I repainted my 94 Saturn Coupe, a car that actually had a 95 color on it. Black Gold. The paint used had along with the gold, some blue and red glitter too. Great bling.
I used a quality brand paint followed directions well, did screw things up requiring a recovery and a lot of work but it turned out killer and I liked it,

untill it lasted about 2 years and started to fail.
Arizona, at least around the Valley of the Sun is brutal on paint, plastic, tires and batteries.
But 2 years?
I was dissappointed.
Today I went to the GoodGuys Car show in Scottsdale and talked to the PPG paint booth and found out why.
I did follow all of the instructions and the MSD sheets. I was satisfied I did not try to short cut things, the materials were all good quality and if not PPG a match for it. But
And I love those Buts.
There was an instruction that was not given.
Naturally the instructions assume a commercial quality paint booth and controlled environments.
Oh yeah and naturally I have that too eh?
But the recommended temperature is sort of 75 degree ish. Not about 75 degree at 5 AM which is what it might be when I start and close to triple digits by the time the sun comes over my house and hits my cement slab behind my drive through garage.
I can paint between about 5AM to about 10AM and I had better be done.
Base Coat Clear Coat is formulated to paint the clear shortly after the base is done.
WHY?
Because the Base Coat actually serves as chemical primer coat for the clear and the chemicals have a reaction time based on temperature.
And if you don't get the clear on it before the chemicals are through doing there what ever they do, the clear does not adhere properly.
So what you are doing is prepping the car and then painting the base color and immediatly following that with what ever coats of clear you want to use. A minimum of 2 is recommended.
The time frame allowed is in the instructions for using the materials.
And the temperature is based on 75 degrees.
The unwritten instruction is the 15 degree rule.
For every 15 degrees higher the temperature is, the time is halved.
And at 90 degrees, I ran out of time and although it looked good and did not show a problem, 2 years later it did.

Now I get do do it again, a bit older now and a bit more smarter.
Dang, I wish I had learned some of this stuff 40 years ago.

 

Talk about a sneaky issue -- You have my sympathy WRT the repaint. Sounds like if I need to do mine over for whatever reason, I'd better find a professional, cuz there's no way I could keep with a time schedule like that

 

Well, base coat/clear coat is only an option. Single Stage Acrylic Enamal is also one. It paints almost as easy as lacquer did or does, you can't buy it any more, and where lacquer required color sanding and buffing to get the final shine, Acrylic Enamal the shine is in the can. You have a reducer and a hardner agent. That holds up well in the sun and heat here. A catalyzed enamal does to, it is more or less a 3 part where the hardner is sort of like an epoxy forumla. I used that on my motor I am building. Damn it looks good and took about 2 weeks to harden up to where it is more or less like rocks. It however is very raspy. Since lacquer dissappeared, that was the perfect drive way paint. Spray it and with in a couple of feet, overspray was dust and you could sweep it up afterwards. Labor intensive to get a good shine come color sand and buff, but perfect for driveway paint jobs, now gone. Enamals, be prepared to deal with over spray. Clean up is almost impossible so nothing near it.
But to have some one else paint my cars? Can't afford it. I sort of screwed up the Paint Job on the Saturn through stupid so I ended up putting about 100 hours into it. Arond here a low level show paint job is about $6000.00 going up. Earl Shybe and/or MAACO top level paint jobs about $2000 and masking sucks. Did that once, won't again. And I have seen paint, haven't bought any yet but have seen it, that costs $3500.00 a gallon. that is in the can. I am not good enough to pull that off. And last week went to an open house for a new paint shop that opened up and got an estimate for "Fire" Five grand for fenders and hood.
I dunno, I have a good gun, a couple of o.k. guns for jamming and primer, a low level professional grade compressor and a place to paint, so I guess DYI ain't cheap either but been doing it for more years since I can remember now.
I guess we can never have too many expensive toys can we?

 

It's close to Christmas and I am getting caught up with projects, the bills are paid and I have some extra money left. I need to do some exhaust pipe welding for the exhaust of the Mercury Marine Engine I am installing in my Hornet and some painting. Which means!!!!!!
I have to buy paint and while I am at it, I gues I will buy a gallon of black gold for my Saturn. I am tired of seeing the Clear Coat fall off. The PPG rep gave me some rightious information and I need to digest it a bit more. I need some blue with some pearl in it for my Hornet so I will probabily get Catalyzed enamal, but I might try BaseCoat ClearCoat on the Saturn again with the ClearCoat undercoat that PPG recommended to keep the problem from occuring again. I might even call up Iskenderian and see if they can grind me a couple of cams that will give me the 15 hp increase I would like to get out of it. Heck all it is, is money anyway.
If I don't get a better chance,
Merry Christmas and may the hobby continue to be enjoyable.