Selene's Official Modification Thread ('99 Accord LX)

Okay, I figured it was time to get my car's thread out of the introduction board so people will actually see my updates, haha. If a mod or admin wants to move this to a more appropriate board that's fine; I thought because it's a 6th gen it would get the most views in the 6th gen board.

Anyway, I'll start with photos of the process of my dad and I plasti-dipping the entire car, from OEM Flamenco Black Pearl with sun damage and chipping/a replacement hood that was green to graphite black pearl over gunmetal gray plasti-dip. It's not perfect but I think it looks a lot better than when I got it. The photos and text below are re-posted from my intro thread but I wanted to get them in here as well. I'll be posting updates on Selene in this thread from now on.

Taping off, base coat, grey and top coat with pearl:






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So as you can see, dad and I (mostly dad) got Selene dipped over the weekend. The finish came out a bit textured, especially on the roof, and I believe that was a combination of the sprayer not being quite powerful enough and/or my dad's never painted with plasti-dip before, haha. He was spraying a little too far away where he had a hard time reaching on the roof and center/top of the hood. I don't care about that though, I think it looks awesome! I kept the bottom trim and front Honda logo original (I taped off the whole front emblem). The rear 'H' came right off, and I have to peel the dip off the Accord emblem because I didn't want to risk breaking it trying to take it off. I stuck it back on there a few weeks ago with metal/glass adhesive and it would have been a battle trying to get it off. I have to put the LX emblem on as well, but I'm probably gonna try badge glue on that, or E6000.

Prep:

We taped it off and wiped it down very, very thoroughly with denatured alcohol before painting. My dad's first job was taping off cars to be painted, actually, haha. Before that we did body work: filled a rust hole in the left rear wheel well facing the door and primed it, you can't tell there was ever a hole there now. Filled in gouges on the hood and bumper from a truck backing into it; couldn't get it all but it looks a hell of a lot better. Filled in some little rust holes on the hood as well. I sanded the clear coat that was chipping down/off where I could with a little motorized disc sander. Hand-sanded the sun damage under the passenger side windows, rust on the rear passenger door and a little round rust spot on the driver door. That came right off, it was only surface rust left from [apparently] a magnet that was left on the car.

Plasti-Dip:

We used two gallons of black, one gallon of gunmetal gray, and two gallons of top coat: one gallon of clear that had 25g of hyper black graphite pearl mixed in and the other by itself. We didn't use all of the paint. We put on three tack coats of black, two wet, two or three wet coats of gray, one tack coat of clear and then the rest of that gallon and about half a gallon of the other clear. The wet coats used about a quarter to a third of a gallon each so I think we got the ratio down. I would have liked to get more coats on but dad has a bad shoulder and he could only take so much painting.

Anyway, since the hood and roof came out textured, I might go back up to my parent's place this weekend and try giving it a gentle misting in naptha with the spray gun and see if that evens out the texture. We had xylene to clean the paint gun and mixing stuff, but I knew they stopped recommending xylene to thin dip with.

The hood was my fault. I tried taking a swing at painting and I royally effed it up, haha. But dad fixed it as best he could. You can barely tell by looking at it in person that there's a bit of striping near the top. The photo I took doesn't have great lighting and from the angle it's at you can totally see it. Maybe this weekend I'll go up and practice with the gun so I can do it myself next time, or we can take turns. I stayed in the garage and mixed up the paint and was on air hose patrol while he was walking around the car painting. Dad couldn't believe the color actually came out "looking like the pictures" I showed him back when I was still contemplating it. The color was almost exactly what I pictured in my mind. I wish it was more glossy but we could always add more later. I'd have to fix the texture first.

I took this photo right after putting some Dip Coat Protective Spray on her. I actually applied it with paper towels so we didn't do too terribly with the texture. It only grabbed the paper on the hood and roof a little. Otherwise it went on pretty smooth. If I had a microfiber towel I probably would have had less trouble.