Prepping my Metro door panels for paint and .... ?

[HEMICUDA]

Primer discussion is interesting.   On the surface it seems logical especially on body sheetmetal.

I used Seymour rattle cans directly onto blasted suspension parts 25 years ago and they held up very well.  especially the cast gray finish, the silver pigment had some pinhead rust showing.   
 
On the other hand, I freshly blasted my hood hinges and used SEM self etch and two months later it had rust breaking through.   

last summer, I used rustolium primer and Seymour paint and eastwood diamond clear during my suspension refurbishment, they did scratch easy, especially if primer didn't have several days to harden... we'll see how they do over time.   

One thing for sure, I don't trust SEM self etch primer in rattle can anymore... so suggestion are welcome. 

I know painting with a gun would be better all around.

thx!

It seems painting parts come up often on this website, one thing I can tell you as a professional restorer, if your painting parts and not powder coating, if it's not a "catalyzed" paint or primer, you will never get the longevity with single stage "non-catalyzed" rattle can paint.  Your true "professional" restorers will never use rattle can paint for anything.  Rattle can paint is left for the enthusiast, not a true professional.

[cudaize]

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I noticed with my black Metro panels they were painted or dyed when I bought them.  I'm not sure if all the Metro panels have this done to them or only certain batches if the color is a little off.  I would keep cleaning them until no more black comes off.  There is a chance that your panels were painted but not properly prepped, so you don't want to dye over that.
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Are you sure?  And they were brand new I assume?  Can't imagine why they would be painted.  These are injection molded.  And from what I know about that, its a process where they start out with little plastic pellets that are the same color as the finished product.   They're heated and pressed into a mold.  So, the product is the same color all the way through. Meaning, you could cut the piece in half and it would be the same color on the inside as it is the outside.  So not sure why they would be painted.  I think they know we're going to paint them once we get them. 

In any case, I painted mine already and they look great.  The first door panel, I scrubbed it 3 times.  The other door panel I just washed lightly once and let it dry.  Then followed the regular procedure to paint them as all the rest of the panels.   
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They were definitely brand new Metro panels.  I bought them from Metro at Carlisle about 7-8 years ago.  I had held off buying them as I was hoping they would come out with Convertible ones and wanted to buy them together figuring this would be the best chance of getting them to match.  Since Metro seemed to be winding down their automotive business, to focus on selling of all things skateboards, I bought a set of front panels before they were no longer available.  The only way I could tell they were painted/dyed was that there were clip nuts installed in the armrest area and they were painted black, when removed the sheen in this area was slightly different.

I'm assuming that they used SEM Landau Black or something very close.  I compared the repro panels to my original rears after cleaning them and they were close to identical in color.  Since my one original was slightly sun bleached I lightly misted both with SEM Landau Black after cleaning and using the adhesion promoter.  I am very happy with how the repros match the originals.  In the picture below the shading of them look slightly off but in person the difference is imperceptible.  These panels are one of the best reproductions I have come across.

[Mr Lee]

Cudaize,
They look great. 

So did metro stop making these panels?   Wondering if one day, years from now, if I damage one of my door panels, will they still be available?  Should i buy another set and just put em away?  If theyre $500 now, will they be more expensive in ten years?


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[HEMICUDA]

I'm with you Ola, the panels are in my top 3 parts ever reproduced for an ebody aside from sheet metal.  Yea, I couldn't figure out Joel doing skate boards either, pretty sure Classic Industries bought all his tooling except for the interior panels made by Jesse Lia in Taiwan.  Dave Radcliff (good friend) from Roseville, a sponsor on this website, picked up the manufacturing of all the panels thru Jesse Lia and has been supplying them ever since.