Hairdryers and lamps/lampboxes

[Wetman]

No I havent decided on a career change, but I am wondering has anyone used a hairdryer on auto rattle can paints IE Halfords or Hicote or similar and what are the results? The other one I was wondering about was something I saw on a woodturning video for drying wood. Its basically a big enough box with a lamp head or just the bulb placed into a hole in it. Obviously the heat from the lamp does its stuff but I was wondering if its possible to make a body shop type bakeoven for painting and whats the drawbacks if any?

 

[Falcon#5]

I have only used a hair dryer with PS paint, so can't comment with certainty for automotive paint.

I'd say it would work, but not sure if you'd want to spend that long doing it. PS paint dries very quickly.

When I was a kid I used to work at a crash repairer, and they used a bank of flood lights to heat single panel spray jobs.

They reserved the heated spray booth for full body paint jobs.

I'd say if you knocked up a ply/MDF box and fitted a lamp or a ceramic heat lamp used in reptile vivariums it would work fine.

[KEV THE REV]

The hair drier is ok to raise the temperature in a cool environment , but you need to be careful about kicking up dust etc from the waves and actually causing a problem of dust settling . A proper spray booth is more of a controlled environment with extractors etc so is not really a fair comparison to a cardboard box set up . That said , I have set up a 'booth' and allowed it to settle before spraying paint , mainly to protect the surrounding area from overspray . Dust - the modellers worst enemy !!

[topforcein]

i have used the hair dryer on ps paint(i nearly always tend to use the hairdryer when painting lexan shells as i have no patience for the end result) and auto motive paint also but only on a roof spoiler for my grand hauler but thats about it and dont bother to rush the drying on automotive paint as sometimes it will dry fast and then it will take longer it depends on the weather when you paint you wont need to bother with the lamp or the bakeoven idea as the paint will dry fast enough with out help you will see infrared lamp to dry automotive paint these days when doing a small repair. the key with paint is clean/wipe in between coats you should only need a both if you intend to spray indoors to keep the wife/girlfriend happy i always tend to spray in my back garden when the weather permits

but on the other hand if you mean to use a hair dryer to warm a can up before just put it in a sink of warm to hot water for a couple of mins