Anybody ever seen this before?

My neighbor brought his truck over today and wanted to know why he had dimpling on his truck. I ran my hand across it and felt many tiny little dimples on the roof and hood.
At first I thought it was pitch so I broke out the IPA and tried that followed by an aggressive clay bar but those didn't touch it.

Eventually I ended up taping off a section and polishing with Menz Power Gloss on wool followed by PF on an orange uber and 85rd on a blue uber to finish. After polishing, the dimples were still there, but I did remove some portion of them as the area felt a bit smoother.

So it is definitely some issue with the clear coat and I am wondering if you guys would steer clear of this truck or try and wetsand/compound to level the finish. If these are bubbles in the clear, then conceivably polishing them down would strike through on their peaks but not the surrounding areas. That would be bad news.

Thanks for any input from those of you that have experienced this!

Btw, pictures are below and it is a Dodge Ram that is always parked under a carport.



Here you can clearly see the dimples

After polishing, dimples are still visible but have been leveled a bit

 

Looks like someone did a crappy paint job on it.

 

IDK, He's had the truck for years and never seen the dimples until recently...

 

Was the car ever repainted? because it looks like solvent pop from improper flash times in the painting process. Maybe he never noticed it until now.

 

Could be, I will ask him today. Judging by the swirls and RDS in the paint, any repaint would have been done a long time ago.

 

Just spoke with the owner, he confirmed that the car has never been repainted and that the dimples showed up around 1 month ago.

Do you guys think this dimpling process will continue getting worse, or is it done changing?

 

Not sure what year the ram is but Dodge had the paint issue a number of years ago. Can't remember exactly what happened but the paint started to bubble and flake. this could be the begining of the clear failing.

 

Looks like excessive air got into paint as it was sprayed.Polish it a few times essentially popping the air bubbles leaving pock marks. That was no doubt a crappy paint job at one time.

 

Is there anything else it could be? This guy washes his car by hand on a regular basis, has owned the truck for years and is just now noticing the issue. Seems strange that he would have never noticed it before now.

I am assuming these bad paint jobs would be evident from the beginning and not show up years later....

He might end up wanting me to polish out the truck and seal it up (probably with Opti-Coat) but I don't want to do that if the clear will continue to get worse.

Also, I am worried that polishing them out and leaving 'pock marks' as you say would in essence be the same as flash through.

 

Had the same thing happen to me on a BMW I had. Poor bodywork/paint job.

 

Maybe try and level out the area then re-apply clearcoat or even use opti-coat as clear coat. Just a thought. And Ken, are you finding the new BMW paint work to be thinner and thinner? my family friend's X3's plastic bumper got like scratched by prob shopping carts and the paint just stripped off down to the white plastic. Its like paint you use on toys that strips off by peeling it :S

 

Has the motor ever overheated? My parents had a dodge van that run very hot once when the cooling fans wouldn't turn on. I noticed in the area where the motor is closest to the hood the paint as crazed. Dodge paint in the mid 90's up until a about 2k5 has been garbage. Dodge has always had very thin clear coast from my experience.

 

Might not hurt to look under the hood at the spot below that paint-acne, and see what is there.

Personally, it looks like something under the paint is coming up through it. Have never seen or heard of this before.

What is directly under that paint on the hood? Does this truck have that big fiberglass pad on the underside of the hood there? Does it look all normal under there?

Seeing you say its also on the roof, kind of negates anything causing this from underneath the hood though, right ?

Had a new Chevy Truck in the late 80's that had a defective paint job that the Dealer repainted for me. That original paint started flaking off though, and did not behave like this truck's paint.

I would take it to a known, trusted, body shop and get an opinion from them. I am sure they will want to take it all off and start over, especially if something is under the paint - perhaps even some kind of rust, etc., because this was painted perhaps, without a good primer/sealer originally.

Not sure anything short of sanding it all down with a D/A and some 360 wet or dry, etc., and repainting, and going from there is ever going to make this better...

Good luck with this - let us know what happens..

Dan F

 

I thought of looking under the hood too, but as you say, since it is also on the roof....
This is a weird one for sure, thanks for chiming in with your thoughts.

The guy just had a carport built, bare aluminum plus supports and the truck does sleep under that at night. I thought some sort of fallout from that was creating the dimples, but he has a few other vehicles parked under it that have not had this problem.:shead:

 

Yea I was thinking about that too, but I'm not sure engine heat is the prob as it is happening on the roof too.:shead:

 

What did you do about it Ken? Respray? Wetsand?:thumb:

 

Had to be resprayed.

 

Hypothetically would putting Opti-Coat over this failing clear coat seal things up effectively?

 

Looks to me like fish eyes from silicone or something being on the primer before he painted or posibly on the paint between coats.

 

It isn't slovent pop. Solvent pop happens during the drying process and is tiny holes in the topcoat. It doesn't just appear down the road. It looks like the beginning of a delam issue. It could be from a repaint at some point or just the factory paint. It isn't uncommon for cars to have repair work done before it leaves the plant or the dealer.

Some thickness reading would be helpful. If it was repainted it could be from contamination.