The racer tutorial you are referring to is the AK one right? I think racer would steer you away from that one anyways, he did a hand painted one as well. Check it out here: http://cg.tutsplus.com/tutorials/photoshop/how-to-hand-paint-convincing-metal-textures/
I'm a bit torn. After checking out Racer445 Tutorial at the Next-Gen Hard Surface forums I don't know whether to use Alec Moody's hard surfacing texturing technique or Racer's. Racer seems to use a photo base most of the time but Alec doesn't. Both techniques are good. Maybe I should mix it up but it's gonna be hard to do.…
like you say both are good, why not simply try them both and see which one you like. If your just watching tutorials and not directly applying them your wasting your time and money