Tailgate Paint Job

Hey yall,

My tailgate is cracked and saggy but my buddy is getting his tacoma scrapped and I'm getting his tailgate for cheap to replace it. But his truck is red and mine is gold.

I'm on the fence if I get it painted to match my truck or paint it simple black to match my rims and gas cover. I don't wanna spend too much on a tailgate that I'm probably gonna scratch up in the woods or loading dirtbikes.

Have yall painted tailgates yourself? Does it look like total crap?

Also if I paint it black. I was thinking of having some fun and have my friend pin stripe (he does a Harleys and classic cars) the tailgate with my gold paint.

 

I think black would look fine. You could do black bedliner. It would handle the abuse better.

 

Go to AUTO TOUCH UP PAINT. COM They take your Vin number and mix you paint to match. It works great. Its in spray cans

 

Do you have a compressor and a gun? I've bought from MBI Auto several times on eBay, give them the correct paint code and they ship in locked cans sealed in plastic bags, always a perfect match. You'll want to prime it up properly and I'd think a pint of color and quart of clear would do it. Maybe a pint of clear, comes with accelerator.

Metalflake of any kind is tricky if you're not experienced at it, any runs or mishaps show like a sore thumb. Maybe go with a quart of color, quart of clear and experiment if you're not sure. :-D

 

I have a gold 1st gen, and I used some touch-up paint on some areas, doesn't look bad. Not a fan of a black, but that's me.

 

Thanks for all the replies.

I didn't know about custom matched rattlecans of paint and after watching a couple YouTube videos on them I going to give that a shot first with my original gold color.

https://youtu.be/vwXJwhisYAE?si=xpm-JRIeb2l085v2

If it looks like crap I'll just paint it all black.

I'll add updated pics once I give it a shot.