Badass Monitor Painting Guide - LG 34UM67 FreeSync Gaming Monitor
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2016-05-06
·
1,914 words · ~9 min read
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so the super dirty shirt yeah there's a
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reason for that this is going to be a bit of an unusual video from me today
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while we do tackle DIY projects with
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reasonable frequency we especially lately haven't been particularly focused
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on doing them correctly so today's monitor painting guide will probably
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come across a little weird on the subject of guides let me know with the
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like button below if you want to see us tackle optimizing a 10 G bit Network as
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a short guide it's something I've been working on for a while for our new
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office I'm just not sure if it needs its own
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video freshbooks is the super simple invoicing solution that lets you get
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organized save time and get paid faster
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click my face now to try it for free so
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we kicked things off by finding a nice comfortable place to disassemble our LG
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3467 AMD free sync capable ultrawide
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gaming monitor it's beautiful day for painting monitor I actually did a full
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review of it already and you can check that out in the little eye in the top
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right corner of the screen I thought this was a great candidate for a paint
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JW because while it's 75 HZ variable refresh rate panel has got the
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proverbial business in the front the rear of it is a little lacky in the
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party in the back Department the first step was disassembling the display you
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could paint a monitor by simply masking off the screen and ports and spraying it
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but you wouldn't end up with a nice finish and you'd risk damaging it so I
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used LG's recycling disassembly guide to
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take it apart starting with the screw on the back then by using a plastic pry
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tool which I quickly replaced with the metal one even though that actually did
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damage the plastic on the bottom a little bit to get the clips released to
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pull the backing off next the guide says to remove the speaker so I pulled those
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off then I started forging my own path removing the ARM that attaches the
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monitor to the stand and the screws around the outside of the edges of the
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rear of the inside panel with this done I was able to remove the clips at the
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rear bottom and actually extract the panel from the top/bottom slide bezel as
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well as that little front fascia piece which was able to pop off just fine
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after that point so I put the panel away safely I won't be needing that until
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much later next it's time to work on the
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plastic so I followed this guide on automotivetouchup.com I know that spray
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bombs are not the best way to paint something but I don't have and nor do I
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have any interest in acquiring a spray gun for a one-off project and neither do
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a lot of people so we're going to try it this way we needed masking tape some
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prep solving sandpaper and a scuff pad
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tack cloth plastic parts adhesion promoter sandable primer base coat gloss
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clear coat and finally rubbing compound
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for the finishing touches not actually as expensive as it sounds when I list
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all those things so I started by cleaning off the plastic pieces with
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soap and water although I suspect this step is more relevant for super dirty
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cars then I used prep solvent to ensure it was clean and after that I used the
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scuff pad to rough up the plastic bit to help the primer adhere better it really
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seems like this step could and probably
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should actually be done before washing when you're working on something like a
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monitor but honestly it's not that much work after scuffing and sanding in my
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case to remove a weird line on the back panel to just wash it down quickly one
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more time now before applying any material you're going to want to mask
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anything you don't want paint on so just
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the control button at the bottom for me and set up a decent workspace obviously
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a spray booth with no dust flow and a
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mask would be the best way to keep dust out but I don't have one of those so I
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made myself a little Al clove undercover
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in my garage something that I ended up discovering later that I really needed
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to improve the first two coats are adhesion promoter and the rules for
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applying this are basically the same as any spray balm 20 cm or so away smooth
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overlapping stroke press the nozzle before actually being
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pointed at the surface you're trying to paint and release it once you've passed
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to avoid drips and don't over apply on a
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single coat or you'll get drips from that too then finally always follow the
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recoding instructions to ensure you don't bung everything up if it says wait
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15 minutes before reapplying just wait
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don't touch it just wait
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after the adhesion promoter it's time for primer at this stage you can still
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make some mistakes I mean obviously you want to do your best but don't worry too
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much about it because after three coats of primer you're going to give it
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another light sand with 600 grit sandpaper anyway clean off those primed
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parts with water and then use one of those sticky tack rags to remove any
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dust and lint now you need to step up
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your game so our painting location wasn't good enough and we didn't have an
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anti-st treatment for our panels which means dust was a real hassle for us over
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the next few steps where every stupid little mistake has a chance of showing
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up in the finished products we were able to help ourselves out a lot by covering
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our work area with a tarp but even then we'd get dust problems with almost every
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coat the best advice I can give you now that I'm finished the project though is
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no matter how tempted you are don't try
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to fix anything while the paint is wet
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wait until the coat you're working on dries and you can actually usually get
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little bits of dust out with the tack Rag and even if you can't you're better
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off having one very small problem than several big ones and I was surprised at
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how little of the junk that got stuck in it shows up once you're done with
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polishing so it took four coats of our Lamborghini red Diablo whatever that
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color is called base coat to reach the desired evenness of color so I had
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breakfast and then came back to work on the clear coat after the 30 minute
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interval that it asks for this stuff is
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sticky and also much easier to screw up
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than paint go slow don't touch it and
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you'll be fine it took four coats of clear for me to reach the desired
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glossiness but your mileage may vary and if you do more coats of clear then
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you'll leave yourself more room for polishing the finished product so with
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the clear coat done I left our parts out to dry in the shade never let paint
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paint dry in the Sun or work in the Sun for 24 hours before returning to finish
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the project off so all that's left at this point is take a run at everything
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with some 1500 grit sandpaper for removing any serious orange peel and
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texture and then rubbing compound to bring out the shine and uh that does
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take a little while guys I was at it for a couple of hours and really if i' had
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gone for you know another 6 hours I
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could have gotten a better result a really shiny result result but
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eventually we had to kind of go okay it's time to put this back together and
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find out if it even works and it turns out yes it does and boy is she beautiful
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well okay I won't finish that I'll let you guys be the judge but I think
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considering the reasonable cost of the paint and materials and the fact that
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this mod was done in a total of 8 to 10
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hours I'm really pleased with my now
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totally one-of-a-kind looking gaming monitor I think to take it a step
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further I'd really like to stencil maybe
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not an LG logo again but maybe like something on the bottom here and I'd
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like to stencil something on the back in like matte black plasti dip or something
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that would look sick but it's not terribly critical and I'm really liking
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the shiny smooth red of the entire
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monitor here I consider this project a success and I hope it inspires you guys
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to go paint something it doesn't have to be a monitor speaking of things that
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don't have to be a monitor ting.com they're the mobile carrier that's
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focused on customer service and customer satisfaction first when you call them
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and I've tried this you legitimately do not speak to a robot you get put through
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directly to a person and their billing is different too the average Ting bill
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is apparently only about $24 per month
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per device but because it's pay for
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exactly what you use you might kind of go well gee I don't know how much I'm
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going to use every month the solution is use their calculator so
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head over to Ting excuse me lin.com to
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try out the savings calculator yeah enter your last few bills from your
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current plan as well as how much you're paying and then boom it spits out and
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goes okay yeah you'll save money on Ting or oh no maybe you won't and the best
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part is if you visit that link then you can get
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$25 off a service credit or towards a
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new device just for using the link wow
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amazing also if you're worried about your existing contract they'll cover 25%
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of your cancellation fee up to 75 bucks so that's lin. ting.com to try it out
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today so that's pretty much it guys thanks for watching if this video sucked
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I think you know where the dislike button is but if it was awesome then
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move a little bit over hit the like button get subscribed if you're not
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wondering what to watch next so click that little button in the top right
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corner to check out one of our recent videos on our other channel Techquickie
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where I give a brief rundown of GPS and what it's all about thanks again for
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watching I'll see you next time