question Hammerite

[Aussie]

Does anyone have any experience with Hammerite paint? They say it can be painted direct to rusty metal without primer or undercoat, so I'm thinking the silver colour might be good for the interior of Ferrets, Saladins, etc. where the rust is just scattered speckles. Or is this not a good idea? Thanks for any advice.

James

[ferrettkitt]

They say you can paint it directly over rust but would you really want to? All you're doing is hiding the rust behind a coat of paint not the best way off doing things proper preparation is the key ie have the rust blasted off or use a needle gun.

 

I've used it in my Ferret on top of a primer so its fine in that respect

[Niels v]

The hammerite will probably adhere well to the rust, the thing is then how well does the rust adhere to the metal base materiel. You might end up with the Hammerite flaking off.

When painting directly on rust one have to be very sure that the whole surface is sealed by the paint so that no water or air can pass through otherwise you might make very good conditions for crevise corrosion underneath the paint.

I have also heard that its fairly brittle, so any impact would chip it.

 

I would clean it with needle gun as a minimum befor painting.

[woa2]

I have used Hammerite smooth black on my WOA2, but first the panels were blasted/repaired and then primed before the Hammerite. It then had a couple of coats of matt brown top coat sprayed on. Hammerite was bought because my Daughter had a summer job at Halfords and I used her staff discount.

Reason I used Hammerite was that I restored my WOT2 truck and used Bondaprimer before spraying on the matt topcoat. I didn't realise at the time that a gloss coat between them was essential for protection. I now have rust marks coming through and a strip down and respray is called for.

Don't forget to 'key' the Hammerite paint before applying the top coat.

[Enigma]

I once removed rust with a wirebrush on a anglegrinder and then applied Hammerite.

It worked well.

[utt61]

My experience with Hammerite (and Smoothrite) has led me to the conclusion that it is overrated and over-priced. It is a good conventional paint, but it is not magic - the hammered finish is attracvtive but very difficult to get uniform without spraying, and although it can be applied on rust it doesn't contain any rust-converting properties and therefore is not a good idea to do this. This sounds a harsh assessment for one of the country's most popular paints, and I don't mean that it isn't good paint, I mean it isn't as good as its reputation and usage suggests. It is also expensive to clean brushes afterwards.

 

For a really good paint finish, wet blast, acid wash, then prime, undercoat and topcoat. I favour paints from T & R Williamson (www.trwilliamson.co.uk).

 

The only paint I have applied directly over light surface rust* with no preparations other than hand wire brushong and degreasing and had unexpectedly good result with is "Deproma", this really did work quite well.

 

* There is a school of thought that says that you will get better adhesion on a lightly-rusted surface than a smooth surface, since the rust has the effect of roughening the surface. The problem of course is that you do need a rust convertor to stop the rust. Blasting (wet or dry) will achieve the same surface effect, without the rust. Needlescaling and/or power wire brushing will generally not leave a good surface for adhesion, the latter being particularly bad since it will burnish the surface and result in very poor adhesion.

[Willyslancs]

always used hammerite in the past(smooth)before olive drab jeep still looks good underneath ,

 

used it for certain bits on the Munga , mind you the paint does look thinner than it used to be ........

[Rover8FFR]

DEPROMA is miles better as a paint and greater variety of base colours.........

I think it's better value also and does spray well without special thinners, just using white spirit.

 

Worth consideration and noted in other threads via search function