Case restoration dilemma: to paint or not to paint \ VOGONS

Case restoration dilemma: to paint or not to paint

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First post, by kwyjibo

Posted on 2018-09-24, 09:04

kwyjibo Offline

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Hello all,

I am in the following situation.

I have retrobrighted a PowerMac 9600 case. I have removed all the yellow shading but I think I went too far with the bleaching. If I am not wrong this case should match a tone between Pantone 420 C and Pantone 421 C but to the naked eye I think it is too white. Also the process has left some uneven results (only in small parts). (I will post some pictures later).

Now that I have all the pieces apart it would be really easy to paint it with the correct color (or a close match).

What would be the pros and cons:

Pros:

Close color match
Even finish

Cons:

Losing the genuine "PowerMac" front label.
I will not be able to remove the paint in the future
A think finish can be easily scratched
A think finish can hide the case "texture"

Yes, I know, maybe there is no correct answer, but I would like to hear your thoughts.

Reply 1 of 6, by oeuvre

Posted on 2018-09-24, 23:37

oeuvre Offline

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You can tape oeuvre the PowerMac label before painting.

HP Z420 Workstation Intel Xeon E5-1620, 32GB, RADEON HD7850 2GB, SSD + HD, XP/7

Reply 2 of 6, by badmojo

Posted on 2018-09-25, 02:29

badmojo Offline

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I have painted plastic before and was usually happy with the result, but painting is always harder than I think it should be. If you can accept that the texture will be different and that the colour will probably turn out a little off (exact matching is almost impossible), then prepare it with a good clean and plastic primer, and then only paint in the right conditions. I.e. not too hot or too cold, and in a location that isn't dusty / windy.

I can't really speak to the durability - I had a media center in a C64 case that I painted and that help up OK in the lounge room with kids bashing on it.

Life? Don't talk to me about life.

Reply 3 of 6, by Unknown_K

Posted on 2018-09-25, 04:16

Unknown_K Offline

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Vinyl dye will sink into the plastics if you are worrying about scratches.

You can silkscreen Powermac on after painting.

Leave it be and hope it yellows a little with time so it won't be too white.

Collector of old computers, hardware, and software

Reply 4 of 6, by .legaCy

Posted on 2018-09-25, 19:58

.legaCy Offline

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I painted a metal case once, i will never do it again, but it is just because i lack the skill to do a reasonably good job.

Reply 5 of 6, by derSammler

Posted on 2018-09-25, 20:13

derSammler Offline

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Unknown_K wrote:
Vinyl dye will sink into the plastics if you are worrying about scratches.

Vinyl dye is great, I'm using it often, too. However, there's a catch: vinyl dye is only available in a very limited selection of colors. I don't think they make one that matches the PowerMac even roughly.

Reply 6 of 6, by kwyjibo

Posted on 2018-09-28, 11:00

kwyjibo Offline

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Posts: 44
Joined: 2009-09-20, 09:14
Location: Cartagena, Spain

Thank you all for your thoughts.

I am still undecided. I think I should reassemble the computer and see how it looks.

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