Anyone ever paint there bumper covers? My paint is all falling off cuz body shop did not do correctly. Where can I find a detailed set of instructions for stripping, preparing and painting the rear bumper cover for my 98 SE, sage green .... ? There are a few places out there that will mix your paint in a 12oz spray can to match the color. I thought I would try this.

 

Check at www.paintscratch.com to see what they have. I know they will mix paint for you into spray bottles.

**NOTE: make sure you get "flex" agent put into the paint. That way, if you hit your bumper, it will not spider and shatter the paint off. It should be able to withstand a little more "bending."

 

how would you go about fixing the "spidering" of the paint, cuz my bumper is messed up too, and i looked on that website and they sell pearl white. would it take a lot of work, or would it be better just to let a body shop take care of it

 

As an estimator here at a dealer bodyshop I see these problems often. If paint is peeling off in large pieces then your right the body shop did not prep the bumper properly. Depending on the manufacturer of the cover, there are different chemicals and/or solvents recommended to wipe down the surface and remove chemicals that are present on the surface from the manufacturing process and sometimes applied as a protective coating. Of course the aftermarket manufacturers always recommends there own "special" solvent be used. Different paint syatems usually have their own solvents that they recommend for use when prepping for their paints. Also it is important to scuff the surface well especially near lines and curved areas. We've also seen aftermarket and sometimes even O.E.M. bumper covers that even though everthing was prepped properly, still have adhesion problems. This is usually traced to a either a manufacturing process that uses poor quality chemicals and/or processes in making their products, or something went wrong in the manufacturing that causes poor adhesion problems.

Flex additive is also important to be used. However, many paint manufactures are now producing paints with the flex additive already in place.

Bumpers that have stress cracking usually need a lot of work sanding all the paint off. Usually the hours spent prepping a stress cracked bumper cost more than replacing the cover at normal body shop rates.

As for painting with a spray can, it is just not possible to lay down paint and obtain the same appearance as a two stage paint process applied with a good spray gun. I've seen this attempted many times but I've never heard from anyone who is happy with the results.

Hope this helps !!

 

the same thing happened to me, so I just scraped all the paint off the bumper. Then I went over the entire bumper with wet sand paper to make sure it was all off.

 

Did you re-paint it yourself? How did it come out?

 

I talked to them at this paintscatch.com, there the ones that told me no flex additive or rubberized primer was needed on the bumper. All my other readings say it is needed, that's why I'm confused. Paintscatch.com says people are using there stuff every day painting bumbers, I would like to hear from someone who has actually used there product and what the results were.

 

I recently took an auto body repair course and repainted the rear bumper as a course project. From what I learned actual painting didn't seem so hard if you have right equipment, but preparing the bumper to make it ready for painting takes time and effort (well at least to non-professionals like myself), and it makes all the difference. Make sure you wet-sand and clean the entire bumper and repair all the scratches you may have BEFORE you start painting. I missed a dirty spot and learned a lesson.

 

I made a mistake about it was TOUCHUP.COM that told me no ruberized primer or flex is needed if air dried. Seems like PAINTSCRATCH.COM knows what there talking about.

 

Did you use a spray gun or spray cans?

 

Spray gun.

 

The likelyhood of it turning out well using a spraycan is low. I would just get it repainted by a bodyshop.

 

It would be a lot of work. You would probably have to repaint the whole bumper, so as not to leave "paint lines."

 

Well, if you would like to save a ton on the cost of getting it done at the paint shop, just do as has been recommended above: do all the prep work yourself. This will save you tons on the labor, and then, if anything goes wrong, you can only blame yourself instead of being mad at the guy that did it like me. I had a bad experience with the guy not prepping it correctly, and my paint is struggling now, just a few months later.

Live and learn.

 

I didn't use flex. I sanded the whole front bumper to get out dings and maybe down to it's primer. Then I painted the bumper without primer with my color. This does not look good cause everything underneath will show through. After that initial coat, then I used primer over the not quite dried paint. Seems dumb doesn't it? But the way I see it that will flex better primer over paint. After the primer then I do a few coats of color. Nearly dry or nearly two hours later I paint the clear coat. All cans by the way.

Right now I have a bumper that looks professional and new and hasn't cracked, spidered, or shown any problems. Been over a month since it was done.

Oh yeah. After the sanding I go over the bumper a few times with Isophoral Alcohol 70 percent or better.

 

Sounds good, did you buy your stuff from paintscratch and use spray cans? How many cans?

 

I think I bought three cans from tower. It took about 3/4 of a can to paint the bumper if I remember correctly then the clear. Probably used more clear than the color because it was more difficult to use. Always looks like part of it is foggy.

My wife said I should paint the rest of the car (mainly the hood needs it most with all the dings up front). I laughed. That would be a task with paint cans. Probably take at least two of them. I think I only have one left.

 

I've recommended Paintscratch to the members here numerous times and I've also used their paints.

Make sure you use flex paint for everything metal and plastic.

 

What do you use to fix the little scratches in the plastic bumper before painting? I completely stripped mine today and ordered stuff from paintscratch.com to repaint. Got two cans each of base, primer & clear.