Painting with the hood on or off?

[av405]

I mainly build curbside and tend to forego engine detailing if it's an option. Most of the time, I've painted the hood and bodies separately and then glued the hood in place when I was done. I did once glue the hood onto the body first and then painted it all together, but I found that there was a lot of paint buildup between the gaps of the hood and body. That was probably my fault for overdoing it on the painting. I'll stick to what has been working for me. Still, I just wanted to get your guys' feedback on painting with the hood on or off, assuming the engine compartment isn't in play.

[64SS350]

Definitely off, it gives better detail of the hood/fender gaps.

[Classicgas]

Yeah off, but at the same time with the same batch.

[Ace-Garageguy]

Oh geez.

If it's a metallic or pearl, shoot at least the last coat with the hood on...or you will most likely get a color "flop" mismatch.

Next time you go to a real car show, look at how many cars have slight mismatches between doors and fenders, or doors and quarter panels.

But folks just never learn.

[R. Thorne]

I guess I just don’t get it.  I always paint with the hood on (attached with a tiny bit of adhesive or tape) .  Why make painting harder?  I have painted 1:1 cars in the past and would have never dreamt  of painting them with the hood off.  Yes, on a lot of cars, it would not show up, but why take the chance when all you have to do is take 5 minutes to fasten it on.?

[Can-Con]

I tape mine on from underneath in a way that the hood sits a couple mm off the body so the hood matches the tops of the fenders and edges of the hood and fenders gets some paint Then after the paint is good and dry, I go back and tape off the engine bay and spray it and the under side of the hood. 

Usually, you can't see the difference.  , , , and this one is candy paint. 

[kurth]

I end up painting the hood separately because I often want to get the body color in the engine compartment, depending on the kit, and if the real car was painted that way.  I might also paint it seperately if i want to get body color on the the underside of the hood. 

Ace-Garageguy's point about metallics is a good one I have not thought of, and It will cause me to re-evaluate my process. I might end up painting the underside of the hood and the engine compartment a day or two before the final body paint job to ensure an even finish. 

 

[Ace-Garageguy]

56 minutes ago, R. Thorne said:

I guess I just don’t get it.  I always paint with the hood on (attached with a tiny bit of adhesive or tape) .  Why make painting harder?  I have painted 1:1 cars in the past and would have never dreamt  of painting them with the hood off.  Yes, on a lot of cars, it would not show up, but why take the chance when all you have to do is take 5 minutes to fasten it on.?

Exactly.

[av405]

1 hour ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

Oh geez.

If it's a metallic or pearl, shoot at least the last coat with the hood on...or you will most likely get a color "flop" mismatch.

Next time you go to a real car show, look at how many cars have slight mismatches between doors and fenders, or doors and quarter panels.

But folks just never learn.

Sorry, your tone is confusing me. Did I say something wrong? The whole point of my question is to learn.

[Ace-Garageguy]

34 minutes ago, av405 said:

Sorry, your tone is confusing me. Did I say something wrong? The whole point of my question is to learn.

What's confusing?

The "oh geez" is for the experts who say "paint the hood off".

I think my answer is pretty easily comprehensible as to why you don't want to do that with pearls or metallics...as several other guys who understand have echoed.

Those of us who paint real cars and have a clue would never dream of painting parts separately, unless the paint is a solid color. 

And even then, if the color is a base-clear, you can get a slight panel-to-panel mismatch.

But then again, some people just don't even see it.

EDIT: Some years back, the idiot know-it-all painter who shot a real-steel 354 Hemi-powered '33 Plymouth I built for a nationally known shop shot the HOK sunset orange with the fenders, hood, and doors separate..."but at the same time with the same batch." When it came back to me to build up, you could see across the parking lot that the panels were at least 3 different colors.

This was a $250,000 build, and to say the owner was a little upset would be the understatement of the decade.

It ended up costing the poor SOB who owned the car another 30 grand to get the paint right...as the clown who did it wrong wouldn't make it right himself, making up excuse after excuse after excuse.

The car owner sued the bozo who made the mess, and collected absolutely nothing.

Below is the car just before I'd completed the metalwork.

The frame and engine in HOK sunset orange...

 

Edited January 5, 2024 by Ace-Garageguy

[av405]

19 minutes ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

What's confusing?

The "oh geez" is for the experts who say "paint the hood off".

I think my answer is pretty easily comprehensible as to why you don't want to do that with pearls or metallics...as several other guys who understand have echoed.

Those of us who paint real cars and have a clue would never dream of painting parts separately, unless the paint is a solid color. 

And even then, if the color is a base-clear, you can get a slight panel-to-panel mismatch.

But then again, some people just don't even see it.

EDIT: Some years back, the idiot know-it-all painter who shot a real-steel 354 Hemi-powered '33 Plymouth I built for a nationally known shop shot the HOK sunset orange with the fenders, hood, and doors separate..."but at the same time with the same batch." When it came back to me to build up, you could see across the parking lot that the panels were at least 3 different colors.

This was a $250,000 build, and to say the owner was a little upset would be the understatement of the decade.

It ended up costing the poor SOB who owned the car another 30 grand to get the paint right...as the clown who did it wrong wouldn't make it right himself, making up excuse after excuse after excuse.

The car owner sued the bozo who made the mess, and collected absolutely nothing.

 

It wasn't clear if your "oh geez" and "but folks just never learn" was directed at me, at others, or who. Yes, that was confusing for me as the OP. Anyhow, thanks for clarifying and thank you for your information.

[64SS350]

Oh...I digress 

[Bills72sj]

3 hours ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

EDIT: Some years back, the idiot know-it-all painter who shot a real-steel 354 Hemi-powered '33 Plymouth I built for a nationally known shop shot the HOK sunset orange with the fenders, hood, and doors separate..."but at the same time with the same batch." When it came back to me to build up, you could see across the parking lot that the panels were at least 3 different colors.

This was a $250,000 build, and to say the owner was a little upset would be the understatement of the decade.

It ended up costing the poor SOB who owned the car another 30 grand to get the paint right...as the clown who did it wrong wouldn't make it right himself, making up excuse after excuse after excuse.

The car owner sued the bozo who made the mess, and collected absolutely nothing.

Below is the car just before I'd completed the metalwork.

 

Thanks for sharing. My Dad used to drag race a 33 Plymouth Coupe with a 331 Hemi in the mid 60's. At one point he had 8! 2BBLs on it. If he saw that there was no one in a certain, Blown, class, he would run a flex hose from the heater blower into one of the carbs just to win a trophy.

[Ace-Garageguy]

16 minutes ago, Bills72sj said:

Thanks for sharing. My Dad used to drag race a 33 Plymouth Coupe with a 331 Hemi in the mid 60's. At one point he had 8! 2BBLs on it. If he saw that there was no one in a certain, Blown, class, he would run a flex hose from the heater blower into one of the carbs just to win a trophy.

That, sir, is pretty cool.   

[StevenGuthmiller]

As Ace says, spraying the body and hood separately for the initial coats to get color on the engine compartment where applicable, followed by taping the hood in place for the final coat or two is the best approach.

That said, I don’t always do it.

Probably out of laziness more than anything.

Now if I were doing the model as a curbside, I would absolutely glue the hood in place prior to paint.

If you’re having issues with filling in the hood gaps with paint, you should be having the same problem with the other panel lines.

If not, that tells me that you need to do some additional work on the hood gaps so that they match the door and trunk gaps.

If you are having problems with obscuring the other panel lines, you either need to use different paint, or less of it, or you should be scribing to make all of the gaps deeper.

 

 

 

 

Steve

Edited January 6, 2024 by StevenGuthmiller

[av405]

Thank you all for your answers. It's given me some good food for thought.

[Classicgas]

Saying to paint it off doesn't make one a expert, and none of us that said it's how we do it said we were, it's just our opinion. Others that disagree with us do think they're experts and go to any length to make it known.?????

Edited January 6, 2024 by Classicgas

[slusher]

12 hours ago, av405 said:

Thank you all for your answers. It's given me some good food for thought.

Sir, I have painted mine with the hood off, but if I was doing a curb side build I would leave it on.  I enjoy seeing your builds…

[1972coronet]

The last two curbside kits I've built were painted with hood on ( AMT 1963 Nova Wagon and AMT 1965 GTO ). However, before I affixed the bonnet in both instances, I made sure that the panel separation (hood-to-fenders, etc.) was 'true' , then I painted some flat black around the hood's edge and fenders' edges. 
[ EDIT ] : This is done before the final primer coat.

Like @Ace-Garageguy and others have stated , metallics and pearls - and especially candy colours - need to be uniform. This is true in 1:1 as it is on our scale replicas. Final coats with all relative panels affixed (temporarily) is paramount. Solid colours ? Not so much (at least in my experiences).

 

Edited January 7, 2024 by 1972coronet

[CA Whitecloud]

On 1/6/2024 at 4:00 PM, 1972coronet said:

then I painted some flat black around the hood's edge and fenders' edges. 

What does this accomplish exactly? A shadowing affect?

[CA Whitecloud]

On 1/6/2024 at 4:00 PM, 1972coronet said:

The last two curbside kits

What is Curbside? Same as Out Of Box, or no?

[Straightliner59]

14 minutes ago, CA Whitecloud said:

What is Curbside? Same as Out Of Box, or no?

Curbside is a model that's built so that you only see what you see, when a real car is sitting "by the curb". No engine (except for parts protruding from the hood), no chassis detail. I generally add some detail to the interior, as well as details to tires and wheels, headlights, turn signals and taillights, master power switches for drag racers, etc. I enjoy building them.. ...