QUOTES....

[BusyKiwi]

geez i had no idea paint would be so much, i know theres more to it than just paint

The primer I'm using on my van is $100 a litre (plus the hardener), well it's not really the primer, it's the etch primer, the primer (which is cheaper) goes on top of this

[Bas / NZ]

Gee, my first Bedford was painted for under  $600.00, I belonged to a club called West City Vans, and we rented a space under some shops in Glengarry Road in west Auckland NZ, we primed it, wet sanded it, 2 coats of 1k lacquer and then 4 coats of clear, started Friday night, drove it out Sunday night finished. Yes those were the days…  owned the van for 5 years and sold it looking as good as the day it was painted, minus 1 coat of clear. lol

[taggraphx]

Some of the prices that people pay these days for paint and body work really amaze me, I can under stand if you want perfection and painted a dark colour, but the average paint job can be done for $4000, providing the van is straight and no rust, I used to do full resprays for $2000 back in the 80s, and still did all right, my paint will cost $600, but can not put a price on the labour because the airbrush work is going to take quit a while, it will be my last one so there's no rush   

[BusyKiwi]

Some years ago a mate of mine got a van and wanted to be a courier, had to paint the van black (company colour), was a jappa van, so told him to bring it over friday night after work. He wasn't to fussed it not being dead straight as it would get knocked around but did want a few dents knocked out.
Was just the two of us, I put him to work stripping everything off and then sanding while I fixed the worse dents ...
Long story short, he drove out sunday evening with black van and to this day he swears he'll never prep another car/van for paint. I don't know what he was on about, his fingers only just bled a little (he didn't believe me about masking tape on fingers - wet sanding chews your finger prints off).
time wise, you spend more time stripping it, sanding and putting it back together, painting only takes an hour or two