| It has been a few months since I put down the new paint but it has taken this long to complete the job. :) The process took essentially a full week back in late September of last year to build the booth, disassemble the car, prep, shoot the paint, reassemble. This was also with two of my guys helping out in the process. I went with the Matrix product and changed up a little on the mix for the base. The Nissan color calls for a fine pearlescent flake but I wanted a little more vivid appearance so we used a medium flake and increased the pearlescent quantity by 25%. I used a Devilbiss HVLP gun to shoot the base and clear - 3 coats of base, 3 coats of clear. Total cost for all materials including the booth: $925. Total man hours, three of us for 6 days pretty much doing nothing else, so figure ~100 hours. I couldn't be happier with the color and pearl - unfortunately the camera just can't really capture the way it looks in person. The medium pearl flake really brings an attractive appearance to it in the sunlight that you just have to see in person. :) All said and done though I would never want to do this kind of work for a living - the process is painstakingly slow and there is very little margin for error. I had a few runs in the clear here and there - the lighting is so important and we were a bit weak with illumination. You've got to have a lot of light to really see the surface of the clear and some areas in the booth just weren't lit up enough. Fortunately a run isn't a big deal to fix - block sand it out and buff. Between the prepwork and final wetsanding/buffing there is just a ridiculous amount of time involved. All in all though I'm in under a grand for the project. Over the past few months since then I've gone a few rounds with wetsanding and buffing to get that mirror finish. Yesterday she got a wash up and a nice coat of wax after work. It wasn't until this morning coming out to see her in the sun that inspired me to post up this project. :) So here it is, enjoy! (The last few pictures were taken just a couple of hours ago)
Temporary paint booth: 12' X 24'
 Lots of prepwork:
 
Picture of reflection off of the hood.
Repainted all of the engine pieces -
 
Enthusiasts soon understand each other. --W. Irving.
Are you an enthusiast? If you are out to describe the truth, leave elegance to the
tailor.
Albert Einstein
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AshsZ-II Ultimate Street Z - New Paint - 
