I've seen people here on the forum (after looking at the plastidip project thread) plastidip their front grill and some their rear spoilers.
Here is a thread to a picture for a quick reference.
https://my350z.com/forum/exterior-an...thread-19.html

My question is, how can I go about painting it (glossy) black, using spraypaint from a can? Is there a DIY for this somewhere? (Not that I could find, I somehow ended up at the plastidip thread)

I know if I wanted to plastidip it I could just mask it off, spray and I'm done, but I really don't like how flat/dull plastidip looks once it starts to fade.

I would like to paint my front grill and rear spoiler glossy black, will I have to sand it ? primer? wet sand? paint? will sanding fk up the natural clear coat forever? is it even possible to spray paint it glossy back as opposed to plastidipping? thanks for your help.

 

This is one of the simplest step-by-step guides I found on Google (keep in mind that painting parts isn't exclusively for Z's so you don't have to only search this forum):

http://www.pugaddicts.co.uk/2012/06/...astic-car.html

Yes, properly painting will completely get rid of the original clear coat (there's no way paint would adhere correctly with all of it still intact).

Hope this helps. If you don't have much experience with prepping/painting plastic I would try a smaller trim piece before I tackled a larger part like your rear spoiler.

 

yes,
you will need to do proper paint prep which will include sanding off your clear coat and possibly into your base coat as well.

If you're not confident in your "DIY-ness"
I would just get quotes from local shops to see how much it will cost for them to do it for you.. weigh your options from there. Nothing worse than painting your own stuff only to have it orange peel and chip off in a year.

You'd be surprised that the cost of a shop painting a small spoiler or front lip isn't that much.

 

This is what you'd need to properly do it. A sealer, base/clear, 400 grit sand paper (wet sanding). Then you're 1200 and 1500/2000 for wet sanding and polishing. And the typical spraying equipment.

If you're wanting to use an aerosol you could just get some 800 or 1000 grit sandpaper preferably the 800, wet sand and spray . If you go this route just like any other route you need to soak the paper for a while to soften it up. When sanding you need to dry it off regularly and check for deep scratches. These scratches will show through the paint when you paint it most of the time depending on the size. Especially with just using an aerosol it will be worse. Also, it will be considerably harder to get a nice finish on your spoiler using an aerosol can. It would be better in all aspects to properly paint the spoiler. The grill you could get away with it due to the obvious reasons.

As far as the grill goes, you could use 600 wet, or a sanding paste and gray scotch brite.

 

Do a quick search on YouTube for a channel by "Bigbandit007". He specializes in painting bikes mainly, but with all the wiggly bits for a grille and spoiler, its pertinent information. He also does a couple of very complete tutorials or How-tos which would help you a lot.

He also stresses the prep work (masking and sanding. Don't let the short scenes in the video fool you, it can take a couple of hours to get the sanding right.

One tip is to get a piece of bodywork from a scrapyard and try painting that, before messing with the car. That way, it you do mess it up, no harm done and you can learn from the mistakes. For the grille, I would get a broken piece of grille from the same scrapyard (doesn't have to be identical), that they may just give you, and try painting that, to understand how the paint is going to react across the multiple surfaces.

Hope that helps!

 

its alot of work thats why people plastidip its cheap, reversible, and dosnt require expensive equipment.


with that said if you wanna go through with it and try it out check out eastwoods 2k paints. something new ive come across its a 2 stage paint in a case(just like what real paint guns spray) thats the biggest downside to spray cans is the cheap 1k paints they use so try that out i know it has me interested lol.