Any painters in the house?

[Stan 24v 0]

I am toying with the idea of colour coding my handles (Passat rears) , grille and rear number plate surround. I was also toying with the idea of "Doing it myself" :shock:

 

So

1) Is it easy to do?

2) Where is the best place to get the right paint?

3) What sort of price should I be looking at?

4) Should I stop being tight and get it done professionally?

 

or

 

5) Just leave it all as standard?

 

Cheers me dears :wink:

[coolrado 0]

halfords in wrexham are selling off all there u-pol plastic primer for £2 per can, not sure if other branches are selling it off cheap though.

 

they are easy enough to get a perfect finnish on if you take your time, but it is worth taking them apart properly to get at the bits that cant be seen until you pull the handle, you will need to drill the pin out that holds the two bits together.

 

its also worth leaving them to dry for about a week as the paint can wrinkle if you pull on the handle too soon.

[biggerbigneil 0]

1) it is quite easy yes

2) from the dealer, paint shop/body shop or even Halfords are good these days

3) £20 ish?

4) it's nice being able to do things yourself, practice on some unwanted trim or anything, if you really suck get it done professionally.

5) I would just leave it standard, the door handles will most likely chip and scratch easily (girlies with rings or Hugo....). I had my front grill and number plate suround painted and the grill picked up alot of stone chips and the back always looked like it was painted plastic so I bought new exterior plastics all round.

 

If you are going to do it yourself you need to prep the plastics, buy matching paint, laquer several layers afterwards and then use G3 rubbing compound (can be bought at body shops). It is worth buying wet and dry sand paper grades 400, 800, 1200 and 1500 for preparing the plastics, rubbing down after spraying and for rubbing down the laquer.

It is very difficult, if not impossible to get the plastics back to plastic after spraying if you make a mess.