I'm going back to lacquer

[turtlevette]

I painted my vette with flame red dupont lacquer a long time ago. Since then i stripped and repainted it dupont bb/cc with glamour clear, then years later went over that with House of Kolor uc-35 with pearl. Then laid down a foundation for kandy several years ago and never finished it.

I've rcently started doing some repair on the trans am with duplicolor perfect match rattle cans. This black lacquer buffs out looking better than anything i've seen before. There is a certain richness to lacquer. And it doesnt matter how bad the spray goes on, you can run the heck out of it or back away and spray it on dry. Color sanding and buffing perfects the surface correcting most all mess ups. Unlike clear coat, i can use a rotary buffer on this every month if i want to without break through worries. If i break thru to the primer, simply spray more on as it blends wonderfully.

Once i'm done with the t/a i'm thinking ill use the duplicolor spray gun lacquer on the vette. Mixing clear with their blue base should make a nice kandy.

 

[Johnny2Bad]

Just be prepared for regular wax and polish. It's mostly the lack of necessary maintenance that drives the modern finish choices. Well, that plus the Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) that make it difficult for any large scale use.

 

[redbone3]

For what it's worth, many years ago I painted my Saab Sonett with lacquer. Big mistake. It wasn't flexible enough for the fiberglass body and cracked badly.

 

[turtlevette]

Originally Posted By: redbone3
For what it's worth, many years ago I painted my Saab Sonett with lacquer. Big mistake. It wasn't flexible enough for the fiberglass body and cracked badly.


Vettes were painted with lacquer for 30 years. The National Corvette Restorer's Society NCRS demands that you repaint in lacquer to achieve the highest category, top flight.

 

[TomYoung]

I sort of get this. The GM cars back in the day had paint that had almost supernatural richness. I think that lacquer is reasonable on a Corvette because that is what it came with. All of the romance aside, modern paints are better ans superior in every single way.

 

[turtlevette]

Originally Posted By: TomYoung
I sort of get this. The GM cars back in the day had paint that had almost supernatural richness. I think that lacquer is reasonable on a Corvette because that is what it came with. All of the romance aside, modern paints are better ans superior in every single way.


Except you have to worry about breaking the clear if you like to buff it a lot. Or you want to sand the orange peel out.

 

[69GTX]

Cars from the 1960's and 1970's had nothing but orange peel on them. That's one way to spot an original paint job...orange peel, paint runs, and other factory sloppiness. I loved that orange peel look on my orig paint Mopar muscle cars. Fwiw the US mint made their proof gold coins with an orange peel surface from the 1850's to 1907. Those were wonderful looking coins with lot of character...and much harder to fake because of those unique surfaces.

 

[fdcg27]

The old lacquer paints polished up really well with a depth and richness you don't see in today's two part systems.
GM used acrylic lacquer for years and their cars always looked better than Ford and Chrysler products.
WRT 69GTX's comments, I never saw orange peel on any GM car made before the early seventies. After that, it became common for some years but that was fixed by the early eighties, at least at GM.
The polishing and color sanding ability that the OP refers to was possible only because there was no clear top coat and the color coat was quite thick.

 

[Robenstein]

Lacquer cuts and buffs easier because it is very hard....but not very tough and it doesn't go on very thick. Lots of people still use acrylic or even old school nitro lacquer on high end wood (especially guitars) for that reason.

One problem with lacquer on a car is it is bad in terms of UV resistance. So as mentioned, you want to protect it and baby it to keep it looking good for a long time. I know a few people with trailer queen show cars done in black lacquer. They are beautiful.

 

[JetStar]

I grew up using lacquer in the body shop back in the 70's and early 80's. It is sensitive to film thickness and will weather check (crack) if to thick. It also tends to shrink, so your prep work needs to be a little better. It can certainly be made to look beautiful, but compared to modern paints, I don't miss it that much.

 

[CincyDavid]

Holy cow, can you even buy lacquer?

As an aside, my ex father in law was a body man and painter, and swore by lacquer thinner as a cure for athlete's foot and jock itch...I kid you not. It said it stung for a minute but took care of it.

 

[GMBoy]

Originally Posted By: turtlevette
Originally Posted By: TomYoung
I sort of get this. The GM cars back in the day had paint that had almost supernatural richness. I think that lacquer is reasonable on a Corvette because that is what it came with. All of the romance aside, modern paints are better ans superior in every single way.


Except you have to worry about breaking the clear if you like to buff it a lot. Or you want to sand the orange peel out.




The buff thru fear is only real if you're using abrasives and if you need abrasives then you are not taking care of the paint anyhow. Base coat/clear coat is durable enough to handle the initial buffing you need to do after the paint job. After this, why would you need to buff so severely? Just a light cleaner wax would be all the grit you need to maintain a smooth finish. But if you wash regularly, use a spray wax and wax with a non abrasive pure carnuaba wax or even a sealant - you are fine for many many more years over lacquer.

Now - on the other point, I agree how rich and forgiving lacquer paint can be. I am also a Corvette guy and my '67 is lacquer. It was repainted about 25 years ago in the same color and style paint. Since the car is garage queen, I only use a pure wax on in to keep it up. I also have a '32 Ford streetrod, real steel body car not a kit, it was my Dad's car and was done somewhere around the late 1950's. The paint is lacquer and very bright but a lot of cracking and crazing. I won't redo it for sentimental reasons.

I think you should keep an original lacquer car with lacquer paint.Anything else should be upgraded to the better paints of today and, no offense, but if you are judging paint quality by using over the counter and consumer grade Duplicolor and similar paint - you are NOT eperiencing quality paint at all. It sounds like you are VERY knowledgeable and I do agree that those rattle can paints can be pretty good sometimes, especially black.

 

[double vanos]

I believe GM called it "Mirror Lacquer Finish" back in the day.