spraypaint info does not compute

[onboard]

Could someone please set me straight? Enamel, laquer, and acrylic being the big three. I've read all the pedal painting posts, goggled many a glossary, talked to the friendly guy behind the counter at the local mom-n-pop home center...

First there are the two main "families" of paints, lacquer and enamel. Right?

1) Lacquers - evaporative, they dry by the evaporation of the solvent, and can be recostituted by their own solvent.

2)Enamel - polymetric, they dry, or "cure" as a result of a chaining at a molecular level, and cannot be reconstituted by their own solvent.

Both are oil, or alkyd paint.  So far so good?

Where does "acrylic" fit in? I found a definition in a glossary of painting terminology which reads "Acrylic: A synthetic resin used in high-performance water-based coatings. A coating in which the binder contains acrylic resins."

If acrylic specifically refers to water base, how in the world can there be acrylic enamel or acrylic lacquer?!?!? Both of which I see on the shelf, and here/read reference to. Do oil and water now mix? Probably not, so what am I not getting?

[onboard]

I remember trying to debug my first build and thought "Once this is up and running, putting it in a box and finishing it will be a breeze compared to the electronics".    :roll:  But now that I want a perfect paintjob, there's as much to know about prep/painting/finishing as there is about the rest of the project.

No wonder DIY is it's own arena - you have to know how to do it all, not just one or another step along the way.

I didn't realize how much there is to consider, as folks here who turn out great paintjobs and graphics can attest to. I think MartyMart's post recently about his new Vibe build mentioned something about the finishing being the hard part.