Painting Tutorial
Ok so heres how I paint all my consoles. Its pretty straight forward and a little strange but its some things Ive learned. Its horrible to see a nice coat of paint and then you spray on another and the paint cracks, has happened to me luckily it gave a rather nice effect. So hopefully you find this helpful, The best paints to use are most paints that you find at Auto Car parts stores the selection is limited at least in my area but the paints are worth it and they last ( they are quite expensive I pay $11.00 for a can ). Well lets get started,

Things youre going to need

1.Paint of your choice

2.Primer ( I go with whatever color I need to achieve the desired effect I want the darker your primer the darker your paint is going to be so choose your primer wisely )

3.Latex gloves

4.Painters tape (if you going to be masking off a design or it your painting the case multiple colors.)

5.Respirator ( you know the little white thing that goes on your face)

6.Clear Acrylic ( I dont get my clear unless its acrylic if it doesnt have Acrylic on the can most times it yellows you can get this off with light sanding but it saves me a little time if I dont have to)

7.Sand paper 400, 600, 800, 1500, and 2000 Grit make sure its wet/dry

8.A dishwasher ( ill explain in a sec)

Step 1 Sanding
You want to sand you console very well to get rid of any imperfections that will stick out after you have painted your console. A small piece of plastic can ruin a perfect paint job.

1.Start by roughly sanding your console with the 400 grit it will look like crap but hang in there

2.Next comes the 600 grit ok so now its looking a little better but still looks like crap

3.Now youre going to use the 800 grit ok so it looks a lot better than the 400 but it still look a little rough and my arm is starting to hurt ( take breaks)

4.Finally youre going to use the 1500 Grit this takes the longest and is the worst part of sanding but is necessary for a nice uniform look.

Step 2 Washing
Ok this is where the Dishwasher comes into play. Place all your parts in the dishwasher no soap and dont throw it in there with all the dishes either it should be the only thing in there and on the bottom rack. Set it for the lowest heat setting you can then go watch some TV or something. When the Dish washer has run it cycle take your console out on let it air dry.

Step 3 Primer
Now when it comes to primer I put on 2 coats with light wet sanding (dont sand to hard or youll just remove the paint) between coats with 1500 Grit sandpaper. So it will go something like this,

1.Apply first coat allow at least 45 minutes of drying time

2.Light wet sanding and let dry ( I use a hair dryer to speed this process)

3.Apply second coat and let dry as before

4.Repeat sanding

5.Primer finished

Step 4 The Paint
I always use three coats of paint, but you can get away with two if it looks uniform. I follow the same steps for the paint as I do the primer.

1.Paint

2.Wet Sand

3.Paint

4.Wet Sand

5.Paint

6.Wet Sand

7.Done

(Yeah I know I got lazy)

Step 5 Clear Acrylic
This is the most important step in painting you console it is what give the paint that something extra. You could do a perfect job painting and mess up on the clear and it turns the console to crap. This is where all the little imperfections come out and become really noticeable. For clear I use three coats no more no less. Its the same story as with the primer and the paint except you dont sand the last coat I do this to avoid having to buff my console with wax as I have no clue how and I dont have a need to learn ( just lazy). There is an exception here as you use the 2000 Grit sand paper. After your done I would let the paint cure over night as a minimum but if you can wait a day or two I give the paint time to fully harden.