Painting: PPE for Breathing

[sp73]

For those of you that have painted on your trucks at home, what is the best course of action concerning a respirator?

I have set up an 230v air compressor with a cooling loop, Iwata 400 gun, and am looking to move beyond the rattle can domain. We are not talking about doing a whole vehicle, just touch up/maybe a panel here or there as well as work on my tractor.

I am readying NASTY things about hardener/clear... specifically isocyanates. Many of the youtube wizards I have watched seem to be using open face respirators... :/

 

[White Stripe]

From what i understand you absorb a fair amount of chemicals through the eyes.

 

[BurntToast]

I use a full face like this one with the appropriately rated filter

Amazon.com: 3M 6800 Reusable Respirator, Full Facepiece, Medium, 1 Each : Tools & Home Improvement

Amazon.com: 3M 6800 Reusable Respirator, Full Facepiece, Medium, 1 Each : Tools & Home Improvement

www.amazon.com

 

[diesellibrarian]

It's been a while since I did this research, but when I was looking at PPE for painting my 62, I read somewhere that respirators will not protect from isocyanate vapors. The only way to avoid isocyanate exposure when spraying is to use a helmet with a fresh air feed. For that reason I ended up painting my truck with a single stage acrylic enamel. I had to drive two hours to find a paint supplier that sold anything but polyurethane-based paint, but I think it was worth it in the end.

I've been hearing about paint shops moving to water-based paint, but I don't know anything about that except that the drying time is much longer. But I would imagine that water-based paint would be less toxic than other types.