Painting wheels and bumper.

[MrBlackonWhite]

I'm finally buying a m3 bumper to replace my broken one, but I don't want to pay to have it painted. So is there a place I can get alpine white spray paint to paint the bumper. Also I want to spray paint the centers and bolts of my style 5's how should I go about doing this?

-thanks

[405style]

alpine white should be ridiculously easy to spray since its white, it doesn't show much imperfections. White, sand clear sand clear 2000 sand buff mint

[MrBlackonWhite]

alpine white should be ridiculously easy to spray since its white, it doesn't show much imperfections. White, sand clear sand clear 2000 sand buff mint

Where would I get a can of alpine white spray paint and what do you mean sand clear sand clear 2000 Sand buff? Sorry kind of a noob to this stuff.

[flyfishvt]

Take your paint code to any auto paint supply place and they will mix up some for you in spray cans. Probably about $15 per can and you'll be best to get 2 cans.

sand it, paint it, sand it, clear coat it, sand it, clear coat it, sand it, buff it and smile.

[JE BMW]

if you have never painted before, id suggest you pay someone to do it for you.. but if you still wanna do it.. youtube is your friend..lol

here you go for the style 5's.. i wouldnt spray paint the bolts thou
http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1910001

[Ghost328IS]

if you have never painted before, id suggest you pay someone to do it for you..

This x10!!!

[iturboh]

orrrrr get your whole car dipped!

[linkeds2]

is it regular practice to sand between the basecoat and clear process?

[Moron95M3]

Rather than going by paint code (and getting new paint that hasn't been faded/etc), go to a paint place and have them color match it via camera.

Worked for me :shrug:

[keeslinger31]

is it regular practice to sand between the basecoat and clear process?

I wouldn't

[Kody]

I wouldn't

I agree, I've never done that. I've always finished any sanding after I spray on primer.

[Rastastatus]

Flyfishvt said, "sand it, paint it, sand it, clear coat it, sand it, clear coat it, sand it, buff it and smile." If you're a professional, you would sand, prime, sand, base coat, then gloss coat.
The only reason he said to sand so many times was to point out the fact that painting isn't always the easiest thing :)

[DamageAppraiser]

You'd be better served buying a $100 EBay bumper and spending $250 to have it professionally refinished than buying a $250 bumper and spending $50 + your free time to paint it yourself. A shit paint job can turn a brand new car into a turd, and a sweet paint job can make a station wagon look ballin'. Any decent shop will back their work for as long as you own the car. When the rattle can paint job on your bumper starts peeling in 6 months, they'll rightfully charge you $500 to strip it and do it right the second time. Just my 2 cents...
If you're budget-minded, MAACO may do it for $150. Not trying to insult your ability to fix stuff, all of us E36 owners are usually pretty good at it. Some jobs, however, should be left to the pros. Surgery, firefighting, and painting your car are 3 of them. Especially if you're inexperienced at it. Cheers.

[RobertsRedE36]

Prepping it yourself and then taking it to Maaco is not a bad idea. We've done it 4 times now! First we replace the stock bumpers with M3 bumpers. Each was damaged... once by my son...and once by a hit-n-run. We are about to put the repainted rear bumper back on. I bought a used bumper for $100 that was (coincidentally enough artic white!) and sanded down the clearcoat and filled all imperfections with flexible filler. NOT BONDO! After you have sanded it, prime it with a flexible primer. SEM makes a good one(39133). English Color carries it. I used about 1 and half cans of primer. Maaco will usually spray it for $150-200. We also had a new nose panel to put on. We were going to "rattle-can" it, but since we were getting the bumper painted we had them spray it too. It is already installed and looking great.

You will get a good result if you spend a lot of time on the prep. If you only spend an hour, don't expect great results. I worked on this bumper for about 6 or 7 hours, and this used bumper was pretty clean to start.
If you spray it yourself and haven't done it before, expect runs and dry spots in the paint. If you don't have a dust free environment, expect spots and "fisheyes" in the paint too. After your final sanding and before the final painting, make sure that you wipe it down with a "cheese cloth" and then wipe it down with the correct cleaner to remove any final dust and finger oils.

[MrBlackonWhite]

I think I'm going to give it a try and if I start to feel like its to much I'll take it to the pros and I'm not really worried about faded color difference as I'm getting the car resprayed in hopefully August.