Painting the dashboard AMX silver

[Eagle Groupie]

So I'm in the anti-faux wood grain camp and would like to paint over all that business with a nice coat of metallic silver. Does anyone happen to know which shade of SEM Color Coat best matches the silver of the AMX dash? I am, of course, referring to this...



Sorry, had to stare at that for a while. Anyway, for the record, the plastic in these dashboards does indeed react to acetone, quite a lot, actually, which means it is one of "ABS, PVC, and other similar plastics" and SEM 38363 Sand Free is the adhesion promoter of choice. I have no further words of wisdom at this time, but hopefully I will later.

[Nightpath]

I just repainted my interior to the Eagle. On the harder plastic trim I used a light sand paper (200+ grit), then washed and painted. Stuck to it nicely. The old paint is odd though because I think it was treated with something that will cause paint to "pool", looks messed up.

I did the same thing with the dash, not thinking that it was vinyl. Light sanding, then held the spray can about 2-3 feet away and did light sweeps at first. Took about 2 days to get it to lay properly and it looks nice, I even slapped a bit of clear coat on it to boot. Haven't had any come off.

If you do repaint, I highly suggest a light sanding, even on the dash vinyl. The paint on these cars is old, and I noticed in some places quite thick. 10 minutes with some light sandpaper, then clean it off with some hot water then a wet sand for another 10 minutes and it ended up really nice looking.

I learned this the hard way. Washing it off then using the no-prep stuff does NOT work. I did this for the whole interior (neglected to use any of the foundadtion sprays that keep the paint on better, next time I imagine I will). I think it was the Rustoleum brand, for use on plastics and the like.

I imagine that there was several different brands with applicatble silver metallic paint you could use though. Just make sure that there isn't a retarded coating of clear plastic over the top of it.

[priya]

I used Tamiya aluminum coloured paint for plastic and it looked exactly right to me.  The colour on the cap is not the same as what comes out of the can so don't be led astray by that.  I sanded with 180 grit horizontally only to give it a brushed aluminum look.  I started with actual AMX pieces so your woodgrained pieces may take more sanding than I had to do.  I had an entire AMX dash shipped from Kenosha to Saskatoon Saskatchewan and I think the total was about $400 by the time I got it here.  If only I had known I could just use the easily found woodgrained pieces and painted them aluminum colour.  For the radio/heater control bezel I took off the plastic overlay that was on it and used it to trace an outline on actual aluminum flashing I flattened out.  I used gasket punches to cut the curved corners and the rest of the metal was thin and soft enough to cut with a pair of sharp scissors.  I then also sanded that only horizontally with 180 grit, clear coated it and then glued it to the bezel with two sided tape.  That part was quite a bit of work and it took 3 tries to get it close enough to fit but also came out really nice.

http://forums.amceaglesden.com/index.php?topic=15595.525

Most hobby stores probably carry the Tamiya aluminum coloured paint for plastic.