Spray-painting my AR?

F

firespectrum

New member
I've been toying around with the idea of doing a camo job on my AR-15. Guys out here just lay their weapon on the ground or hang it from a coat-hanger and spray it - it's Uncle Sam's after all. But for my personal weapon I want to do it right. I live in the Suburbs in the Southeastern U.S. so I'm thinking foliage colors or urban.

- Is there a certain kind of paint I should use?

- What components should I leave unpainted?

- How do I make the patterns?

- Pointers regarding technique?

- Pics? It's the camo job I want to see so I don't care if it's an AR-15 or not. Heck, here's an excuse to show off your gun!
 
My buddy did this with camo spray paint, and some twigs and leaves from his yard:

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well... personally i wouldnt do it to a good rifle, but i know a lot of people do. i would use krylon camoflage paint,its very flat, i dont know if it will stick to plastic, thogh.
ken
 
camo on guns

krylon on the cheap, reasonbly durable, Dura coat if you can afford it. buy some toy guns first and practice with cheap paint. Dont get too detailed, remeber "less is more" smooth the hard lines, lighten dark areas,darken light areas.I will try to post some of mine.
 
The camo'd rifles are Krylon. Large patches of OD and brown, and then black over some woodland stencils.

The two-tone is Brownell's Alumahyde II (Coyote) and the factory black finish.

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If your not sure, I'd use Testors first, as it can be completely removed(it does take work though). Krylon would probably be OK too, I just havent used it totally on a gun and removed it to the original finish like I have the Testors. If you use some of the other paints that are more durable, your only choice may be to bead blast to get them off.

A lot will depend on what pattern you want to copy, and how involved it is when it comes to how you do it. I've been painting guns since the 60's, and usually sprayed the base color and then used a brush to complete the pattern. You usually get a better job and more "definition" this way. With some of the new patterns, you can get away with spraying the whole thing.

This was done with a sprayed base in OD, and then brushes for the rest. The pattern is German Flecktarn.......

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This was done just using spray cans and sheets of notebook paper held over it for templates. Pattern is Multicam......

ry%3D400
 
Optactical has a how to guide on their website.

My weapon painting efforts got started with .mil weapons, and I've mostly just duplicated that on the couple long guns of my own I've painted -- krylon, use some locally procured foliage as a negative-stencil (or go hogwild and buy some of that raffia stuff in the crafts section of walmart for a couple bucks), makes for a solid end result. And if you get scrapes, scratches, and such that you don't feel add to the character, you can always just give it a two second touch up and you're good to go again.

Only stuff I ever taped off were magwells, exposed bolts or other internals (not an issue on an AR, just close the dust cover), iron sights, and serial numbers (last optional, but seemed like a good idea to me).
 
This one was done with Krylon as recommended by a high-dollar duck gun painter on another site. It will be re-done prior to hunting season this year. I plan to post a blow-by-blow of the process.

I plan to soda blast the metal and Gun-Kote prior to a full paint job. I just have to wait for the ol' lady to leave long enough to use the oven. NOBODY messes with her oven!

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Unless you're in snow, darker is better.
 
I have done a few now!

I started out with Krylon many years ago before there were other choices and as I can remember, they came out fairly well but would scratch over use. That was ok because you can always touch it up easily.

A couple years ago I got excited about Duracoat. I bought some, selected a relatively inexpensive pistol that I needed to camo and it came out very nice. Next I did a CETME rifle and then my expensive AR Prairie dog rifle. I can e-mail pics if you like. The Pistol is random camo, the Cetme is close to Vietnam tigerstripe and the AR is digital in Air Force colors which best represent the terrain I hunt Prairie Dogs in.

Honestly, with Duracoat, I had a couple of places where the coating came off in small pieces. I tried Cerekote next. That is now my primary coating as it is easy to apply, no mixing(the air dry formula) and tougher than anything I have ever seen. I dont want just camo, I want environmental protection!

There are some lessons learned though. But if you really want to get into doing it, and you want it done right and to last, try the Durakote. You wont be disappointed.
 
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