Paint dust precautions

JC Arcade

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I'm making my first attempt at a decent finish on a painted cab. Nothing fancy, just a generic black JAMMA cab. The part that has me a little nervous is the sanding of the paint between coats. The only place I have room to paint is in the driveway in front of my garage. I have two small kids and their playset is right near the garage. How nervous should I be about getting paint dust all over the place? Any tips or precautions I should take? Understand that my oldest, my 4 year old son, has autism so things like this that don't worry people too much scare the crap out of me.
 
Hey Joe -

Is your garage attached or detached? Mine is detached and I just do all my bondo work and sanding in the garage or outside the garage after they go to bed. If your mainly worried about the original paint dust maybe consider using a water based stripper and strip all of the paint off "after hours" "then" get out the shop vacuum and a sand off the remaining paint.

I'm amazed at how much more careful I am now compared to my first restoration only 3 years ago. I'm still coughing up Ms. Pac Man blue.

My buddy uses a box fan with a furnace filter taped to it to filter the air. I'd keep your kids out of the garage for a day or two and let the fan filter the dust out of the air. But, the shop vacuum will help keep the dust to a minimum.

Bill
 
While I've never done this it's been mentioned that you can attach a vacuum to many sanders and create so little dust that you can sand in the house without making a mess. Not that you want to sand in the house but if you can reduce the dust to that level by using a vacuum then I'd imagine that you could do the same out doors.
 
I'm amazed at how much more careful I am now compared to my first restoration only 3 years ago. I'm still coughing up Ms. Pac Man blue.


Bill


you and me both bro..... when i was sanding my ms pac my nose was running horibly and i had blue snot for a week lol
 
While I've never done this it's been mentioned that you can attach a vacuum to many sanders and create so little dust that you can sand in the house without making a mess. Not that you want to sand in the house but if you can reduce the dust to that level by using a vacuum then I'd imagine that you could do the same out doors.


This is what I do when sanding to keep the mess down. I attach my shop vac to my sander and it picks up a lot of the dust. When I used to build retail floor sets at a clothing store we used those industrial back pack vacuums that you see cleaning people use and there was little to no dust. All you do is remove the dust catching bag on your sander and connect your vacuum hose to the port and you are good to go.
 
+1 on hooking up a Shop Vac to the sander.

I'm using a DeWalt random orbit sander that came with a dust catcher, I took the catcher off and hooked up a Shop Vac to the port so it draws through the punched holes in the sandpaper.

If you want to take it one step further, Shop Vac sells paper bag liners that go inside the vac canister to catch the extra fine dust that might make it past the main pleated filter.
 
When I do body work, I wet the ground with the hose before I sand, and then before I paint. Pretty much takes care of any dust that can be kicked up or lands on the wet pavement when sanding and dissapears. You dont have to flood the place, just a nice light spray to soak up dust particles.
 
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