hey bubblez

Painting the interior is not as difficult as it is time consuming. Depends at the end of the day what effort you put in as to what the results would be. I saw on here the black gloss finish on the Fairmont interior and this very easilly achieved from some effort and some goodies from super cheap/auto barn/repco...
I've painted quite a few interiors now, and the below works best for me.
Basics would be:
* Your chosen paint colour - in spray can or even better if you have a compressor and spray gun
* Plastic Primer - in spray can form is fine... KNH do one...
* wet and dry
* Clear Gloss
* Cleaning agent (don't use brake clean as certain brands can eat at plastics). Metho diluted with water works well as it cleans and dissipates.
* Time.
* Patience
* a nice sunny day
* area with little to no wind.

Once you have your plastics out, its a matter of cleaning them properly getting rid of oils (ie. armourall), dust and general crap.
Give the plastic piece a light rub down with a 400 wet and dry and clean again. This will get rid of some imperfections on the plastic, and help the primer to bond better. Once its dry, apply a coat of plastic primer. Give it 5-10 minutes in the sun and then you're ready for a coat of paint.

The thing to remember is to do light misty coats - it takes more time, but the results a 100% better!!

do 3 coats of your chosen colour, remembering to let it dry for 10-15mins in between coats. Once its dried after the 3rd coat you'll notice that 1) you've now gotten a good even coverage over the plastic with little to no plastic showing through... heres when you get your 600-800 wet and dry and start cutting back the shine off the paint. this will get rid of most imperfections out of the paint. Clean the plastic again and once dry hit with another 3 coats of your chosen colour, again remembering to let it dry for 10-15mins in between coats. Grab the wet and dry (800) again and give it another rub to take the shine completely off. Clean again and leave to dry. At this stage you can either spray another coat of your colour, or spray with a clear gloss and repeat the above steps (ie, 3 coates, wet and dry) It all depends how glossy (wet) you want it to look...
After the final coat, leave the plastic to dry in the sun and leave it overnight in a spot where it won't get moisture. By the next morning you should be right to fit back on the car. The biggest mistake you can make is to fit immediately after drying the last coat. While it looks dry, and feels dry, its only touch dry, and not cured. Trying to fit pieces back in place that are uncured is only going to lead to imperfections in the paint (ie finger prints, smudging etc).

Hope this helps. If you need anymore info or piccys, let me know (PM me.)

Cheers

Dave-o

but if your to paint it if your interior gets scrathed for some stupid reason wouldnt that mean that it would show through?

You'd see the same problem with buying a factory painted one from Ford. Unless you sit there and gouge at it with something sharp, it won't go back to plastic, the worst you may get is some light surface scratching. And that would only be over time. That being the case, after a few years, take the piece out, rub it back with some wet and dry, and reapply the clear / or colour... it wouldn't be the same lengthy process, unless you were changing the colour of it completely. Same sort of thing with the paint on the body of the car...