**** UPDATE: SEE PAGE 6 FOR STEP BY STEP PHOTOS. I DID A STOCK RECENTLY, AND TOOK PHOTOS!!!*
Hey folks. So I recently Krylon camo’d my CZ858, and a huge amount of CGNer’s have complimented me on the job, some going as far as saying it’s in the top 5 they have ever seen (Krylon jobs, that is). I have also had some requests to describe exactly how I did it, and possibly to have it made a sticky (that’s up to the Forum Gods
)
This is the Gun I sprayed. Remember this guy??
Seeing as you guys here on CGN have helped me a lot over the short time I have been here (be it donating parts for projects, giving me great deals on firearms, or just providing amazing advice), I have decided I should honour those requests for a step-by-step description, in order to somewhat return the favour. It’s not much, but I hope this helps.
So here goes:
*** First off, I cannot guarantee that this will turn out the same for everybody. How capable you are in painting/handywork, how well you read the instructions, how well you prep the surface, and the effect you want will ALL affect the final product. I will try to be as concise as possible, and make it as understandable as possible!
I am NOT responsible for your screw-ups, and this is just a guide as to how I did it. You may have to tweak for your particular situation. Please use common sense, and treat this as a rough guide.
This can be done on anything, not just a CZ858, or rifle for that matter. For kicks, I painted a Danish Cookies Box, some toolbox, etc.
*** Disclaimer # 2: PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT!! Before you go and spend $20 on Krylon, get yourself some 97 cent Walmart paint cans, a shet of scrap metal or wood, and practice on there first. When you are comfortable, THEN apply to your rifle... no need mucking up a good gun with a paintjob, right?
****Disclaimer # 3: DO EVERYTHING OUTDOORS unless you have access to a paint booth at a shop... I don’t want you guys getting lung cancer and dying on me, and not being able to enjoy your paintjob!
Materials you will need:
- 1 (or more hopefully) firearm(s) to paint (or whatever you want to paint)
- Brake cleaner/degreaser
- 400 grit wetsand sandpaper
- Scratchpad/steelwool/something like that
- Any other sort of surface cleaner you like, such as Sure Clean (it’s a product used by estheticians)
- Krylon or Rustoleum camo paint: 1 can Khaki Camo, 1 can Olive drab camo, 1 can Brown camo
- 1 can of BBQ or whatever other resistant, flat black spray paint.
- (Optional) 1 can speckle stone effect in spray can (walmart)
- Masking tape, Cotton balls, newspaper, cardboard, old tarp (or other surface to work on)
- (optional) 1 can matte clearcoat
- The final ingredient: Dry Pine Needles (the super long ones, the annoying kind that get all over your car! Argh! You know the ones... )
Paints I used (the two on the right can be varied to your taste. Example: I could have also used rubberized undercoating spray instead of the stone speckle, but the speckle is hard and holds paint better):
Procedure:
Alright, now the juicy part, and the part a lot of folks have asked about; How on Earth did I make my CZ look so fantastic? (I promise that’s the one and only time I will toot my own horn).
Well prep work was key, so that’s the first step.
1. Disassemble your firearm as much as possible. In the case of the CZ, I removed the folding stock, upper and lower handguards, rear sights, pistol grip, then stripped it down (field cleaning style, so bolt carrier, cover, springs, piston etc). Put the delicate parts in a ziplock bag so you don’t lose them (piston, rear sights, any internals you don’t want painted. I actually kept the bolt in the bolt carrier, and just masked it up well, but that’s later in this How-to. Don’t mask anything yet!)
2. Clean! Clean! CLEAN!
Get that brake degreaser going at this stage. (degreaser, since you have to get that gun oil out and off of everything. You can also add any other chemicals you like at this stage). ***Words of warning: This sh*t stinks.. so if you don’t like the smell of brake degreaser, or if you have a wife, do this outside!!!! Trust me!!!
3. Ok, so you have you gun disassembled, it’s grease/oil free. Awesome, let’s paint right? WRONG! (Yes, I have to abuse my power a little as the instructor here, and tease you a bit!).
Time to matte EVERYTHING possible. Get that 400 grit wet sand paper out, get a bowl or bottle of tap water, and make sure you keep the surface and sandpaper wet throughout this process. Also, this makes a mess, so it is a good idea to lay out some old tarp or cardboard. You can start with whatever part, I did barrel --> receiver --> nooks and crannies --> folding stock --> handguards/plastics. Order is NOT important, BUT I realized that if I had done the plastics first, I would have saved some sandpaper for other uses. (the paint gunks it up, and the metal parts also make the paper tainted blackish)
4. Ok, so now that the gun is oil free, all the paint has been matted and roughed (no need to go to the metal, unless you’re OCD like me haha. I actually didn’t even go down to the metal entirely, just so happened on a few corners where the paint is thinner). Now I recommend you get a nice cloth with some mild water/soap solution and WIPE off (don’t drown your gun) with it. This will get that nasty paint/water mixture residue off, ensuring a nice clean surface to work with. You don’t want paint peeling!
5. Do you now have a clean gun? Good! You’re coming along well young grasshopper! Ok, so here we go with the beginning of the fun part! MASK IT UP! Masking tape and newspaper wherever needed, like the tops of your mags (where you load), the bottom of your bolt carrier, etc. Stick cotton balls into the piston tube, and the barrel ends (front and rear). Use cardboard cutouts to slip into the magwell and the top of the receiver (yea, that big gaping hole where everything normally lies). Now, get a big piece of cardboard, assemble all your pieces, lay them flat as best you can, and get that can of Khaki Tan Krylon Camo all mixed up and shook up like the victim of a back alley robbery (not that I wish that on anyone!). So I guess you figured out, we’ll be laying down the base layer now. If you do this with the gun in pieces, it makes it easier to get a nice coat that gets into all the nooks and crannies. Do a few thin coats instead of one thick one. Don’t worry if it doesn’t cover it all up right away... just keep laying it on. Remember, there will be ANOTHER layer of Tan afterwards. Let each side dry for about 30 mins, flip do another side, over and over. Adjust time for drying, according to temperature of your workspace. Let your ENTIRE finish dry for a day now, allowing it to set well.
6. Ok, so you’ve painted all your pieces, and they all look good, all sides covered (did you get the inside of the folding stocks shoulder rest? ). Cool beans. Here’s the optional Step. Get the stone speckle spray. Mask off a section of your lower handguard and your pistol grip. Let her rip! Now you have to let this stuff dry for a day, hence why it’s optional. Once it DOES dry though, you have a rock hard, very grippy and rough textured surface to hold onto VERY well in gloves
7. Ok, so you have you rock imitation speckle in the grip areas. Let your finish dry (or maybe it already is if you knew what you are doing or followed this well), and now you can repeat step # 5, WITH ONE DIFFERENCE. Assemble your gun (minus delicate parts, or not. I reassembled it fully for kicks, it doesn’t affect anything really. Just remember to keep everything masked that needs to be, and the barrel plugged with cotton). Now lay on another layer of khaki base, but since your gun is assembled, it will cover anything you might have accidentally missed (since you can now see all the parts together). Let the final coat dry a day or two (depends how impatient you are).
8. Now the fun fun FUN stuff, and also, for those without any artistic genes in their body (like I do... personal horn toot # 2... sorry), then this is also the HARDEST part and easiest to screw up. Good news? You can just spray a bit of krylon tan overtop if you mess up, and you once again, have a blank canvas. Get that big slab of cardboard, give those other colours of Krylon a good shake (brown, and green), and that can of black. Get those pine needles out too! We’ll be using them as a stencil! Go Art Attack! Alright so I will maybe lay this out in a few steps so it makes sense.
If there is an UTTER need for pics, let me know and I will update the thread.
**** Captain Obvious says: BE SURE TO ROTATE YOUR GUN FOR EACH COLOUR. DO NOT SWAP COLOURS UNTIL ALL AREAS ARE FIRST COVERED BY ONE COLOUR, THEN MOVE ON****
a. ***Captain Precaution Says: Start by doing your mags, since they are both flat, and easily repaintable tan to start over with. Also, your mags get worn down fastest (all the handling), so don’t worry too much if it comes out worse on there).Alright, we begin with the Green. This is the order that I went through, and it came out how you see in this thread...aka amazingly well some would even say So here is what you do. Lay the gun down on one of its sides; for today let’s say, ejection side (passenger side so to speak), with the trigger guard facing towards you (so you’re staring into the magwell). Now, take the pine needles and lay them across the gun evenly, but relatively tightly. The needles should not have holes in-between them, greater than 1cm max. The smaller the holes, the better.
*** Mr. Definition Says: by holes I mean: the triangular/angular shapes made by having the needles crisscross over one another***
Smaller holes, but more of them, makes the pattern more “broken up” rather than “globby”, so more natural. Once you have them laid out from tip to tip, and they cover everything, you can begin painting. Don’t worry about them laying on there too thick (as in, piled too high; it’s ok). Take you Olive/Green drab, and just pick a few spots along the length of the gun, and give those spots a few VERTICAL motion sprays (meaning you spray up/down, and on diagonals, and not across... plants normally don’t grow along the horizon.. right?), with the tip relatively close to the needles (closer than what you would normally use for painting something. Let’s say, 5-10cm, depending on how tight the needles are. The tighter the pattern, and the higher the needles are stacked, the closer you spray. Remember when I just mentioned that it’s ok that they’re stacked high? That’s why...you can overcompensate for that height, but spraying lower. Be sure to practice first, on something other than your gun!). When you pull the needles off (I was impatient with mine and even yanked the needles off 15 seconds after spraying...came out fine; However, I recommend you wait about 1-2 mins so it’s not sticky), you will notice that there is barely any green on there. DON’T SPRAY MORE. It’s supposed to be scarce – remember, we still have two more colours to go!
b. Alright so you have your little speckly green tiger stripes here and there now, right? Are you still with me? For those of you that are, awesome! For those that lost me.... a) you are pansies, and b) PM me if you need help. LOL Ok, we’re now moving onto the BROWN. Same concept, however, now we are going to pick spots that are obviously different from the green. It is 100% ok if they overlap in some spots; even more natural. You just don’t want to totally cover the green with brown. A lot of people do that, so be aware fo wher your green is, and spray elsewhere. Same idea though --> Lay needles, vertical strokes, adjust spray distance for height, be sparing but not TOO sparing (use logic; make sure you can still see a lot of the TAN).
c. Alright, THIS is where the magic happens. You know how you look at my gun, and you just can’t put your finger on why it look so good, compared to other Krylon jobs? It’s because I added a secret 4th colour and element --> Black aka SHADOW. By adding black, you give the pattern depth and contrast, like nature! WARNING : be very careful and sparing with the black. It can literally (take it from experience), 2 quick sprays/squirts of paint to ruin an entire pattern by making it too dark. THIS IS WHY IT IS IMPORTANT TO PRACTICE ON NON-GUN MATERIALS FIRST!
-->Do doing the same as we have done so far, we will do with the black. However, with the black, we are going to DISTANCE the can more than the other colours. Why? This si because we want to create a black paint “mist” to fall down between the cracks and onto the pattern, darkening it a bit, and filling in all those nasty voids we had between the colours. It is sort of a blend technique. After we do that (or before in this step, the order in STEP C is unimportant), we will pick a few spots like with the other colours and do the same; a few little “blips” or black spots here and there. Not too thick, and fewer of them than with the other colours, so that we don’t get too much dark!
d. Final, and optional step. Once it is all dry, you can spray the whole thing with a non-reactive (so maybe use the same brand as the paint – krylon is best) matte clearcoat, to protect it all, since it was a lot of work!
WE’RE DONE! THAT’S IT! Now go re-oil the internals! (AFTER it all dries of course! Duh! )
Wasn’t so hard now was it? Let it all dry and go get yourself a beer. You definitely deserve a 2-4 for putting up with my sh!t! haha
Any questions? Post them in here, or PM me. I would prefer you post in here, in case anyone has the same question and I can kill two birds with one stone by answering publicly.
Thanks for reading and I hope this becomes a sticky!
Hey folks. So I recently Krylon camo’d my CZ858, and a huge amount of CGNer’s have complimented me on the job, some going as far as saying it’s in the top 5 they have ever seen (Krylon jobs, that is). I have also had some requests to describe exactly how I did it, and possibly to have it made a sticky (that’s up to the Forum Gods
)This is the Gun I sprayed. Remember this guy??
Seeing as you guys here on CGN have helped me a lot over the short time I have been here (be it donating parts for projects, giving me great deals on firearms, or just providing amazing advice), I have decided I should honour those requests for a step-by-step description, in order to somewhat return the favour. It’s not much, but I hope this helps.
So here goes:
*** First off, I cannot guarantee that this will turn out the same for everybody. How capable you are in painting/handywork, how well you read the instructions, how well you prep the surface, and the effect you want will ALL affect the final product. I will try to be as concise as possible, and make it as understandable as possible!
I am NOT responsible for your screw-ups, and this is just a guide as to how I did it. You may have to tweak for your particular situation. Please use common sense, and treat this as a rough guide.
This can be done on anything, not just a CZ858, or rifle for that matter. For kicks, I painted a Danish Cookies Box, some toolbox, etc.
*** Disclaimer # 2: PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT!! Before you go and spend $20 on Krylon, get yourself some 97 cent Walmart paint cans, a shet of scrap metal or wood, and practice on there first. When you are comfortable, THEN apply to your rifle... no need mucking up a good gun with a paintjob, right?
****Disclaimer # 3: DO EVERYTHING OUTDOORS unless you have access to a paint booth at a shop... I don’t want you guys getting lung cancer and dying on me, and not being able to enjoy your paintjob!
Materials you will need:
- 1 (or more hopefully) firearm(s) to paint (or whatever you want to paint)
- Brake cleaner/degreaser
- 400 grit wetsand sandpaper
- Scratchpad/steelwool/something like that
- Any other sort of surface cleaner you like, such as Sure Clean (it’s a product used by estheticians)
- Krylon or Rustoleum camo paint: 1 can Khaki Camo, 1 can Olive drab camo, 1 can Brown camo
- 1 can of BBQ or whatever other resistant, flat black spray paint.
- (Optional) 1 can speckle stone effect in spray can (walmart)
- Masking tape, Cotton balls, newspaper, cardboard, old tarp (or other surface to work on)
- (optional) 1 can matte clearcoat
- The final ingredient: Dry Pine Needles (the super long ones, the annoying kind that get all over your car! Argh! You know the ones... )
Paints I used (the two on the right can be varied to your taste. Example: I could have also used rubberized undercoating spray instead of the stone speckle, but the speckle is hard and holds paint better):
Procedure:
Alright, now the juicy part, and the part a lot of folks have asked about; How on Earth did I make my CZ look so fantastic? (I promise that’s the one and only time I will toot my own horn).
Well prep work was key, so that’s the first step.
1. Disassemble your firearm as much as possible. In the case of the CZ, I removed the folding stock, upper and lower handguards, rear sights, pistol grip, then stripped it down (field cleaning style, so bolt carrier, cover, springs, piston etc). Put the delicate parts in a ziplock bag so you don’t lose them (piston, rear sights, any internals you don’t want painted. I actually kept the bolt in the bolt carrier, and just masked it up well, but that’s later in this How-to. Don’t mask anything yet!)
2. Clean! Clean! CLEAN!
Get that brake degreaser going at this stage. (degreaser, since you have to get that gun oil out and off of everything. You can also add any other chemicals you like at this stage). ***Words of warning: This sh*t stinks.. so if you don’t like the smell of brake degreaser, or if you have a wife, do this outside!!!! Trust me!!!
3. Ok, so you have you gun disassembled, it’s grease/oil free. Awesome, let’s paint right? WRONG! (Yes, I have to abuse my power a little as the instructor here, and tease you a bit!).
Time to matte EVERYTHING possible. Get that 400 grit wet sand paper out, get a bowl or bottle of tap water, and make sure you keep the surface and sandpaper wet throughout this process. Also, this makes a mess, so it is a good idea to lay out some old tarp or cardboard. You can start with whatever part, I did barrel --> receiver --> nooks and crannies --> folding stock --> handguards/plastics. Order is NOT important, BUT I realized that if I had done the plastics first, I would have saved some sandpaper for other uses. (the paint gunks it up, and the metal parts also make the paper tainted blackish)
4. Ok, so now that the gun is oil free, all the paint has been matted and roughed (no need to go to the metal, unless you’re OCD like me haha. I actually didn’t even go down to the metal entirely, just so happened on a few corners where the paint is thinner). Now I recommend you get a nice cloth with some mild water/soap solution and WIPE off (don’t drown your gun) with it. This will get that nasty paint/water mixture residue off, ensuring a nice clean surface to work with. You don’t want paint peeling!
5. Do you now have a clean gun? Good! You’re coming along well young grasshopper! Ok, so here we go with the beginning of the fun part!
MASK IT UP! Masking tape and newspaper wherever needed, like the tops of your mags (where you load), the bottom of your bolt carrier, etc. Stick cotton balls into the piston tube, and the barrel ends (front and rear). Use cardboard cutouts to slip into the magwell and the top of the receiver (yea, that big gaping hole where everything normally lies). Now, get a big piece of cardboard, assemble all your pieces, lay them flat as best you can, and get that can of Khaki Tan Krylon Camo all mixed up and shook up like the victim of a back alley robbery (not that I wish that on anyone!). So I guess you figured out, we’ll be laying down the base layer now. If you do this with the gun in pieces, it makes it easier to get a nice coat that gets into all the nooks and crannies. Do a few thin coats instead of one thick one. Don’t worry if it doesn’t cover it all up right away... just keep laying it on. Remember, there will be ANOTHER layer of Tan afterwards. Let each side dry for about 30 mins, flip do another side, over and over. Adjust time for drying, according to temperature of your workspace. Let your ENTIRE finish dry for a day now, allowing it to set well.6. Ok, so you’ve painted all your pieces, and they all look good, all sides covered (did you get the inside of the folding stocks shoulder rest?
). Cool beans. Here’s the optional Step. Get the stone speckle spray. Mask off a section of your lower handguard and your pistol grip. Let her rip! Now you have to let this stuff dry for a day, hence why it’s optional. Once it DOES dry though, you have a rock hard, very grippy and rough textured surface to hold onto VERY well in gloves 7. Ok, so you have you rock imitation speckle in the grip areas. Let your finish dry (or maybe it already is if you knew what you are doing or followed this well), and now you can repeat step # 5, WITH ONE DIFFERENCE. Assemble your gun (minus delicate parts, or not. I reassembled it fully for kicks, it doesn’t affect anything really. Just remember to keep everything masked that needs to be, and the barrel plugged with cotton). Now lay on another layer of khaki base, but since your gun is assembled, it will cover anything you might have accidentally missed (since you can now see all the parts together). Let the final coat dry a day or two (depends how impatient you are).
8. Now the fun fun FUN stuff, and also, for those without any artistic genes in their body (like I do... personal horn toot # 2... sorry), then this is also the HARDEST part and easiest to screw up. Good news? You can just spray a bit of krylon tan overtop if you mess up, and you once again, have a blank canvas. Get that big slab of cardboard, give those other colours of Krylon a good shake (brown, and green), and that can of black. Get those pine needles out too! We’ll be using them as a stencil! Go Art Attack! Alright so I will maybe lay this out in a few steps so it makes sense.
If there is an UTTER need for pics, let me know and I will update the thread.
**** Captain Obvious says: BE SURE TO ROTATE YOUR GUN FOR EACH COLOUR. DO NOT SWAP COLOURS UNTIL ALL AREAS ARE FIRST COVERED BY ONE COLOUR, THEN MOVE ON****
a. ***Captain Precaution Says: Start by doing your mags, since they are both flat, and easily repaintable tan to start over with. Also, your mags get worn down fastest (all the handling), so don’t worry too much if it comes out worse on there).Alright, we begin with the Green. This is the order that I went through, and it came out how you see in this thread...aka amazingly well some would even say
So here is what you do. Lay the gun down on one of its sides; for today let’s say, ejection side (passenger side so to speak), with the trigger guard facing towards you (so you’re staring into the magwell). Now, take the pine needles and lay them across the gun evenly, but relatively tightly. The needles should not have holes in-between them, greater than 1cm max. The smaller the holes, the better. *** Mr. Definition Says: by holes I mean: the triangular/angular shapes made by having the needles crisscross over one another***
Smaller holes, but more of them, makes the pattern more “broken up” rather than “globby”, so more natural. Once you have them laid out from tip to tip, and they cover everything, you can begin painting. Don’t worry about them laying on there too thick (as in, piled too high; it’s ok). Take you Olive/Green drab, and just pick a few spots along the length of the gun, and give those spots a few VERTICAL motion sprays (meaning you spray up/down, and on diagonals, and not across... plants normally don’t grow along the horizon.. right?), with the tip relatively close to the needles (closer than what you would normally use for painting something. Let’s say, 5-10cm, depending on how tight the needles are. The tighter the pattern, and the higher the needles are stacked, the closer you spray. Remember when I just mentioned that it’s ok that they’re stacked high? That’s why...you can overcompensate for that height, but spraying lower. Be sure to practice first, on something other than your gun!). When you pull the needles off (I was impatient with mine and even yanked the needles off 15 seconds after spraying...came out fine; However, I recommend you wait about 1-2 mins so it’s not sticky), you will notice that there is barely any green on there. DON’T SPRAY MORE. It’s supposed to be scarce – remember, we still have two more colours to go!
b. Alright so you have your little speckly green tiger stripes here and there now, right? Are you still with me? For those of you that are, awesome! For those that lost me.... a) you are pansies, and b) PM me if you need help. LOL Ok, we’re now moving onto the BROWN. Same concept, however, now we are going to pick spots that are obviously different from the green. It is 100% ok if they overlap in some spots; even more natural. You just don’t want to totally cover the green with brown. A lot of people do that, so be aware fo wher your green is, and spray elsewhere. Same idea though --> Lay needles, vertical strokes, adjust spray distance for height, be sparing but not TOO sparing (use logic; make sure you can still see a lot of the TAN).
c. Alright, THIS is where the magic happens. You know how you look at my gun, and you just can’t put your finger on why it look so good, compared to other Krylon jobs? It’s because I added a secret 4th colour and element --> Black aka SHADOW. By adding black, you give the pattern depth and contrast, like nature! WARNING : be very careful and sparing with the black. It can literally (take it from experience), 2 quick sprays/squirts of paint to ruin an entire pattern by making it too dark. THIS IS WHY IT IS IMPORTANT TO PRACTICE ON NON-GUN MATERIALS FIRST!
-->Do doing the same as we have done so far, we will do with the black. However, with the black, we are going to DISTANCE the can more than the other colours. Why? This si because we want to create a black paint “mist” to fall down between the cracks and onto the pattern, darkening it a bit, and filling in all those nasty voids we had between the colours. It is sort of a blend technique. After we do that (or before in this step, the order in STEP C is unimportant), we will pick a few spots like with the other colours and do the same; a few little “blips” or black spots here and there. Not too thick, and fewer of them than with the other colours, so that we don’t get too much dark!
d. Final, and optional step. Once it is all dry, you can spray the whole thing with a non-reactive (so maybe use the same brand as the paint – krylon is best) matte clearcoat, to protect it all, since it was a lot of work!
WE’RE DONE! THAT’S IT! Now go re-oil the internals! (AFTER it all dries of course! Duh! )
Wasn’t so hard now was it? Let it all dry and go get yourself a beer. You definitely deserve a 2-4 for putting up with my sh!t! haha
Any questions? Post them in here, or PM me. I would prefer you post in here, in case anyone has the same question and I can kill two birds with one stone by answering publicly.
Thanks for reading and I hope this becomes a sticky!
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