Painting question?

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I have a metal railing that I recently built that needs to be painted. It a little hard to describe the design, but it's basically  2"x1" steel top and bottom with 1"x1" verticals placed at a 45 degree angle every 4 inches. I TIG welded the whole thing, which was time consuming, but the practice was really what I was after, I will post pictures when done. Anyway, my question is really about painting it. I have put a primer coat of ZeroRust red oxide, which I have used in the past with good results, but I am looking for suggestions on spray paint for a top coat. I live in about 10 blocks from the ocean so it needs to hold up to salty air. I have heard that Rustolum holds up well, the color will be semi-gloss black.
Reply:ive heard good things about por-15, if the hype is true it may be exactly what you want.http://www.por15.com/
Reply:I am not familiar with the effects of ocean air on paint/metal, though I have painted a lot of steel.  I think most important is technique:  Make sure all welds are primed and all pinholes are sealed.  I brush all joints/welds with a wet(lots of solvent) primer solution.  Then I spray. If you used tubing then make sure moisture cannot get into the tubing.  Must problems occur underneath the paint after moisture/air is allowed to enter at some unpainted area.  Then you notices all those paint blisters.Might want to wet or let it rain on your project to see where rust appears before painting.
Reply:Originally Posted by gavinpierceI have a metal railing that I recently built that needs to be painted. It a little hard to describe the design, but it's basically  2"x1" steel top and bottom with 1"x1" verticals placed at a 45 degree angle every 4 inches. I TIG welded the whole thing, which was time consuming, but the practice was really what I was after, I will post pictures when done. Anyway, my question is really about painting it. I have put a primer coat of ZeroRust red oxide, which I have used in the past with good results, but I am looking for suggestions on spray paint for a top coat. I live in about 10 blocks from the ocean so it needs to hold up to salty air. I have heard that Rustolum holds up well, the color will be semi-gloss black.
Reply:ZeroRust and Por15 are similar products. They are designed to spray over rusty metal in bad environments. When you use it on good clean metal it really comes out nice. I did wipe and clean the whole thing with solvent before primer. This was all TIG welded so it was pretty clean in the first place. The wife came in the shop last night and gave the flat black a thumbs up. So I think now I will just give it a few more coats of ZeroRust and call it good. I have used this stuff on boats and it seems to hold up better than anything else I have used. The manufacturer says it can be used as a topcoat as well. I didn't know about Interlux but I will be checking it out for the next project.