Sunday, January 09, 2011

Painted Dome Switches, Botched Paint on Resin Eye

Today I decided to attempt the paint job on the dome switches and resin eye.

Before painting the eye, I wanted to take care of a scratch just above the slot. I post-processed the photo by cranking up the contrast and definition to highlight the scratch, but it's still hard to see.



After sanding the primer off, I spread a little Evercoat over the area.



Once the Evercoat had dried, I sanded that smooth as well.



I then applied another coat of primer to the dome switches and eye, in preparation for painting.



Everything was going well, until...



...I saw this. Spiderwebbing. If prior experience is an indicator, this is probably due to an insufficient primer job in this area.



Darn. Time for the acetone bath.



In process of cleaning the paint and primer off, I inadvertently knocked out some filler that was filling a corner bubble void. I will refill that soon and try again another day.



In the meantime, I proceeded with painting the dome switches. By this time it was getting late in the day, so cold and darkness started to set in.




As I mentioned earlier, the switches need to be painted in both on and off positions, necessitating that the switch be touched during the painting process.



All done, I think. There is a small ripple in the paint from when I flipped the switch before allowing one of the layers to sufficiently dry. If this looks too noticeable after a couple of days of drying, I may repaint these too. I need to keep my acetone supplies stocked up.



Not the most successful building day that I've had.

3 comments:

Bith said...

Me too! I've been fighting with the paint on my Resin Eye for a week!

Victor Franco said...

At least I'm in good company!

BTW Liz, I've been following your blog, you're doing great! I also like how you tell it like it is. It's tempting to not show the mistakes, but they are part of the story.

-Victor

Bith said...

So true! I hope to save some future builder from any mistakes I've made via my transparency. ;-)

I also plan to copy as much as possible your new dome ring electronics install -- looks great!

Thanks!
Liz