant idea either.

[juular]

As much as it was a fair heft of work, getting as many panels as possible off the car and going through them at the same time seems to be the way forward.

Tidied up the garage which just highlighted how much money I've spent on this daft hobby.

Made the stupid idea of taking some of this door back to the metal.

I noticed a bit of rust under the old filler.

So I ended up having to strip the lot.

This was a shit idea. Whatever the door was painted in was rock solid and even a knot wheel just bounced off it.

Ended up having to resort to a flap disc which was an even more shit idea as it dug into the metal in places and left divots.

Then I found a few dents with old filler in them that I had now wrecked.

So what followed was yet another full day of careful filling and sanding and losing the will to live.

But eventually getting a fairly straight looking door.

The front wings are in really good shape and just needed bits of derusting here and there.

And some glaze over scratches and dings.

Eventually this left me with two doors and two wings to coach paint which at least means I can do things in batches which will be quicker.

The first door which already has one coat got wet sanded with 400 grit which took some of the sags and brush marks out.

I then used a roller this time round, followed up by laying off with a dry brush.

Happier with that now. It has a mild orange peel effect but looks quite nice like a vintage steam roller. Which I guess is the point.

As you can see in the background I cracked on with the rest of the panels.

I'm getting marginally better at this, but the rear door does have a sag in the paint.

I'm finding the thickness of the paint a bit heavy and it does go tacky extremely quickly.

Might look into some brushing additives to see if they will help.

[loserone]

It's going to look like a different car 

[Sunny Jim]

Good work as ever @juular.The algorithm fed me this last night. Details of 'tipping brushes' for spreading the paint and thinners that thin but also increase drying time giving you longer to work the paint. All delivered in a calming ASMR Northern voice.

 

 

[danthecapriman]

This is going to look great when it’s done. Those panels look lovely already. Nice colour choice too, really suits the car I think. 
The roof will be the biggest hurdle as it’s a big flat panel that’s easy to see any defect on. Presumably you’ll have to do it outside too?

 

[JMotor]

I think you done a grand job despite the set backs.

Just having the car in A colour will massively help.  

[juular]

On 15/05/2026 at 09:43, danthecapriman said:

This is going to look great when it’s done. Those panels look lovely already. Nice colour choice too, really suits the car I think. 
The roof will be the biggest hurdle as it’s a big flat panel that’s easy to see any defect on. Presumably you’ll have to do it outside too?

 

Very strongly tempted to leave the roof in its shonky patina and just clear coat it. 

Entirely depends on how stupid that looks against nice new paint. A last vestige of its former South African rat rod glory? Or like someone just forgot to paint the roof?

My replacement boot lid while completely solid is a bit patinated as well, which I was just going to clear coat.

[juular]

This isn't going as well as I'd hoped.

Thought I'd almost had it nailed down and was getting results like this, which I'm quite happy with.

Both panels had a couple of areas that I thought would benefit from another coat, so they were carefully given a final wet sand and another shot with the roller.

This last coat was a disaster and I'm not sure why.

What I'm finding with this paint is that it's very fickle and temperature dependant.

It was a little bit cooler which I thought would be better for painting but ironically this triggered the heating to kick on in the house. As the hot water pipes run through the garage I think it has actually increased the temperature in there significantly.

What I've been reading is that increased temperature causes a reduced wet edge time, and so the paint starts to dry before it has fully self levelled. The result is brush and roller marks galore.

It took rather a lot of wet sanding with 400 grit to get back to a reasonable surface.

I have another problem in that the 'lint free' rollers I bought from the enamel supplier are falling to bits after only one use and dropping fibres into the paint.

The paint brushes I'm using are also not great for laying off, I personally think they're too firm and if you're not careful, the beginning of the stroke can tear off the paint you've just laid.

 I've postponed all painting until I can find a better way.

My plan at the moment is to buy a bulk load of foam roller sleeves and treat them as disposable.

 I've also ordered a proper laying off brush.

I'm going to experiment with adding some Owatrol to the paint which is supposed to increase the wet edge duration and allow the paint to level properly.

While I'm waiting for stuff to arrive it gives me a chance to prep the last two doors.

For some reason the filler in this area has bubbled up again and I had to cut it out.

I've stripped that right back to the metal and cleaned it with alcohol in the hope another skim will sort it.

The rest was cleaned up and treated as required. A few little areas of rust pitting needed sorted.

The driver's door hinge has long been a bit shit so I thought I'd take it off and have a look.

The hinge bolts have a cross head which are a nightmare to undo and someone has chewed them up in the past.  Out with the welder.

Welding random blobs onto the bolt heads then hammering on a bolt extractor is a pretty reliable way of getting them out.

Pretty obvious why the bottom hinge was sagging as it fell apart when I removed it. The pin has snapped completely.

This is a problem. The pin has welded itself into the hinge halves. Hammering them out is impossible.

I think my plan is to go and get the hydraulic press from storage and see if I can push them out. 

If that doesn't work, it will be painful as new hinges are around £150 each.

A good example of why buying a decent car is cheaper than a fucked one. If you had to replace all the door hinges on this car it would be £1200..

[Ronkey]

@juular - let me know if you can't get the pin out. I'm sure I've got a spare hinge somewhere. The pin might be handed for the passenger side but I can't see it falling out!

[rusty_vw_man]

Rolling - I did a van with rollers and some thinners helped keep that wet edge, but also improved flow so it self levelled better. Downside is then it’s a bit runnier. 

I found toolstation foam sleeves were fine if I changed them regularly, but need to work some paint into them before approaching a panel.

The advantage I found was that unlike spraying you get more paint thickness, so it’s easier to sand out issues without ending up back at bare metal! 

If second coats are routinely ropier than first it may be the first coat isn’t yet quite hard enough for a second coat (I found it kind of reactivated the paint) or it’s a bit uneven and the second coat just builds up the higher points more. 

I found it needed a good few weeks before the top coat was tough enough to properly wet sand and polish, sitting it in the sun helped. It seemed to stay softer much longer than you might expect. 

That’s my experience, yous may vary. I reckon it’s looking good though. 

[warninglight]

Admirable persistence with the paintwork there!

I can recommend Purdy brushes for coach enamel from experience. First ones I ever had were from Craftmaster and they just seemed right.

I've yet to find a really good roller, though. For our van I tried the ones everyone recommends - 'two fussy blokes' and found that even they shed fibres into the paint pretty quickly.

Amazon hinges are indeed a pain in the ass. I had to buy some new for mine as the old ones were both worn out and seized solid at the same time, and nothing could be done about it.

Seen here in 2020!

 

[juular]

Change of tack.

A load of foam rollers to be treated as single use.

Dedicated laying off brush.

Tin of owatrol.

The purpose of the owatrol is supposedly to improve paint flow and increase wet edge and self levelling.

Paint manufacturers are incredibly coy about what you can use to either thin or treat their individual paints, as all of them sell their own proprietary thinners and brushing additives.

Of course you absolutely MUST NOT interchange these chemicals or use alternatives or kittens might die.

I've heard of white spirits or turps being used to thin the paint, and have also heard stories of it destroying the quality.

I've also heard of linseed oil being an excellent brushing additive, but you don't get a clear answer from anyone about that either.

Owatrol seems to be universally recommended so I thought I'd give it a go. I have read this is just boiled linseed oil in a fancy tin.  It costs twice as much but at £20 for a tin I'll take the hit for now.

It does feel like a lot of people are gatekeeping knowledge like their 1940s  livelihoods depend on it so all I can do is keep experimenting and failing until the failures look good enough to my eyes.

Anyway, finished off the prep on the final two doors. I swear I'd be happy clear coating this and running with it!

So, another round of rollering and laying off.

Still think that's a bit shit personally.

I have however realised that most of the brush marks are at the top of the panel.

The bottom is fairly smooth.

So, all of the brush marks are due to laying off rather than the actual painting.

I think this is screaming out to me that the laying off technique isn't right.

Rolling the entire door, even though it only takes a minute or two, is clearly still too long and is allowing the top of the panel to start drying before I lay it off. 

The next approach is to go back to brush painting small sections and laying off immediately. 

[juular]

@Ronkeyis a legend. Thank you!

[captain_70s]

10 hours ago, juular said:

Still think that's a bit shit personally.

A brand new BMW has orange peel worse than that...

[Ronkey]

No probs - they would have only sat on a shelf for years! 👍🏻

[warninglight]

8 hours ago, juular said:

@Ronkeyis a legend. Thank you!

What the hell was eating that hinge!

[Sigmund Fraud]

15 hours ago, warninglight said:

What the hell was eating that hinge!

...he had run out of Sherpas.

[juular]

Amazon progress was put on pause this weekend due to 2CV racing at Mallory park, which in the end was so hot we had to give up and come home as we were getting ill.

Still, had some evenings and the odd bit here and there to experiment with paint.

The results from adding Owatrol and painting smaller sections weren't great.

What I saw is that the results you get as soon as you paint it are the results you get after 24h. There isn't much self levelling taking place.

It was recommended to me to heat up the paint. 

So I stuck it in some hot water in a slow cooker.

The results from this were even worse.

I decided to do a little experiment.

Paint, straight from the tin. On one panel I rolled and laid off straight away. On the other I rolled and left it.

Laid off.

Not laid off.

The roller has left a mild orange peel but it isn't bad. It's way better than the laid off attempt which has honking big claw marks through it.

At this point I was getting a bit fed up and I decided I was just going to stop listening to anyone's advice and just do things my way.

Those all seem to be the best results I've got.

What I did was add 10% Owatrol to the paint, roller it on, and then very gently lay it off using only the roller applied as lightly as humanly possible. This bursts all the bubbles and leaves a very fine stippling that does dry flatter.

My plan is to leave the paint 8 weeks or so, flat it back to 3000 grit and either leave it or give it a mild polish.

This leads onto the next chapter of self loathing.

Stripping down the car ready for paint.

There is no way I could really get away with leaving its paint much longer. Some parts are blistering through quite badly.

Impressively none of the repaired areas are showing any rust. Yay for the magic combination of phosphoric acid and zinc.

Off with 60 years of patina.

As feared the paint was hiding some unpleasantness.

First step is to acid the hell out of it.

Then zinc.

Ive found that brushing this on and then flatting it with a roller gives a nice sprayed look.

 

 

Then some glaze, mostly to level off the surface with the already repaired areas.

Then filler primer.

Paint is getting tantalisingly close but I may need to back the car into the garage as the wind is slamming every seed, leaf and beastie off the surface.

 

[Sunny Jim]

Great progress. I loved the patinated look but as it was hiding some nastiness you've done the right thing. Once hardened and wet n dried and as you said maybe a touch of polish it'll look reet lovely. Hope you ad Mrs Juular and the animals aren't suffering too much in the heat.

[juular]

5 minutes ago, Sunny Jim said:

Great progress. I loved the patinated look but as it was hiding some nastiness you've done the right thing. Once hardened and wet n dried and as you said maybe a touch of polish it'll look reet lovely. Hope you ad Mrs Juular and the animals aren't suffering too much in the heat.

I really didn't want to remove it, but I think that even if I tried to repair only the rusty sections, it would be a patchwork of mostly zinc paint and rattlecan with very little original surface left.

I am however going to keep the roof the way it is!

I think it will work.

[rusty_vw_man]

I’d agree, you’re not getting much flow, once it’s on it’s just staying there. Looks like the brush then just adds texture! 

I went to around 10% magic thinners (white spirit!) and a nearly dry roller to de-bubble. Thinning helped, although it increased the chances of runs, but then it needs to be proper runny to self level. 

I’ll try and find some photos to show the steps, I found orange peel was inevitable, but for a decent wet sand it would be fine - however heartbreaking it might sound I don’t reckon you’ll get a perfect finish without a lot of wet sanding ahead of you!

[juular]

Last days of sunshine, let's get this done!

I can think of no better way to attract and trap flies.

I only managed to get one coat on before the forecast started to change. However that's now the metal waterproofed until I can get the second coat on.

I used the last dry day to put the doors and windows back on so that I wouldn't have to tarp it and fuck up the soft paint.

This was a marathon. Even though I'd just taken the doors apart I completely forgot the order that things needed to be reassembled, and there is a very specific order or you have to start again.

Rage ensued.

By far the worst bit was reattaching the exterior chrome trim under the windows. These use spring clips that are under enormous tension to force the trim against the metal, and there was absolutely nothing I could do to reassemble them. I scratched the new paint quite badly in the process. I suppose thats inevitable. At least I can touch this up with a brush now!

As part of the chrome trim there's rubber finishers that stop the metal chafing against the paint. These all fell to bits when I took them off. Luckily I found a roll of stuff at the back of the garage that fit perfectly. No idea how I even came by it but it'll do.

In the end I attached these from inside the door frame using self tappers. Sue me.

I have also used an inordinate amount of cable ties to replace fucked spire nuts.

Anyway, much further swearing and losing the will to live ensured as I slowly built up the door internals, fitted the handles and locks and adjusted the doors individually so they didn't catch the paint.

I eventually got there at about 9 in the evening, having forgotten to eat.

By this point the heavy clouds had rolled in and it looks like I'd finished just in time.

The results seem worth it.

The entire crew were knackered.

I used both of the hinges @Ronkey sent me and they are perfect. The door shuts lovely now with a perfect snick, instead of smacking off the door frame every time. Once again, thank you.

I'm happy with the finish now. I may not even bother wet sanding away the orange peel as it kind of suits the classic shonky car vibe.

The enamel has a sort of glow and depth to it that I can't explain.  Base and clear from a spray gun seems a bit clinical in comparison.

Still a long way to go. Bonnet and boot lid need tidied up and refitted. Door seals need made. Interior needs reassembled. I will also clearcoat the boot lid and roof as they have a nice patina.

It's not bad for a paint job that cost under a hundred quid in materials.

It wouldn't suit a modern but it works here just fine.

[danthecapriman]

Looks great to me, well done👍

Considering the price difference between what you’ve achieved and a pro respray you really can’t go complain about that at all. Personally I’d do the roof and boot lid and have the whole car the same but that’s just me. Either way you’ve done well on that.

[Ronkey]

That looks great. Those window trims are a bloody nightmare. I scratched the new paintwork on mine putting to front passenger side one on. I could have cried; the guys that painted it for me said they would be a nightmare and not to worry. 

I'm for painting the rest too but it is your motor. I nearly clear-coated mine once it was back in bare metal, complete with stickers on the repair panels. It did look awesome. Would a two tone work?

I'm sure they did that colour with a black roof.

Edit - like this: