Looking for paint advice

Thanks to a some members, I have finally tracked down all the parts I need to fix the deer damage on my car. Now it's time to plan a road trip I would like to attempt to paint the inside of the door, fender, and underside of the hood myself and put them on the car. I've talked to a local community college auto body instructor and they can paint the car but it will be quicker if they don't have to replace any panels. Plus I think I would be more careful with the door panel and wiring,

Could I paint the insides with a single stage paint or would it have to be base/clear? I've messed with "backyard bodywork" but not much painting.

Anybody here with some experience in this? I asked about having the college do this but they won't do piece work.

Suggestions welcome!
Thanks
Jon

1. What color is your car? It looks DCM, and I'm not even sure THAT is base clear. Find out if it's a tri-coat because of the metallic.


2. It all depends on how anal retentive you are. You obviously don't want to open the door on a DCM car and see a bunch of white, so you want it to be color matched to a point. That point is directly proportional to how forgiving you're going to be with your own work. If you'll hate anything that's less than perfect, you may take a little longer or want to farm it out. For a daily driver, I'd recommend the mindset be somewhere between whether or not your wife would notice enough to bring it up and you wanting to show off the door jams to friends of friends.

For me, I'd pick somewhere insignificant and at least TRY something like a duplicolor paint code matched touch up can. You may be surprised on how close it actually is, and it'd probably be close enough for jams and underhoods, etc.

My first wagon (and b sedan) was DCM. Duplicolor makes (or made) a match that's darned near perfect. If you want to chance rattle can, the color is good. Making it look just as glossy as factory is the hard part.

Just my .02.

My buddy paints 80k Harley show bikes and gave me this little tip.

I bought a new mirror for Dusty and got the duplicolor. Real good match on the LDM. Sprayed one coat let it dry, spray the second coat and while it's wet spray the clear on it too. I used Krylon or Rustoleum clear high gloss. Looked perfect. Let it dry and did a second (and maybe third) coat of clear on it.

Careful as two coats of wet will want to run if it's too thick!! (may wanna practice if you aren't experienced with spray cans.

The mirror has been on the car since Oct 2007 and still looks good.

Bewber - the car is DCM. I didn't even think about it being tri-color. I think I'll try the dupli color. Maybe on the bottom of the hood in case I screw up and have to go to a professional. I am a bit anal and that's actually why I want to change the panels myself.

Thanks everyone.
Jon