you guys remember color by numbers, right? I need some help...

I've never successfully painted anything in my life (including the walls in the living room as the paint melted off the wall and soaked into the carpet... I'm still in trouble for that one)... so any guidance will help no matter what...

I've removed the covering from a large warbird and am about to put 3/4 oz fiberglass with WestSystems 105 over the entire model. Once that's done, sanded, and patched as need I need to paint it (paint instead of covering is the goal).

I have a color scheme in mind (base white with royal blue highlights and blue/white checkerboard fore and aft).

I understand from reading that I need a light grey primer... Krylon? Rustoleum? once primed - lightly wet-sanded with 400 grit sandpaper.

Dry it with a lint free cloth and then shoot my white base coat (white - Krylon? Rustoleum?) let it dry then tape it off for high-lights and checkerboard. shoot my blue (again, which paint?)

lightly wet sand it with 1000 grit paper.

The spray some sort of clear coat (w catalyst?) on it to make it "pop" (look really good).

Am it on the right track?

Great start with using West. I love that stuff.
Next you might want to get a spray gun. I use the ones from Harbor Freight with decent success.
I too have experienced paint woes till I bit the bullet and got the good paint. Forget rattle cans and cheap primer. Go to a decent auto parts paint store and get 2K primer preferably white but buff will work ok too.
They will help you with a good basecoat clearcoat system and you will get much better results.

In the mean time get a foamy and practice your spray technique with water based acrylics before messing up the good stuff.

Have you thought about using latex exterior house paint? Roy Vaillancourt of Vailly Aviation has a whole write up on how to do a latex paint job. The good thing about latex is .. you have several chances to get it right. If while painting you mess up, just use a wet sponge and wipe off the paint and start over. With auto, it may look better but you only have one shot to get it right. There is no wiping off and starting over. You could wait until it dry and sand it off. Another good thing about latex, you could finish painting a plane in one day or just a few hours depends on your scheme. The clear , some say should go on when the latex is fully cured which takes about a week. But in terms of looks latex painted warbirds look fantastic. Do a search and you will see, and it is a hell of a lot easier to paint than auto paint also minus the smell.

http://www.vaillyaviation.com/Intro.html

Oh by the way, when using latex you don`t have to prime.

Latex is not fuel proof so if you are running glow fuel, you need a fuel-resistant clear coat.

The most important part of my post was to practice on something first.
Sure, spray latex on a foamy, see how you like it.

Sparky you need to keep it as simple as you can because of lack of any experience. What I have to offer is a simple and inexpensive way to get a quality paint job from a beginner, it's a good way, not the only way. You are on the right track for the glassing and you could also use nitrate dope to put the 1/2 or .75 oz glass on and fill it with dap light weight spackle, it sands nicely and is lighter then resion. Primers I use are grey Dupli-Color high build for starters, most of which is sanded off and followed with Dupli-Color white sandable primer which I wet sand with 600 grit for a beautiful surface which will accept any paint. Vacume it well and wipe down with a paint Prep solvent prior to the color coats.

Dupli-Color Has base coat colors in spray cans with good color selections, called Perfect Match $7.00 per 8 oz. can and it goes on very smooth, easy for the new guy and experienced as well. It is compatible to most clear coat automotive paints which are fuel and chemical resistant as that is what you will want to finish with. An automotive supplier will help you with the right clear coat, get an economy clear coat and save money, they do a nice job. Keep in mind you will need a spray gun HVLP is great for this, most cheep guns will have a 2mm or larger tip where as a 1.2 to a 1.7 is desireable and air pressure 10 to20 lbs.

If you have the compressor, filters, regulator and right spray gun you can do a nice job. Clear coating can be challenging for the new user but it's doable even for the beginner. Regardless of what products you use I wish you well. Leroy

It turns out that there's Dupli-Color at the O'Reilly auto parts down the street... going to visit tomorrow and cross my fingers that have both primers... I'm also hoping they have my blue in stock (royal blue preferably - no sky blues please) and my white.

I want the colors to pop and shine so I'm going to find someone to shoot the clear coat for me once I get the colors down. I'm wondering if I tape it all off and bring it all to a Maaco or the like if they'll do it for less than $100?? don't know... don't want to jump the gun...

first things first... filler primer, sand, and white primer... I'll have pics up next week...

thanks, Leroy!

91zulu... I went to home depot today and spent $20 on a can of white and had them try to mix a blue... no matter what they added, the blues all came out washed out... the guy tried three different times to match the blue I brought him (monokote royal blue) and he couldn't do it... I felt bad he did so much work so I bought the quart anyway... lol...

Good luck with it.The bright clear colours can usually only be had from expensive automotive paint systems,candys too

Don't schedule too much time between paint and clear. They need go together pretty quickly.

If you are looking for the bright just out the factory look then with latex it will be difficult. Some guys get some what of a bright look by adding primary colors like black to get the shade they want. There was a paint mixing thread some where where folks describe how to tweak colors. I will try to find it. But usually most of us are not looking for a factory finish, more of a battle finish. For the finish that you want auto may be the way to go.

Ps. Oh Dave Platt was the guy that know how to mix colors to get the right shades.

Sparky O'Reilly will have the primers but they may not have the Perfect Match, it's usually found at automotive paint stores and if clear coating you have to use a base coat, don't use anything else and there is a window of time to work with when doing urethane base coat/clear coat finishes, the two go together to make one. Do it wrong and you'll have a mess you don't want, you need to undrestand these finishes or it's best to go another route. Here is an example of what can be achieved when it's done right, but I have been doing it for years.

Good luck with yours, Leroy

Leroy... I've run into an issue... I'm using the DupliColor high fill primer (as directed). 3 coats, 10 minutes apart, wait an hour and then dry sanded with 220 and then wet sanded with 400.

next day I put on 3 coats of sandable white primer... it looked terrible. did not cover welll at all... I wet sanded most of it off. The resulting surface is highly polished but a mix of the ruddy red from the highfill primer and white streaks from the second primer.

do I paint on that?

DupliColor Ford Blue and Ford White.

Sparky when you primer with the high build and sand it off you should expect to see light and darker spots, remember it's just a filler. I don't put several coats on and start sanding, that's not how you fill weave and imperfections, it's also where the work is involved. Fill and sand, fill and sand and fill and sand and only after the filling is finished do you put a uniform primer coat / coats on and lightly sand it to loosen over spray and wash down after a vacume job to get the dust out of cracks and whatever prior to painting. Do not sand any finer than 600 grit, 500 and 400 is ok also just don't sand it any more than required to get the dust loose. Base / filler coats I sand with 320 grit, do not wet sand those base coats. When your done with the paint prep it will be slick with some shine.

If your paints are not transparent then your base can be a bit blotchy and have no effect on the finish what so ever. There can be short cuts for painting a RC plane or anything else for that matter, I just don't use them and doing it as cheep as you can go generally will lead to problems you don't need at this stage. Sounds like your ready to paint, always paint the light colors first if possible, you'll do just fine.