Question: I would like to take this opportunity to know your personal preference on how to go about re-spraying a whole car.

To be more specific:

·        Do you paint the hood, trunk lid, bumpers and doors in situ?

·        How do you go on about painting around the door shuts?

· Do you take the doors off first and paint the shuts (also finish it off with clear coat) and then put the doors back on and paint the outside of the car? But then wouldn't the overspray get in the door shuts through the door gaps?

·        Or is there a special way of masking the painted door shuts?

 

Answer: The professional method of repainting a whole car is to remove the doors, hood, and trunk lid from the vehicle. Once you reach the paint application stage, the color would be applied to all areas.

The doors are then re-hung back onto the vehicle and so is the hood and the trunk lid. Once everything is back on the vehicle, you would then re-paint them again in-situ. Effectively, you are painting the parts twice. This makes absolutely sure that all areas are covered, but more importantly you don't need to mask anywhere afterwards.

So to confirm: paint the whole of the door (front and back), same with the hood and trunk lid, hang them back on, open all these parts, re-paint them, apply lacquer. Then shut them, paint the outside of the car, apply lacquer.