How to paint w/ pro results?

My bike needs a paint job and I'd like it to look really good.

However, I live in a rural area in Thailand and the local paint shops
aren't used to high standards. I mean, they might just spray a coat over
the old paint and that's it until it flakes off. But they can of course
strip off the old paint and use primer and a couple of coats thereafter.
The results look pretty amateurish, imperfections, etc. They've never heard
of clearcoating a bike.

I believe they could do pretty well if they had a specification. So does
anyone here know of a good online guide to painting or have a quick spec?
I'm just gonna do basic black. I wonder about how many coats of what (would
it need a clear coat?), the sanding between with what grade of paper, the
final finish, etc. I did Google but I didn't find anything very
satisfactory.

Thanks for any help.

 

happy reading:
http://www.xs11.com/faq/paintfaq.shtml#Adjusting Paint Gun0

JT