 1955 Allstate 125 - 1978 P125X - 1979 P200E - Booth&Painting   JPM in front of the basement spray booth built by Eric and JPM. NOTE stylishly appropriate Morrissey vespa t-shirt and smart ventilator mask THE BOOTH THAT ERIC AND JPM BUILT Having three complete scooters and Kj's pair of cowls to re-paint, Eric and I, in Oct 98, decided to build a ventilated spray booth. We researched getting professional paint jobs done, but when Eric contacted me via email telling me he got a quote of $800 for one scooter-- we decided to make the booth and use it for all our many parts and frames to paint. I had two P series Vespa's that I wanted to restore, and Eric had his early 60's hybrid Allstate. Kj decided to re-paint the cowls from her P125x while we were at it. Eric and I had already set up a fairly complete workshop in my basement commercial space located in downtown Boston Chinatown. We brought all the scooters down the stairs from the street-level entrance and set up a nice shop to work, restore, and repair over the colder months. HOME DESPOT (aka HOME DEPOT) Eric found some sort of plans and descriptions for building a spray booth on the internet. We took a trip to hardware stores, and ultimately Home Despot, to find materials and figure out how we could make this thing. We knew we needed a good enclosure to contain fumes until they were exhausted to the outdoors via a fan and hose, and didn't want dust or debris to get to the surfaces while painting and drying.  Cowls hanging in booth, ready for priming. NOTE clamp lamps above, newspapers on booth floor THE MATERIALS (BOOTH) Follows is a fairly complete list of the materials and costs for our spray booth, hereafter referred to as DAS BOOTH:
THE PLANS and DESIGN of DAS BOOTH The booth was built so as to accomadate a complete assembled scooter entirely and allow room to spray from all angles and sides. This required as a minimum 6 inches in excess of scooter dimensions. Our booth was 7 feet wide, 4 feet high, and 3.5 feet deep. The wooden frame is constructed of the two identical palettes on their sides and connected by various 2x4's and wooden moulding strips lengthwise so as to make a box. One of the slats of the palette on one side was removed to provide a gap to connect the exhaust fan. The plastic sheets were cut to enclose the box and overlap each other. Single pieces cover the right, left, top, and bottom. Duct tape was used to close the seams and connect pieces. The front and back of the booth utilizes a 3-flap design, each piece overlapped approximately 2 inches with the center piece on top. They are secured with staple-gunned-staples and the plastic was reinforced with a strip of duct-tape first. Making the booth enterable by front or back proved to be very smart considering turning the full-frame around multiple times to paint both sides sounded rather obnoxious. The flaps on front and back should have about one foot of overlap on the bottom to provide more weight for them to stay down, and also to help enclose the side. We tried putting wood strips on the edge of an exact length flap, to weight it down, but this was hard to fold over the top for loading of the booth or when folding to the side to paint. Overlapping, unweighted flaps worked better.  Exhaust fan and hose on outer side of Booth. NOTE liberal use of universal problem solver, duct tape LIGHTING THE BOOTH Two clamp lamps secured above the booth worked well to light our process, however there were several other clamp lamps and light sources in the workshop providing light. Sometimes we would unclamp the lamp and set it at various places on top of the booth for direct stronger light in specific locations while painting. This proved very helpful when painting the frames. Good light is required to see if you have a good, thorough coat of paint.  Applying the third coat of primer to cowls. USING THE BOOTH Most of the painting was done by suspending objects from the top cross supports with rope and a small hook fashioned from a cut and bent piece of clothes wire hanger. This worked particularly well for the cowls, horncast, center stand, and exhaust. At first we were supporting objects on an angle against boxes or the edge of the booth, but this makes it difficult to spray all sides without having to wait for a coat to dry. The multi-flap design enabled us to paint the objects by sticking our head and arm into the booth (wearing a spray-chemical-filter ventilator mask, of course!) and still keep a decent enclosure to keep fumes in the booth and dust and particles out and off the painting surfaces. We found it to be a good idea to put down newspaper on the floor of the booth and also to remove and replace it often as well as vacuum (with a small handheld vacuum) to prevent paint-dust build-up inside the booth. OTHER CONSIDERATIONS and SUGGESTIONS Avoid climbing into the booth while painting, as the fume buildup is pretty severe. I strongly suggest making some sort of exhaust system to take the fumes and dust out of the booth to the outdoors. Wear a strong filtered ventilator and goggles if possible to protect yourself. You might want to wear rubber gloves if you are really sloppy. We built a three level shelf with several milk-crates right outside of the booth to keep the spray cans on. We also had the handheld vacuum nearby to keep things clean to keep us and the painting surfaces as clean as possible. Also, it's wise to keep a shopping bag or garbage can next to the booth to dispose of the cans and rags and masking materials as you go along.  P125 frame in booth after base-coat of green. NOTE masking materials for engine including old funny cowboy shirt. THE MATERIALS, part 2 PREP WORK and PAINTING Follows is a list of materials for prep and painting and a quick list of the processes and steps we used. Don't be fooled-- a decent job can be done with only aerosol paint (AKA rattle-cans.) A good prep job is needed, as well as patience and intelligence to plan the materials and process properly. Try to use compatible paints-- eg, use primer, base, and clear coats by the same manufacturer. If you think you are rushing it, you probably are. Take your time. Do a good job. The following process can also be used for a more meticulous, professional job done with a compressor and paint-sprayer. Eric and I opted for the can method to save money, time, and avoid having to clean and refill the paint sprayer sixteen times for all our different colors and coats.
THE PROCESS
EXTRA NOTES: Be patient. Experiment with colors and combinations of primer, base, and top coats to make sure that they are compatible and that you like them. It is better to buy serveral different colors at the store and then test them at home to see which you like, then go back to buy as much as you need. Buy extra. Return what you don't use-- of the unused cans, obviously. With my projects I found that the following number of cans was needed: Each scooter used a total of 5 cans of Automotive primer (10 oz ea.), 6 cans of color (10 oz each, or approx 10 5oz cans.. eg total of about 60 oz.), 4 cans of clear gloss (11 oz ea.) I also used one can (11 oz) of chrome/silver aerosol for various parts-- rims, centerstand, fork, horncast grille, rack, seat frame. The chrome paint will dullen when clear coated. I chose to clear coat it anyway, usually, with the exception of when I wanted to retain the silvery, shiny finish-- on the grille and turn-signal frames. Have fun, be safe, enjoy! JPM 1955 Allstate 125 - 1978 P125X - 1979 P200E - Booth&Painting design ©1998 JPM |