KVR Audio

bronxsound · Post by **bronxsound** » Wed May 25, 2011 8:14 am

Hi guys.

What I'm planning to do is to repaint few of my instruments. The problem I have is that their front panels/cases are plastic. Some of them have few scrathes here and there. So the plan is to sort out scrathes first then put primer, paint and the finish.

My major concern is primer as it is important to pick the right one not to dissolve the plastic. Does anybody knows which one is right for that task? Maybe someone can tell me how can I figure out type of plastic the body is made from? (I guess theres a stamp inside the part but symbols are cryptic to me)

Thanks

trimph1 · Post by **trimph1** » Wed May 25, 2011 2:07 pm

What type of plastic used is a difficult question unless one knows the age of the piece as well as make...a couple of general comments...a good way to find out what kind of plastic you have seems a little off putting but has worked for me on occasion...it is this..take a little sliver of the plastic in question off the faceplate concerned and take a match to the end of it..

Result?...Polypropylene(PP) and Polyethylene(PE) will both burn slowly and both will drip...PE always seems to smell of candle wax...now as for other types of plastics...PVC does not burn..it just gets soft and stinks to high heaven, Acrylics burn slowly and smell sweet, and ABS plastics tend to burn quick and give off a pong..always do this in the open air please!!

Now as to paint, I've had some success with Krylon Fusion paints...

http://www.krylon.com/products/fusion_for_plastic/

...as it does not need all kinds of prep work for it to cling...although I still tend to lightly sand my faceplates when I want to make sure the thing does not chip off

bronxsound · Post by **bronxsound** » Wed May 25, 2011 7:16 pm

trimph1 thanks for your post. It is very useful tip (buring test). I have been looking for different sorts of painting stuff and was wondering if vinyl die would would work for music gear makeover projects. The benefit I see is that you don't need too much sanding (if at all) and there's no need for priming. Having said that what primer would you recommend?

trimph1 · Post by **trimph1** » Wed May 25, 2011 9:00 pm

With the Krylon paint you really do not need the primer..seems to work just as well without it...otherwise the only primer that I've used was Rustoleum's Primer Spray...http://www.rustoleum.com/cbgproduct.asp?pid=119

And lightly sanding the surface does help give it that extra 'bite' as well..

bronxsound · Post by **bronxsound** » Thu May 26, 2011 9:06 am

Is it resistant to chipping? I bet you do graphics/text using decals. Is there anything you could recommend?

trimph1 · Post by **trimph1** » Thu May 26, 2011 12:04 pm

It is quite resistant to chipping, from what I've seen so far...

As to decalling, most of my stuff gets done using water slip white paper ... that and a good ink jet printer!!

Although sometimes I have found that using stencils work just as well...if you find that you can't get the NOS decals for the piece it would be an idea to see whether you can kind of take a photo of the decal work and see whether you can come up with a close approximation of the decal that way..

A good source of info on the waterslide decals is here...

http://www.mcgpaper.com/decals.html

Some actually use vinyl as well...

Question - restoring an instrument - painting