I painted a 1940 Bridgeport, one of the worse decisions of my life. I stripped it down, cleaned all the surfaces and applied the etching epoxy primer, got a beautiful finish, I waited a week, went to apply the paint, the primer fell off in sheets. Restripped the mill base, cleaned it completely again, reapplied the primer, waited a week, again the primer came off in sheets. I completely stripped and cleaned the mill base again, switch to a different brand of paint, it would not stick. Over the next 2-3 months, I washed it with white kerosene, acetone, muriatic acid, brake-Kleen, and other products, even carbon tetrachloride, nothing would stick.
One of my customers, made industrial coatings of all kinds, I mentioned to him the issue with the mill base, he asked a few questions and said he would need to think about it. About a week later, he came over to the shop, pulled out somekind of cleaning prep rags, wipe down 3 or 4 areas, put the rags back into their containers and left. About 3 or 4 days later he called and said he believed he had an answer. He gave me some prep wash, some primer and some blue-grey machine coating. I followed the hand written instructions to the letter, all application done out doors, wearing a respirator, keep everyone else clearly out of the area. after the prep wash had dried, the rags were extremely dirty, I applied the primer, waiting the required 3 days, I checked and the primer was solidly attached to the metal, I applied the paint, all went perfectly, the coverage and finish were great.
That was roughly 20 yrs ago, the coating engineer has passed on (cancer (?)), the coating company move to some place in Kentucky, and recently the paint is starting to peel off, in sheets, off the mill base again. Since that time I have not or will I ever paint any machine again.
