how do I prepair and buff a new clear coat paint job

[hondo402000]

I am getting ready to paint my 71 Triumph TR6, super red base coat and dupont scratch resistant clear, I purchased a PC kit with LC pads but dont know what products to purchase or the steps, I also have a 3m DA sander and will get the 3000 grit wet sand paper, once I wet sand the clear what steps and what products do I use, Way too much information out there for me to figure it out, I have buffed cars before but been a long time and things have changed

Hondo

 

[Superdutytd]

I am getting ready to paint my 71 Triumph TR6, super red base coat and dupont scratch resistant clear, I purchased a PC kit with LC pads but dont know what products to purchase or the steps, I also have a 3m DA sander and will get the 3000 grit wet sand paper, once I wet sand the clear what steps and what products do I use, Way too much information out there for me to figure it out, I have buffed cars before but been a long time and things have changed

Hondo

I'm sorry but you are going to paint and wetsand a vehicle then remove all the damage from wetsanding with a PC? That is going to take a while by itself even though it can def be done. I would reccomend a M105/M205 combo starting with a yellow pad then working down to maybe a white pad with M105 then M205 with a white pad again.

 

[sullysdetailing]

You are going to need a rotarty with wool and foam pads and products that are body shop safe like M105 and M205

 

[Superdutytd]

A PC with an orange pad can and will take out 3000 grit sanding marks if thats all he is removing...

 

[TurboToys]

well... if you really dont have anything but a pc... wetsand the clear by hand with the proper grits depending on your clear coat and how much orange peel you want to remove. then go and get a couple of trizact pads (3000 grit) for the DA sander. then after you go over the whole car enough with the DA with the trizact pads (use one and do the whole body in a certain order, then slap on the other use and go in the opposite order so you get an even removal). and then get some 4000 grit pads for the DA and go over it to remove the 3000... then you can move on to a yellow pad and 105 on the PC, which should get rid of the marks if you work it enough, like the post above mine said... work your way down, so after a yellow pad and 105, try an orange or white pad and 105, and then go to 205 white and gray.


but youll save a ton of time by using a rotary... time and headaches.

 

[hondo402000]

I do have a rotary and some wool pads so it sounds like use it first and then the PC and foam pads. I hope I dont have to wet sand the whole car, thats not my intentions, but in case I have to I just wanted to know what to do. Only because I repainted my hood on my toyota 4 runner and got some OP in the clear so I wet sanded the clear and I did use my rotary on it but it still have some swirl marks, so when I get my PC and LC pads I can practice on the 4runner and getting it right then proceed on the Triumph once painted

thanks

 

[TurboToys]

I do have a rotary and some wool pads so it sounds like use it first and then the PC and foam pads. I hope I dont have to wet sand the whole car, thats not my intentions, but in case I have to I just wanted to know what to do. Only because I repainted my hood on my toyota 4 runner and got some OP in the clear so I wet sanded the clear and I did use my rotary on it but it still have some swirl marks, so when I get my PC and LC pads I can practice on the 4runner and getting it right then proceed on the Triumph once painted

thanks

well you either wet sand it all. or none of it, if you try to nib out little pieces of dust that got into the clear, your gonna have tiny flat spots from where you did spot sanding... if your going to sand its best to do it all or nothing. depends on how happy ou are with how it looks when its done being sprayed.


forgot to add. if your going to wet sand AND/OR buff a fresh paint job. its best done within 72 hours of the paint job, and depending on the type of paint, you can start wet sanding and buffing (be careful with a rotary because of the heat and uncured paint), 10-12 hours after painting (depending on the clear used). best done early on because the paint is still uncured and extremely soft compared to fully cured, and is much much easier to work with.

 

[hondo402000]

well I will see how it turns out, but I will have all the tools necessary if I have to. I plan on building a paint booth and spraying in a company whare house thats empty and is heated. I will also spray an old door very soon and practice and see what works, as soon as all my stuff come in, I ordered a PC and pad kit, some mernendez compounds and polishes in various grades, If I can paint a car I feel confident I can get it to shine like glass

thanks

Hondo

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

The problem with trying to remove sanding marks with a PC style polisher is that if you push down too hard or if the face of the pad is anything but flat against the surface, (held on an edge), or if you're buffing on top of a raised point, the

Clutch-like-mechanism

Or the

Free Rotating Spindle Assemble

Will not allow the pad to rotate.

Here's the skinny on that, paint is removed best when the pad is rotating over the surface, not just vibrating or jiggling against it. When the pad stops rotating against the paint it more or less is left just vibrating or jiggling against it thus you won't be removing paint thus you won't be removing sanding marks.

Make sense?

Everyone out there hung-up on the word clutch happy? :laughing:


It's this free rotating spindle assemble that makes the PC style polishers safe because it dramatically reduces their ability to burn through the clear layer and expose the basecoat layer and it also reduces their ability to instill swirls although like you get with a true, direct drive rotary buffer.


That said, you can remove sanding marks using a DA style polisher as the write-up I'm working on documents that and shares how to do the procedure.

It will be pretty easy on flat panels but will be a lot more difficult on any body curves for the reasons I stated above.

So the right tool and the best tool for removing sanding marks out of an entire car that has been sanded is the rotary buffer with a wool cutting pad and an aggressive cutting compound.

Next would probably be the Flex 3401 but I would personally opt for a heavy duty RB like the Makit or the Dewalt models.

Cool car by the way, I've owned 6 vintage British Sports cars and once you get past the junky engines, transmissions and faulty wiring, the bodies sure look cool. For example, even the A.C. Cobra of Shelby fame started out as the A.C. Bristol, a British sports car.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

well I will see how it turns out, but I will have all the tools necessary if I have to. I plan on building a paint booth and spraying in a company whare house thats empty and is heated. I will also spray an old door very soon and practice and see what works, as soon as all my stuff come in, I ordered a PC and pad kit, some mernendez compounds and polishes in various grades, If I can paint a car I feel confident I can get it to shine like glass

thanks

Hondo

Stick with the 4" CCS cutting pads and you can easily remove #2000 grit sanding marks as long as you get right on it and don't wait for a month to sand and buff.

How easy or difficult it will be to remove any depth or grit of sanding marks will in part be determined by how hard the paint is.

I've been using the Griot's Garage ROP for to remove sanding marks as it seems to have a little more power than the PC 7424XP but the XP model does in fact have a lot more power than the non-XP version and like the ROP can easily rotate a pad on the 6.0 speed setting.

The XP will easily rotate the 6.5 and 5.5 pads but again, these will rotate best on flat panels, anytime you have a curve the high point of the curve will result in more pressure to only portions of the face of the buffing pad and usually that's all it takes to slow down the rotating action of most PC style polishers.

And just to comment...

Using a rotary buffer to completely buff out an entire car as it relates to removing sanding marks is a ton of work so maybe hit the gym for month before you start the painting process.

 

[O.C.Detailing]

I think you all kind of missed the fact that he's using a scratch-resistant clearcoat. Unfortunately, I haven't really found a way to remove wet-sand marks from scratch resistant clear with a DA-type polisher AT ALL...it will remove lighter swirls, but not wet-sand marks. I'm not sure if being freshly painted makes it easier or not, but if you're lucky, it'll remove them if the clear is fresh.

 

[Superdutytd]

I think you all kind of missed the fact that he's using a scratch-resistant clearcoat. Unfortunately, I haven't really found a way to remove wet-sand marks from scratch resistant clear with a DA-type polisher AT ALL...it will remove lighter swirls, but not wet-sand marks. I'm not sure if being freshly painted makes it easier or not, but if you're lucky, it'll remove them if the clear is fresh.

Oh good catch.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

I'm not sure if being freshly painted makes it easier or not, but if you're lucky, it'll remove them if the clear is fresh.

From my experience in the body shop world, I'm not sure if any of the major paint companies would ever introduce a paint that could not be sanded and buffed.

At the OEM level it's possible because it seems at the OEM level they never take into consideration that if a bird leaves a dropping on someone's hood and it leaves an etching in the paint, that quite possibly the owner might want to have a paint that's workable enough that they can remove the etching or pay a detailer to remove it for them.

All the OP has to do is check with the paint mixer at the PBE store where he's going to buy his paint and ask if the paint can be sanded and buffed and if so what are the limitations.

If the paint mixer says one of the cool features about the paint he plans on spraying is that it doesn't need to be sanded and in fact cannot be sanded, then it's time to find a different paint system because even if you were to never sand it after painting, whose to say it won't need correction work down the road?

Sometimes new technology isn't always better... (Vista cough cough cough)

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

M105 states right on the back label that it can be used on Scratch-Resistant Coatings so if they've done their homework on these paint systems in the aftermarket it's probably a safe bet that he won't have any problems.

If it were me?

I'd probably stick with something less high-tech and let them dial these new paint systems i for a couple of years. The last thing you want is a paint system that's hard to polish unless you're going to park it in a museum.

 

[Superdutytd]

M105 states right on the back label that it can be used on Scratch-Resistant Coatings so if they've done their homework on these paint systems in the aftermarket it's probably a safe bet that he won't have any problems.

If it were me?

I'd probably stick with something less high-tech and let them dial these new paint systems i for a couple of years. The last thing you want is a paint system that's hard to polish unless you're going to park it in a museum.

Is this the same thing as a ceramic clear?

 

[TurboToys]

I think you all kind of missed the fact that he's using a scratch-resistant clearcoat. Unfortunately, I haven't really found a way to remove wet-sand marks from scratch resistant clear with a DA-type polisher AT ALL...it will remove lighter swirls, but not wet-sand marks. I'm not sure if being freshly painted makes it easier or not, but if you're lucky, it'll remove them if the clear is fresh.

seen 105 take out some hefty scratches with the right pad on a DA, ive removed ridiculous oxidation which could rival the depth of wetsanding scratches.



but fresh paint is a ton easier to buff out and sand out than paint thats fully cured.... after the paint has set (1 hour typically), you can touch it but no foreign debris can be introduced to it, so its safe to roll out and either let bake in the sun, or put in the shade so it can be worked soon after.... you can feel it 24 hours after painting, touch it with your fingernail and you can see that you can make an indentation into the paint.... so if it really is a scratch resistant clear, your best chance to get all the orange peal out is soon after painting.

and if 105 says that it is capable of being used on scratch resistant clear, then by all means, go for it, meguiars wouldnt lie as far as i can tell.

 

[O.C.Detailing]

I'm just saying that, in my experience with wet-sanding on and attempting to remove the wet-sanding marks with the Griot's DA and M105 with ANY pad I've tried, has only resulted in an increase in gloss, without FULLY removing the wet-sanding marks. By that I mean that in direct sunlight, the scratches are EXTREMELY bold against all of the paints I've tried to remove them on with the DA and even a 4" LC CCS Yellow Cutting pad and Foamed Wool pad. We did a 2006 Mercedes SL230 convertible and tried to remove some wet-sanding scratches I put on the trunklid to remove a MASSIVE amount of scratches induced by the previous owner and the DA and M105 wouldn't touch it. I had to pull out the rotary and M105 with 3-4 passes before I could get them to go away, and that's after 3-4 passes with M105 on LC Hydro-tech Cyan pad with the Griot's DA, the most powerful of the DA polishers at the moment. I'd love for someone to prove me wrong and show me where they removed wet-sanding scratches with a DA and M105 or other product made for hard clears, but as of now, based on real-life experience I've had on several cars I've detailed...there's no way to remove them completely with a DA polisher and M105. It takes a rotary's torque to get rid of them.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

I'm just saying that, in my experience with wet-sanding on and attempting to remove the wet-sanding marks with the Griot's DA and M105 with ANY pad I've tried, has only resulted in an increase in gloss, without FULLY removing the wet-sanding marks.

Just to piggy back on your correct observation.

There's a HUGE difference in sanding paint and the making the surface shiny again, that's pretty easy to do.

Removing 100% of the sanding marks is a completely different thing and something I've been posting about for the last 7 years every time someone posts a fluffy sentence or two about using a PC style polisher to remove sanding marks.

Pictures don't tell the story unless you can get really close like this to capture a single tracer left over after buffing. Like this,

The green thing in the upper left hand corner is the weave of a folded microfiber for reference.


:laughing:

 

[TurboToys]

Just to piggy back on your correct observation.

There's a HUGE difference in sanding paint and the making the surface shiny again, that's pretty easy to do.

Removing 100% of the sanding marks is a completely different thing and something I've been posting about for the last 7 years every time someone posts a fluffy sentence or two about using a PC style polisher to remove sanding marks.

Pictures don't tell the story unless you can get really close like this to capture a single tracer left over after buffing. Like this,

The green thing in the upper left hand corner is the weave of a folded microfiber for reference.


:laughing:

whered you buy the dual action microscope/camera mike? lol

 

[O.C.Detailing]

I just missed that in my last post I didn't mention that I can't remove wet-sand marks on scratch-resistant clear coats with the DA and M105 using ANY of my pads. Normal clears, I have had much success removing wetsanding marks completely, though I'm sure it takes a bit longer than with a rotary. So long as I'm not working on a scratch-resistant clear, my DA, M105 and the Hydro-tech Cyan or CCS Yellow pad WILL remove wet-sanding marks completely, including the marks you can only see when putting your face almost on the paint to see them.