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DIY Paint Booth

zerobalance

Well-known member
Joined
Sep 15, 2020
Member Number
2874
Messages
166
Loc
Ohio, the middle part of it
Anyone with experience building one? I looked at the inflatable ones, but by the time I get one big enough to fit a truck, mess with setting it up, storage, all that, I decided it's easier to convert my lean to into a part time booth. I only use this lean to to store my tractor, mini excavator, and cars that actually run, so I can just pull them out when it's time to paint. It's 12x50, with a 11' ceiling. I'm thinking about building a moveable false wall, so I can adjust the booth size, and can put the filters into it, vs the actual wall.

Looking at blowers, I'm trying to determine the correct sizing. If I build a smaller section, I figure the volume to be around 5000 cubic feet. This blower Ebay blower will move about 1700cfm, so 2.5 min to turnover the air. That seems like too long to me, but I have no clue. There is conflicting info, and some specify feet per min, not cfm.
 
i plan on a few box fans one or two on each end. i bought a portable garage off vevor.

i think it was 250 delivered

www.vevor.com

VEVOR Carport, 12 x 20 ft Heavy Duty Car Canopy with Roll-up Ventilated Windows, Extra Large Portable Garage with Removable Sidewalls, Waterproof UV Resistant All-Season Tarp for SUV, Truck, Boat | VEVOR US

Discover the VEVOR Heavy Duty Carport—12 x 20 ft all-season shelter for your SUV, truck, or boat. Roll-up ventilated windows, removable sidewalls, waterproof, UV-resistant tarp.
www.vevor.com www.vevor.com
 
There is a kid on YouTube that did a paint job on a shed, he messed up and had the fan pulling the fumes out, this caused it to pull dirt and insects in. Figured out to push filtered air in pushing out dust. Ronald Finger Fiero on youtube, did basically what you want to do, believe it was just plastic sheeting, box fan and furnace filters.
 
You got any old carpet? I just saw a Facebook thing where the guy was saying how they carpeted their paint booth, and it helped keep the dust down as well as something to do with the static.
 
Lumberjack said:
There is a kid on YouTube that did a paint job on a shed, he messed up and had the fan pulling the fumes out, this caused it to pull dirt and insects in. Figured out to push filtered air in pushing out dust. Ronald Finger Fiero on youtube, did basically what you want to do, believe it was just plastic sheeting, box fan and furnace filters.
Click to expand...
That's what I always figured. Filtered air pushing in to create positive pressure. Any gaps or cracks will leak air out rather than suck air in through them...

I've had other people disagree though.
 
gunracer1 said:
i plan on a few box fans one or two on each end. i bought a portable garage off vevor.

i think it was 250 delivered

www.vevor.com

VEVOR Carport, 12 x 20 ft Heavy Duty Car Canopy with Roll-up Ventilated Windows, Extra Large Portable Garage with Removable Sidewalls, Waterproof UV Resistant All-Season Tarp for SUV, Truck, Boat | VEVOR US

Discover the VEVOR Heavy Duty Carport—12 x 20 ft all-season shelter for your SUV, truck, or boat. Roll-up ventilated windows, removable sidewalls, waterproof, UV-resistant tarp.
www.vevor.com www.vevor.com
Click to expand...
This is what l did. I had a portable garage and bought a tarp big enough to wrap around the entire thing. Put a single box fan in the bottom corner pulling fumes out, and got to work.

I even hung some lights in it.

It was my 1st time painting a vehicle and 1st time building a paint booth.

For as ghetto as it all was, the paint jobs turned out good.
20240317_144939.jpg
 
The previous owner of my house built a DIY spray booth out of one of the garage bays. It's a little too narrow to spray a full sized vehicle comfortably, but worked great when I refurbished my boat years ago. It has one exhaust fan in the center of one wall, and two inlet air filter racks at the ends of the opposite wall. Roughly a cross draft design. With recessed fluorescent lighting in the walls, washable paneling, mixing bench, and hot & cold water supply, it does the job.

Depending on the weather and ambient temperatures, I can crank the heat or A/C in the main shop and draw that conditioned air through the filters into the booth.

Couple of old pics of when I did the boat project. You can see the exhaust fan up high on one wall, and the walk-through door in the same pic has panels that flip open to expose one set of filter racks. The other pic has the second set of filter racks at the opposite end.
hot sauce booth.JPG
hot sauce black.JPG
 
Interesting input from everyone. The lean to is getting spray foamed, so no chance of sucking in air from other places than where I want and I'll put some sort of heat in there, maybe duct a mini split into it to help a bit. I would prefer the fan to exhaust rather than blow in, just to keep turbulence down. I ordered the blower I linked, so I guess I'll find out if it works, I'm starting with a raptor liner job, so there is a lot more room for error than spraying real paint. I have done a bunch of backyard jobs, and way back my dad was a professional painter, I grew up helping him paint agricultural equipment in a pole barn, we never had a legit booth (it was the 80s after all)
 
grumpy356 said:
You got any old carpet? I just saw a Facebook thing where the guy was saying how they carpeted their paint booth, and it helped keep the dust down as well as something to do with the static.
Click to expand...
Damp the floor. Carpet would hold a shitload of dirt and cause static.
 
I’ve done a lot painting with a setup like Lee shows. I agree with fan sucking out. You want just enough airflow to clear out the room in a few minutes. Too much will cause a suction and pull dirt from every crack in the building. Clean up the area, blow everything off with air hose, leaf blower etc with fan running at least a few hour before spraying. I prefer the evening before if possible. Get all the junk out of the room so you’re not catching the air hose and have as much room as possible. Keep the floor damp, you don’t want puddles that splash up into the painted panels. No carpet! WTF? You don’t want any source of lint, dust etc. Cheap plastic drop cloths work good for covering things you can’t remove from the area, overspray will get on everything not covered. Covering it up will also help keep dirt down. Lots of lights like xjmark shows. You want to look at the reflection of the light on the panel as you spray. I like vertical lights off each corner as well. You’re going to get dirt, but you can minimize it. Also pay attention to the weather and time of day. A windy day can cause lots of problems. At night all the bugs are active and attracted to the light and fresh paint! I like early morning, it’s usually cool, calm and not a lot of bug activity.

Paint type matters as well. You can fix a lot of dirt, runs etc with block sanding/buffing. I swear you could do BC/CC with a brush and polish it up decent. Single stage enamel and polyurethane is less forgiving but it can be done.

Also match your reducer speed to the temperature. You don’t want a fast reducer on a hot day, or slow on a cool day.

Keep trips in/out of the booth to minimum, every trip stirs up dust that goes straight to the paint. And tell your buddies to go sit somewhere and have a beer until you’re done. Don’t be sticking their head in every few minutes to watch! Hope that helps.
 
What's the risk of a sucking fan causing an explosion? Old wives tail, or 1 in 73? I thought that legit booths had an explosion proof fan, and that diy booths had pusher fans for this reason:homer:
 
Downdraft airflow is ideal. Make the roof as many filter panels as possible, draw out from the bottom. You want lots of air movement, but at low velocity. Start painting at the top of the car and work down so the overspray is carried away from the finished areas.

downdraft 1.jpg


Pro booths may have an exit grate in the floor for true down flow.

downdraft 2.jpg


A supplied air mask is ideal for lung and eye protection. Pull air from outside the booth away from the exit fan. Just mind the hose so it doesn't muss your paint job.

supplied air_.jpg
 
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I’d love to see my friends lungs if he ever dies. 25 years as a body man, pack of newports a day, I’ve never seen him wear any PPE.

He’s got a raggedy paint booth, he wets the floor sprays the paint, then turns on the fan for a few minutes. Good enough for crashed auction junk.
 
Thatg9659 said:
I’d love to see my friends lungs if he ever dies. 25 years as a body man, pack of newports a day, I’ve never seen him wear any PPE.

He’s got a raggedy paint booth, he wets the floor sprays the paint, then turns on the fan for a few minutes. Good enough for crashed auction junk.
Click to expand...
What does he charge for a paint job if I bring the car to him masked but nothing else?

Edit: single color two stage
 
Thatg9659 said:
I’d love to see my friends lungs if he ever dies. 25 years as a body man, pack of newports a day, I’ve never seen him wear any PPE.

He’s got a raggedy paint booth, he wets the floor sprays the paint, then turns on the fan for a few minutes. Good enough for crashed auction junk.
Click to expand...
I know a similar guy except I would rate him one of the top ten painters in the country. Bunch of Pebble Beach Best in Class and Best in Show attest to his abilities.

His shop would not even classify as a prep area in most shops. But his work is exceptional.
 
arse_sidewards said:
What does he charge for a paint job if I bring the car to him masked but nothing else?

Edit: single color two stage
Click to expand...

Probably less than the actual cost to transport it eight hours from you and back. He’s in pa.
 
I've seen plenty of nice paint jobs done in a shop without much fuss. Suppose it all depends if you're painting heavy equipment or Concorde pebble Beach level stuff.

No sense spending weeks and 30k putting together a nice booth for a tractor or old truck. Though probably not wanting to paint a Ferrari with Krylon in your dooryard, but plenty fine for a rusty 1987 Ford Topaz.

They painted most of the dump trucks at work over winter, just put up some tarps to divide a bay, left the vehicle door open after inches and painted.
Did 8 or 9 trucks like that.
Good paint too. Devoe, devcoe? I have the info saved so I can buy some next thing I paint.
The truck I run went in Friday morning and I was hauling snow again Saturday night.
 
I use a 36" fan on the exhaust.
 

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