Paint preparation can be one of the most tedious parts of building a street rod. However, it doesn't have to be, thanks to the myriad of products out there designed for the professional body shops (but every bit as accessible to the homebuilder as well). The art of paint prep can be almost as much of a science as the actual paint job when taken into account the vast array of methods, applications, and time it takes to mask off an entire car-whether it's for a quick fix or an entire paint job. Thankfully, there are products out there that make life much easier for us one-time guys who aren't painting cars once a week. It's amazing the technology involved in tape designs; the same holds true with paint prep supplies as it does with just about anything else in our industry-if you can think of something that would make it easier or faster, chances are there's a product out there that will do just that.
We were nosing around recently at Creative Concepts to take a peek at what Zane Cullen and the crew had going on at their Santa Rosa, California, shop when the subject of a tape story came up. Zane mentioned that there was really only about a dozen different tapes they use on each job, but that they all serve a unique and different purpose. One type might be used to hold a patch panel in place while it's being tack welded. Another type might serve to protect a piece of chrome trim or glass while a panel is being welded or ground on. And then of course there is the wide assortment of sticky subjects that serve to protect certain surfaces from the whole paint and bodywork process.
Truth be told, there were more kinds of tape examples than I would have ever thought of purchasing. But by breaking down the difference between the green tape and the blue tape and the natural tape, and the film-backed tape and the vinyl-backed tape and the paper-backed tape, it all began to make sense; masking tape is not created equal. Like paints, primers, thinners, and sealers, all the different types of tape products had their own specific application. Some are designed for quick and indiscreet masking, while some are made to conform to very tight-radius contours inside door handles and around certain areas, where other tape types would stretch, lift, or tear.