Hi, I'm new to the forum and know nothing about auto paint or finishing, but I got myself into this project and now I want to make the best of it and need advise. I'm trying to breathe new life into a 20-year old car whose clearcoat failed and mostly flaked off. A professional paint job was more money than the car is worth, so I decided to do the best I could. I took a razor blade to the old clearcoat which left sharp edges at the point where I could no longer scrape it off. I tried to feather the edges, but they will show through. I don't want to remove all the paint and start over if I don't have to. I wet sanded the whole surface with 400 and 800 and started to paint with rattle cans from Sherwin Williams. They call it acrylic enamel, but it's probably lacquer. It's a dark blue metallic. Nice match, but my main problem is that no matter what I do, I get bad overspray fogging on every pass because it dries so fast and with a narrow spray pattern. I'm also using UPol #1 clear over it which covers the paint's overspray, but has it's own overspray fogging. So, I know this will never look great, but I need to deal with the fogging patterns. Is there a way to knock the fogging down and maybe polish and wax the surface to bring out a uniform high polish look? I'm willing to buy a RA type polisher and products if I need to. Could I, for example, wet sand the whole thing with fine paper like 1200 and then use a polisher to finish the surface? If so, I need to know the proper steps and products to accomplish this. This is not a show car , but i would like it to end up uniform and shiny. I'm stalled right now until I decide the next steps. I'll also need to know how long to let the paint cure before attacking it with paper and polish. Thanks for any advise. If this ends up okay, I may be emboldened to detail my other car's surface...(but no more painting) Ron
I just did a quick spray on my GF's front bumper. The paper your using is way to aggressive IMO. I used 1000 wet paper to get the finish prepped for paint and then wet sanded with 2000 in between coats. I wet sanded the clear with 3000 after I was done and then with it with my flex and Menz SIP on an orange uber pad. Dinish was not perfect...at least for me but did turn out pretty freakin good for a garage fix.
Hi Sprinter I'm no spray painter by all means, but going from experience, it very much sounds like the spraypaint your using is not really supposed to finish up looking smooth without some finishing work to begin with. I sometimes do some spot sanding on customer cars because they appear to have uneven looking surfaces and a little bit of wet sanding does usually fix the issue. I tend to agree with JC98. Make sure you have enough paint first. Let it cure for about a week or more depending on your weather. The hotter the better, then start with 1000 wet sanding. Keep rubbing till the surface becomes nice and flat. Make sure you use a rubbing block and have running water over the surface when sanding. Running water is in my opinion always the best as it washes away grit while your sanding, therefore eredicating scratches Once you have achieved that, then go over with 2000 in a different hand direction to that of the thousand grade. When you can see all the sanding marks gone from the 1000 grade, you know you've completed your 2000 cut. After that, follow through with your buffing techniques to get your desired finish. You can even go with 3000 like the other Chap does after 2000 and then follow through with buffing. Dr Buff
