midcoat painting

[Tattootex]

I do a lot of custom work on bikes and cars.Here is a tip for doing flames that has been excellent.Put your base color down .Wait for the base to totally set up and dry.Mix powder pearl and your base reducer together .It doesnt take much of the pearl[ so be careful].Get the mixture that you want.At the gun use lower air about 25 to 35 pds and go 1 fast coat over your flame design.Dont waste time you want this thin to be able to see thru it.Then clear your panel.

 

[rex]

Welcome to the board.As you know this does work but I rarely do it since that first coat of clear can move it and I don't use clear that lends well to a tack coat,and I'm kind of leary about things like this in public so a novice doesn't misinterpret it and cause themself a problem somewhere else.Please don't read this as disrespectful because it isn't,but there's alot of 'green' people stopping in for advice and we tend to harp the basics to get them set up and going.I'm as guilty for throwing a wrench in the wheel and really screwing up their heads,but I try not to unless it's with the more experienced.Hang out for a while,this is the best place I've seen on this subject-and once again,welcome to the forum

 

[rex]

To clarify my last post I put my pearl in midcoat clear to give it some body so the pearl isn't just laying on top of the base after the reducer dries.Just putting the pearl in reducer will work but yu have to be careful not to tack it off or touch it and if you lay the first coat of clear on wet it can float the pearl and move it around some.

 

[DDG]

If you're doing ghost flames w/ pearl you need something to "transport" the pearl, hence the
intercoat clear which is just clear paint.
I personally would not recommend using straight
reducer for the transport. It will only melt the paint below.

 

[DDG]

One more thing, when painting the flames simply
dust on 2-3 coats of clear/pearl mixture or until you're satisfied.