Paint and prep ?'s

[OutbackL130]

I recently purchased my first real tractor that is more than just a lawn mower and I am in the process of restoring it. I stripped it down to the frame and want to repaint everything.

As you can see in this pic the body and fender panels have surface rust but there is no deep pitting or penetrating rust.

I'm going to coat everything in degreaser and pressure wash. The frame will then be primed and painted with rustoleum.
The body panels will be painted JD green with the enamel paint from TSC.

1. I like Rustoleum's Rusty Metal Primer. Can I use this to prime the enitre body and then paint over it with TSC's paint even though they are different brands?

2. What grit sand paper should I use to prep?

 

[Sysop]

Rustoleum makes a full line of FARM EQUIPMENT colors, they have a perfect match for JD Green and Yellow in rattlecans, quarts, and gallons and it's the same as any other rustoleum.

SEE HERE

There are other places besides amazon that carries it. ACE Hardware carries it locally here.

 

[OutbackL130]

Awesome! I will use rustoleum start to finish then.

I was wondering if this type of surface rust would require 180 grit initially and work my way up to 400?

 

[Sysop]

I generally just wirebrush off any loose stuff and spray. Rustoleum has chemicals in it to dissolve and stop current oxidization/rust (much like naval jelly and other rust removal products), except it's meant to reduce the number of steps, spray a bit on some rusty metal and you'll notice it bubble some before adhering to the surface (it is more noticeable with flat colors than gloss).

If it is a surface I want to look nice, I generally scrub it down really well with a wirewheel on a drill to get anything loose off and start spraying with the rustoleum flat primer and doing light sanding to smooth it out. After three or four passes of spray and sanding it's normally smooth enough to take a nice gloss coat and look good. If some of it was extremely rough and pitted, sometimes I'll use a little spot and glaze putty to fill in and smooth out between primer coats.

I really don't like sanding away all the rust, because to get all the rust out of the pits the oxidation process creates, you must sand away a lot of good metal. I prefer letting the rust removal chemicals do their job of dissolving the rust from the surface and pits, and letting the paint fill the low spots left by the pits. Main thing I concern myself with on prep is ensuring it is free of anything loose or greasy that is going to prevent good adhesion of the new paint. I never have rustoleum I apply come off or rust through, I generally end up scratching it while working with it. I also try to touch up any scratches on any of my machines yearly.

Don't forget some pics of the process, progress, and finished product!

 

[OutbackL130]

Sounds good! Earlier today I picked up a wire wheel from lowes for doing the frame and was wondering how it would work on the body panels too.

 

[Sysop]

Should be fine, just go slow and easy at it.

 

[Stick895]

I would take it down to bare metal, degrease, epoxy prime, skim coat with body filler, block it, prime again and paint. But that's just me.

 

[bjr]

I did a JD 240 last year where the battery had leaked and took away paint down the side of the machine right into the mower deck. There was some serious rust in those areas. I took it down to bare metal with paint remover and that was a real job (a lot of coats of paint remover). I then used Ospho on it. Ospho is some kind of acid that treats rust and makes the paint stick better. I primed and painted the deck, and primed the body, but had a buddy shoot the green color for me, as I get to many runs when I do it. We used the hardener in the paint so it won't fade quickly. I bought the regular tractor paint from the local Western wear/tractor parts store, I don't remember the brand. Maybe not a factory job but good enough for my garden tractor. I traded tilling job for the tractor and couldn't afford to put a lot of money into the paint job. I took most of the body parts to a "professional" body shop for quote, well, they wanted $700 to do 4 pieces, they didn't get the job. bjr