Opti-Coat high spot fix?

[coredump4]

I just attempted my first OC install over the Labor Day weekend, and I botched a few panels. Despite having researched the tricks to applying OC, and *thinking* I was being careful, I still managed to leave some high spots. I understand that high spots have to be polished.
Questions:
1) I'm assuming I need to buff the OC all the way off the affected areas, or is it possible to fix them without a total re-do? I'm pretty sure it's the former but looking for confirmation of this.
1a) If it's possible to fix the high spots, what pad and polish combo would give the best chance for success on a DA?
2) If I buff the OC all the way off the affected areas, can I mask a perimeter around the affected area and buff that portion of the panel, or do I need to re-do the entire panel? The vehicle is a Subaru BRZ, and some panels are rather complex. For example, the quarter panels wrap around the door to form the A pillar on top and the rocker panel on the bottom.
3) Is there a benefit to polishing the areas now, when OC has only been applied within the past few days, or wait longer? What timeframe is proper?

thanks!

 

[Chris Thomas]

As long as you're not too aggressive, you won't have to reapply. Since the coating isnt fully hardened, a pass or two with Optimum Finish, Polish II, GPS, or Poli-Seal on a soft finishing pad will likely remove the excess easily. As long as you stop when it clears up...you will still have a normal thickness of the coating intact.

 

[coredump4]

Chris,
Thanks for describing a technique to improve this situation. I attempted my repair roughly 3 days after initial application. I used a CCS blue pad with Polish II very gently at low speed (~1500 OPMs on the 7424) with some success. I'd say about 40% of where I polished worked as you described. The other 60% had no hope: by the time the high spots weren't visible, too much product had been removed. This was verified at the next washing, as it's really obvious where there's OC and where there is not.
So now the big question is, can I re-apply OC to the areas where it's missing? I think this should be OK, though I'm not sure how it will look at the juncture of an area that already has OC and one where it's being re-applied. Any further thoughts are appreciated!

thanks!

 

[tuscarora dave]

Chris,
Thanks for describing a technique to improve this situation. I attempted my repair roughly 3 days after initial application. I used a CCS blue pad with Polish II very gently at low speed (~1500 OPMs on the 7424) with some success. I'd say about 40% of where I polished worked as you described. The other 60% had no hope: by the time the high spots weren't visible, too much product had been removed. This was verified at the next washing, as it's really obvious where there's OC and where there is not.
So now the big question is, can I re-apply OC to the areas where it's missing? I think this should be OK, though I'm not sure how it will look at the juncture of an area that already has OC and one where it's being re-applied. Any further thoughts are appreciated!

thanks!

Is this your Subaru or is it a customer's car? If it's your personal vehicle, then it seems you may be in a position to do some testing with Opti-Coat spot repair/re-application. If you felt so inclined to do such testing and report your findings back to the forums, you could really help a lot of folks who seemingly are posting up initial application issues with Opti-Coat. Give and take is the name of the game on these forums. If your testing was successful, you could really offer a great contribution to the forum.

I'm subscribing to this thread as I am interested in how this turns out for you.

 

[coredump4]

Is this your Subaru or is it a customer's car? If it's your personal vehicle, then it seems you may be in a position to do some testing with Opti-Coat spot repair/re-application. If you felt so inclined to do such testing and report your findings back to the forums, you could really help a lot of folks who seemingly are posting up initial application issues with Opti-Coat. Give and take is the name of the game on these forums. If your testing was successful, you could really offer a great contribution to the forum.

I'm subscribing to this thread as I am interested in how this turns out for you.

It is my own car. I will likely try to do a spot repair this weekend; at this point, I have nothing to lose because if the repair fails, I'm re-doing the whole panel anyway. I will report back...

 

[coredump4]

I never reported back, but I did re-apply OC to some areas. It seemed to apply just fine, and didn't cause any problems when I overlapped with the areas with OC on them. I'm still not a true OC believer, however. It's about to start warming up here in the mid-Atlantic region, and I'll assess whether OC has remained on my vehicle through the winter. I'm not entirely sure that it has.

One trick I've learned: if you're applying OC in your home garage, like I am, it's going to be nearly impossible to have enough light to properly apply OC. My recommendation is to try one of these white LED work lights:
Rakuten.com - 2 - Pack - 27 LED Superbright Worklight/Flashlight w/ Built-In Hook Hanger & Magnet (Batteries Included)
Portable Super Bright 27 LED Magnetic Hanging Hook Flashlight Spot Light Camping - Newegg.com
(I actually bought mine at my local 7-Eleven!)
These helped a ton in finding OC high spots. Basically, after applying a section of OC, trace the entire section with this light and you will catch your high spots. There are wand versions of these worklights that I'm sure work well too.

I'll add more information in a few weeks, after I've had more time to do a proper springtime assessment of the vehicle.