Spray painted my Dell Laptop!

Cool write up that many people will find useful!

 

This is one of the best mods ive seen. great job

 

wicked sick paint job

 

Sweet......
That looks better than the original DELL skins found now.

 

looks mint, great job dude.

 

One Word: DOPE

 

Looks good. Funny though.. I have same yellow-black mod with my dell E1505 but with reverse color as what you have. Painted the palmrest black(yellow side), bottom with yellow and the top cover with black carbon fiber(yellow side).

 

Hey stuff79!

I'm really hoping you read this post and can help me out. When I first found your thread last september, I was amazed at the quality of your paintjob and it was what pushed me over the edge to paint my own dell 6400.

I followed your guide, among several others i found online and I used krylon primer, black krylon for plastic, and krylon triple thick glaze clearcoat. I then buffed out the paint with 3m polish.

It looked great for the first week or so, but for some reason the clearcoat and paint were very soft. The paint scuffed and dented VERY easilly, finger prints would leave marks wherever I put too much pressure and i had a whole host of annoying problems. Suffice to say I'm really frustrated after spending so much time painting ( i did about 4 layers of primer, 5 layers of paint, and 4 layers of clear, over hours and hours of sanding lol ).

can you PLEASE tell me exactly what brands of primer, paint and clearcoat you used, as well as where you found the 3m buffing compounds..i cant find them anywhere..

please help!

 

i'll admit i came into the thread expecting a gaudy, riced out, overstated, badly painted POS covered in component manufacturer logos or some gay, nerdy pop culture reference like most of these threads turn out to be.

but you did an amazing job, the paint, colour and gloss all work really well and manages to achieve what many modders fail at- actually making the notebook look better than it did originally.

 

Ok. From what I've gathered by the problem you're facing, it seems to me that you might very well have applied too thick a coat for the paint and quite possibly not allowed it to dry sufficiently between each coat. Please remember to apply thin layers of paint. I know sometimes there is a tendency to apply a thicker coat to get the surface all covered but this isnt necessary for the first few coats of paint.

The plastic primer I used is by Dupont Paints and the paint & clearcoat are from Nippon Paints. These were all available in can sprays at the hardware store. The 3M compound and polish I used were purchased from an automotive paint shop. It has better abrasives that help polish the paint and give it that mirror like finish. I hope this info helps.

 

I suggest you use metal primer then polyurethane car paint. This also requires lots and lots of sanding.

 

Hey Stuff79,

thanks a lot for the response! I was worried that you don't check this thread very much anymore and I would never get a response so I was really surprised to get a reply only a couple days later!

I definitely think that I may have sprayed each coat on too thickly without allowing for ample time to dry in between layers. I'm not completelyy sure thats the case though because I know that for the last few layers of paint, I would spray, wait several hours and then wetsand with 1000 grit sandpaper to remove orangepeel.

I am thinking that the problem may have been the clearcoat I used. I will change up the clearcoat and use the same brands you used but I was wondering - how has the quality of the paint and clearcoat held up for the past year? Is it like a factory clearcoating job where the clearcoat is rock hard and fingerprints just wipe off? My paintjob is a borderline disaster because the clearcoat is VERY soft, to the point that fingerprints and palmprints leave lasting impressions =(

Can you also give me some suggestions on painting locations, temperatures and dry times? I painted in the garage and had a lot of problems with tiny falling dust particles

 

that is a sweet paintjob dude! what steps/paints did you use?

 

so did u write a guide? if u did wat page is it on? i dont see it on the first page

 

Amazing! Istead of messing up your laptop like most people do. That looks so professional and actually looks like it would add value to your notebook and not take it away!!! Well done.

 

awesome job! only DIY one I've seen that hasn't been messy...looks sweet

 

Extremely impressive!

 

Looks great, Now that it has been a year or 2, How is this paint job holding up? Have any current pictures?
Hum........
Last Activity: 02-18-2009 09:00 PM

So i guess he no longer logs on..

 

haha, that so rocks... heading to the paint cupboard now to see if i have any magnolia wall paint left :/

 

That looks great! Looks better than my first attempt at that.....

 

Bumblebee :d !!!!

 

Wow this paintjob is awesome, so shiny and flawless! Looks kind of like a car's paintjob lol

 

Got an old Dell Inspiron 1000. Gonna do this. Maybe not as much detail, but gonna paint it for sure. I'll try to post back when I do.

 

Wow... drools...
GREAT JOB!!!

 

looks like a well done paint job, i wouldn't have gone with the yellow but to each his own

 

that's a beautiful paint job.

 

that looks really good!! I want to do mine!

 

great job, very cool

 

Awesome!!

Sooooo nice painting job!

I have already try something like that on my last computer so I know how is difficult...
(my results was a catastrophe...)

 

wow oh-so-awsome, there are some great painters here

 

If they'd only offer spray painting in Dell's customizations....

Still, kudos to the awesome paintwork!

 

The OP is being way too modest. He obviously knows far more about painting than the average person. And I'd still consider it a professional job--even if he's not getting paid for it.

 

What happens when the chassis of the laptop flexes? my display casing has a lot of flex so i was wondering if this would cause the paint to crack

Does anyone have any advice for what to use on the palm rests? i want a matte finish

Also can i paint the touch pad?

Also is there any clear filler i can use? i want to cut a design out of the lid and make it glow

 

Its been about 2 years now since I completed this project and it has been well worth the effort. Attached are the most recent pictures I took today, I apologize for the quality as it was taken with my HTC Touch Pro. Happy modding everyone!

 

Damn, still looks pretty professional and awesome!

I am not sure if you answered this but how many clear-coats have you put on it and have you done the wet-sanding technique per each layer ?

I am trying to achieve nice glossy-glass alike look without the stickiness but have yet to learn and perfect the technique.

Thanks!

-Mel