Yes rotary for earlier steps should be ok. Using DA for all steps works take a long long time unless you have one of the stronger and quite expensive da's
I never could get 3M's line to yield that great of results. They push it like its the only thing in the world you can buff a car with, but...
This was 200 grit:
This is as smooth as I got them before painting:
Just after paint was applied..
and, ta-da, after drying! They came out beautiful. I wet sanded a few dust specks and buffed them back to clear.. I've done this to two sets now and it has worked great. Corvette is...
I've used a high quality exterior automotive clear coat for coating headlights in the past. So far both sets of headlights I've done this way (sanding starting at about 240 and going up to about 1000) then painting it with clear. You do NOT have to make them perfectly slick prior to painting...
Try Trizact 3000 on a DA to refine the scratches. 3M recommends their "interface" pad to even the pressure across the surface and help you not go too hard on corners/body lines. You can even go to 5000 after 3000 if you want to. Unfortunately, neither are cheap and you usually have to buy a...
Are you going to re-base it or just re spray the clear? You really need to get the orange peel out of what you have now first or you'll just be trying to cover it up, which isn't going to make things any easier.
It doesn't look like you had enough atomizing air to me. Also may want to thin...
Gotcha--I need to order a smaller backing plate so I can try some of the smaller pads. Obviously I'll give it a shot with what I have first to see if it works well enough to finish off this project
I used a cheapo HVLP I found on amazon, this one: Tool Force A-C1 50 PSI 2-in-1 HVLP Spray Gun - Hvlp Sprayers - Amazon.com
I used a 1.4mm tip on the primer & first coat of base, then remembered I had a 2.0mm so I switched to that for the clear.
I may have used the 2.0mm on the second coat...
lol, thanks--I guess most of the things I read about them had good things to say, but it was also mostly people sanding over factory clear coat or taking out minor issues, not grinding through an absurd amount of orange peel.
Funny thing is today I was looking at the car and there are several...
Yeah, I really should have bought some thin tape, such as the 1/8" vinyl. I think the smallest I had was 1", which made it pretty tough to really protect the edges. Ah well, live and learn...
I'll give the Denim pads a try once on a few of the spots I have left once they come in (should be...
I ordered a pair of those but unfortunately they weren't on amazon prime and I didn't want to pay $20 extra for expedited shipping, so they won't be here until tomorrow. I have a few spots that still need a little work, mostly near some of the edges that I didn't want to go too crazy on, so...
So, long story short, this is all on my 2005 Corvette. I purchased it a few months ago with some damage on the passenger fender, door & rocker panel (obviously, it was cheap). Unfortunately the rocker panels are epoxied on to the frame on these cars in such a way that they are pretty much...