Interior Plastic Spray Paint
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Teching In
Joined: Jan 2005
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From: North Alabama
Interior Plastic Spray Paint A few years ago I was at a local body shop having some work done on my Chevy truck. Another Chevy truck was in the shop and they were putting in a new dash. The truck interior was maroon, but the plastic dash was black. The body man said all the replacement dashes for these trucks came black and were painted to match. The paint store had spray can paint just for this purpose. I had always assumed all plastic pieces like that were made the color that they are. This brings me to my question, can the plastic interior pieces of our cars be painted this way? I have some pieces that I would like to restore back to a mint look, my car hauled a kid in it's previous life.
interior pieces from the factory were molded with a colored plastic to get them the right color for the car. You can paint your stock pieces but they scratch easily. I guess you have to weigh what you want, durability of the less than perfect stock piece or repainting your stock piece monthly to keep it looking nice.
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Teching In
Joined: Jan 2005
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From: North Alabama
Originally Posted by jammon46
Bead blast it, primer then a good 5 coats is the best thing you can do for plastic. Maybe even some clear coat over the color.
Thread Starter
Teching In
Joined: Jan 2005
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From: North Alabama
Originally Posted by Z95m6
interior pieces from the factory were molded with a colored plastic to get them the right color for the car. You can paint your stock pieces but they scratch easily. I guess you have to weigh what you want, durability of the less than perfect stock piece or repainting your stock piece monthly to keep it looking nice.
On The Tree
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 103
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From: Tulsa, OK
The guy at the GM dealer is right, most interior peices that are large come from the factory in black then are painted by the shop. In the old muscle cars people change plastic colors all the time this way too. It's a special paint they use and I really don't remember the process to prep the material
Carcraft had a how to article on how to paint interior pieces. I followed it step by step cleaning, preping, and using all the products they suggested. I was also using a quality paint made just for this you spray out of a gun not just a rattle can stuff. I did this on my 69 Mach 1. It looked great, but the stuff would scratch right off if anything hit it real hard. I finally just bought rattle cans to keep and touch the stuff up with. I really have to be pretty careful or the paint is coming off. I've also painted my center console insert in my 97+ console. I've already had to repaint it about 3 times in 3-4 months. Just one little thing or slip up and paint is scratched. 
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Thread Starter
Teching In
Joined: Jan 2005
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From: North Alabama
Originally Posted by Z95m6
Carcraft had a how to article on how to paint interior pieces. I followed it step by step cleaning, preping, and using all the products they suggested. I was also using a quality paint made just for this you spray out of a gun not just a rattle can stuff. I did this on my 69 Mach 1. It looked great, but the stuff would scratch right off if anything hit it real hard. I finally just bought rattle cans to keep and touch the stuff up with. I really have to be pretty careful or the paint is coming off. I've also painted my center console insert in my 97+ console. I've already had to repaint it about 3 times in 3-4 months. Just one little thing or slip up and paint is scratched.
This stuff looks like what I saw if I remember right. SEM rings a bell. I can only hope that your results aren't typical, for whatever reason. It's definately not bonding. I know that the piece in my Dad's truck looked the same as the rest of his dash for a long time, until he sold the truck. Owners of replacement dashes would be taking them back to the shop also.
I would hate to add the results of a ford into a truly scientific study of these finishes because of all the other elements that get added in due to the cheap initial construction. It could come down to something as simple as the baling wire rubbing the plastic
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My 1996 GTP had a partially painted dash. They came that way from the factory. Looked really nice...but over time, it did scratch. The 69 in my sig has some repainted interior parts...they are holding up well so far. I just wouldn't recommend painting items in high impact areas.
TECH Fanatic
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 1,654
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From: Ga
My father in law just redone some of the interior parts on a 91(I think) Z24. He painted the plastic pieces with interior plastic paint and it looked like brand new. Can tell they were painted. I was very impressed.
