Is my clearcoat finished?

E

ElliottG

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Hey guys

I bought this car and it had a lot of sap on the car when i got it...right when I got the car I tried removing it and seemed to get it all off...but now 2-3 years later my roof has all these marks which appear to be sap marks that have eaten through the clearcoat...

Here's some pics:

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It is extremely hard to tell if the marks are above or below the original clear coat but it seems like it's below...as you can see they marks are dull now so it seems like the clearcoat is gone...

I just bought a DA with megs 105/205 but now I'm worried about using it on my roof because it looks like there's no more clearcoat to remove...

I also just bought some touch up paint today (spray can) with some clear coat to go with it...do you think spraying the clear over the effected areas and then polishing will do some good? I feel like I just bought all this detailing stuff for nothing (look @ all those nasty swirls) :(

What do you guys think?

Thanks,
Elliott
 
It's peeling off. So it's done.

I am trying to find a paint booth to rent so I can re-clear my 92 Explorer. Might even experiment with putting pearl in the first coat, let it flash, then another coat of clear on top of the pearl. Explorer isn't worth anything, might as well have fun with it.
 
It's hard to be completely sure. But, I've had some success with wet sanding those etchings, compounding, and polishing. I've taken a ton of them out this way. I would at least give it a shot.

Try going over some of those etchings with 205 and a finising pad...then check your pad for paint color. If you see color, you know there's nothing you can do. If there's no color...then try the 105 with a few brief passes and see if it helps. If it does, then do the normal passes. It's either gonna take them out, or improve them.

The wet sanding woul be risky...but might be worth it. If you do wet sand, use something light like 3000. Then, follow up with 105 and 205.
 
oldmodman said:
I am trying to find a paint booth to rent so I can re-clear my 92 Explorer. Might even experiment with putting pearl in the first coat, let it flash, then another coat of clear on top of the pearl.
Click to expand...

In my home town there used to be a place that would rent out their spray booth on weekends, I rented it and sprayed a pearl blue over white paint job on a 1975 Triumph Spitfire. Which I had a picture of it today, after sanding and buffing it came out pretty good.



Kristopher1129 said:
It's hard to be completely sure. But, I've had some success with wet sanding those etchings, compounding, and polishing. I've taken a ton of them out this way. I would at least give it a shot.

Try going over some of those etchings with 205 and a finishing pad...then check your pad for paint color. If you see color, you know there's nothing you can do. If there's no color...then try the 105 with a few brief passes and see if it helps. If it does, then do the normal passes. It's either gonna take them out, or improve them.
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Good advice.

You can't always remove a defect 100% but you can often times improve a defect to the point that it's less noticeable and you can live with it.

Then keep those horizontal surfaces cleaned and protected.


:)
 
Thanks guys. Yea I was thinking about doing the M105 but I'm worried that if the clear is gone it wont stand up to the suns uv.

But I'll have to try that method and see whether or not paint comes off on the pad thats a great idea. If it does, regular pad cleaner should take care of it rightto get it off the pad?

Any other opinions?
 
ElliottG said:
Thanks guys. Yea I was thinking about doing the M105 but I'm worried that if the clear is gone it wont stand up to the suns uv.

:confused:

But I'll have to try that method and see whether or not paint comes off on the pad thats a great idea. If it does, regular pad cleaner should take care of it rightto get it off the pad?

Any other opinions?
Click to expand...

If you find paint transfer on your pad, you've gone to far ;)

The only other options are to hire a pro, repaint or run it off in a ditch
 
Most of those look like bird poop etches to me. I'm not sure what oldmodman is looking at, but I don't see any peeling.

Here's my opinion, for what it's worth. I don't see generally failed clear, I see some bad etch spots which may be locally failed. The general condition of the paint actually looks pretty good. I don't think I would wetsand anything (especially if you haven't done that before).

You could try hitting the whole thing with 205 as suggested, but I would just go over the whole area with 105, and follow with 205. You'll probably improve those etch spots, maybe enough to live with, maybe enough to be hardly noticeable. If they are really bad, the compounding might make them worse, but hey, then you get to use your touchup paint and practice wetsanding ;)
 
Right. Well what do you think about re-clearing only the damaged spots and then buffing out the car?

I have two options basically:

1) Do as posted above with M205 and a polishing pad (that would be the white pad I got with this kit, right?) and see if there's any paint transfer. If there isn't, keep going and detail as normal? If there is, clear over it and go again?

2) Clear over the effected areas right now and then do the M105/205 treatment after

What do you guys think?

EDIT: Just saw your post now, Setec Astronomy. Yea if the clear isn't gone then this situation isn't very bad, but I'm not sure if it is or not that's the problem. I really don't care if I see them afterwards I just would maybe like to improve them so it doesn't stand out from the rest of the car.

Thanks for your opinion I take it in high regard just with everyone else on this forum.

The only thing I'm worried about is taking the clear completely off which removes all UV protection the car has on the roof!
 
ElliottG said:
Right. Well what do you think about re-clearing only the damaged spots and then buffing out the car?

I have two options basically:

1) Do as posted above with M205 and a polishing pad (that would be the white pad I got with this kit, right?) and see if there's any paint transfer. If there isn't, keep going and detail as normal? If there is, clear over it and go again?

2) Clear over the effected areas right now and then do the M105/205 treatment after

What do you guys think?

EDIT: Just saw your post now, Setec Astronomy. Yea if the clear isn't gone then this situation isn't very bad, but I'm not sure if it is or not that's the problem. I really don't care if I see them afterwards I just would maybe like to improve them so it doesn't stand out from the rest of the car.

Thanks for your opinion I take it in high regard just with everyone else on this forum.

The only thing I'm worried about is taking the clear completely off which removes all UV protection the car has on the roof!
Click to expand...

Your clear actually looks pretty healthy to me. Your not going to remove enough (if any) clear using 105 and a DA. If nothing else, it would knock down that swirlfest you got going on there
 
ElliottG said:
The only thing I'm worried about is taking the clear completely off which removes all UV protection the car has on the roof!
Click to expand...

Don't worry about that, it really looks like you have plenty of clear. As Flash says, one polishing isn't going to take off all your UV protection. If you're nervous just use the 205.

You're kind of confusing me...in one breath you want to repaint the roof, in the next you're worried about removing the UV protection...if you're ready to repaint it, just go with the 105, what do you have to lose?

But seriously, people polish with 105 every day, I think you'll be fine. Where are you located? Maybe a member will look at it for you in person.
 
Flash Gordon said:
Your clear actually looks pretty healthy to me. Your not going to remove enough (if any) clear using 105 and a DA. If nothing else, it would knock down that swirlfest you got going on there
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Thanks but how can you tell exactly? And I thought that 105 was a pretty aggressive polish? I'm using it with surbuf pads...or should I try it with the orange pads I got with the kit first? The orange pads say they're for "light cutting".

Setec Astronomy said:
Don't worry about that, it really looks like you have plenty of clear. As Flash says, one polishing isn't going to take off all your UV protection. If you're nervous just use the 205.

You're kind of confusing me...in one breath you want to repaint the roof, in the next you're worried about removing the UV protection...if you're ready to repaint it, just go with the 105, what do you have to lose?

But seriously, people polish with 105 every day, I think you'll be fine. Where are you located? Maybe a member will look at it for you in person.
Click to expand...

Thanks but as mentioned above how can you tell exactly? Just so I know what to look for in the future!

so 205 with the white pad, right?

I don't recall when I said I was going to repaint the roof, I merely said that I was prepared to clear coat over the affected areas if there's no clear left...just wondering if I should do that first to see if it makes a difference...I'll have to try it on a small one to see what it does.

And I'm from Montreal, Quebec, Canada. I'm not sure how many members are from there!

Thanks guys for the responses I really appreciate the help!
 
How can we tell? I dunno...from looking at a lot of pictures of CC failure? As I mentioned previously, general CC failure from lack of care/UV exposure is a lot different than spots that have been locally damaged by poop, sap, etc. Incipient CC failure is usually manifested by a cloudy, dull appearance (over the whole area).

IMO the Surbuffs are more aggressive than you really need, your paint doesn't really look bad. Yes, 205 with white pad, 105 with orange pad.

Look, even those etch marks don't really look that bad, they aren't bubbled, cracked, or have primer showing through. (Although we could use a better picture of that one with the finger smear, which does actually look like it's down to the primer). You didn't say what kind of vehicle it is (so we could make a generalization about the paint hardness), but you're certainly not going to harm anything by trying 205 on white, and I wouldn't hesitate to use the 105/orange, you could just use it locally on the etch spots.

We have a lot of Canadian members. I did a search on "Montreal" and came up with 46 threads, and saw lots of people who said they were from Montreal.
 
It looks like it could be however some may be just surface stains or slight etching.

One thing for sure is you can't really hurt anything in trying. Many here have made some great suggestions that will hopefully improve things. Try some wet-sanding with 1000 and 2000 grit wet-dry using a foam block to feather the edges back gradually.

Try some of the compounds and polishes mentioned here and also take a look at what Menzerna has to offer. Menzerna Polishing Compounds Products, Menzerna FMJ, menzerna polishes, menzerna car polish, menzerna nano polish, menzerna final polish, menzerna
 
Setec Astronomy said:
How can we tell? I dunno...from looking at a lot of pictures of CC failure? As I mentioned previously, general CC failure from lack of care/UV exposure is a lot different than spots that have been locally damaged by poop, sap, etc. Incipient CC failure is usually manifested by a cloudy, dull appearance (over the whole area).

IMO the Surbuffs are more aggressive than you really need, your paint doesn't really look bad. Yes, 205 with white pad, 105 with orange pad.

Look, even those etch marks don't really look that bad, they aren't bubbled, cracked, or have primer showing through. (Although we could use a better picture of that one with the finger smear, which does actually look like it's down to the primer). You didn't say what kind of vehicle it is (so we could make a generalization about the paint hardness), but you're certainly not going to harm anything by trying 205 on white, and I wouldn't hesitate to use the 105/orange, you could just use it locally on the etch spots.

We have a lot of Canadian members. I did a search on "Montreal" and came up with 46 threads, and saw lots of people who said they were from Montreal.
Click to expand...

Right, not these spots look dull and cloudy in person maybe it's hard to tell from the pics...but it is not over the whole area as you mentioned.

Here's some pics I took to show people before I bought all my products and they recommended me the Surbuf pads. What do you think?

Car paint - Imgur

The vehicle is a 1999 Volkswagen Passat.

The one with the finger smudge is where I was using a razor blade very lightly over the surface to try to figure out if the markings were above or below the paint to see if it actually was the clear that was gone...it's extremely hard to tell so I scratched it a bit to see what would happen...

Thanks who would you recommend from Montreal to look at my car? I'm sure there are also a lot of newbies like myself on this forum from Montreal!

BobbyG said:
It looks like it could be however some may be just surface stains or slight etching.

One thing for sure is you can't really hurt anything in trying. Many here have made some great suggestions that will hopefully improve things. Try some wet-sanding with 1000 and 2000 grit wet-dry using a foam block to feather the edges back gradually.

Try some of the compounds and polishes mentioned here and also take a look at what Menzerna has to offer. Menzerna Polishing Compounds Products, Menzerna FMJ, menzerna polishes, menzerna car polish, menzerna nano polish, menzerna final polish, menzerna
Click to expand...

Thanks.

So basically now my options are:

1) Try using Menz 105 like normal
2) Use Menz 205
3) Wetsand the affected areas
4)Clear over the top of the effected areas before doing anything

Thanks for the help, guys,
Elliott
 
Ur killin' me...you're afraid to polish it with the 105 but you're not afraid to scrape it with a razor blade??? Trust me, the orange/105 is a lot more mild than scraping it with a razor blade.

Ultimately you may need the Surbufs for some of those marks, but overall from your "new" old pictures, the paint looks pretty good--it's shiny, etc. I think you'll be ecstatic about how it comes out with the 105/orange. You might also consider going to a local chain store and get some UCC which is reported to be more user-friendly than the 105.

Your Saturday is a-wasting! Get out there and polish and report back.
 
Thanks and yea I know it killed me to do it too...but it was just one spot and I needed to do a test to see if the clear was really gone or not. Anyway a friend of my dad (body guy) came to look at the car today and he said that clear is still there and to polish it out like you guys said...but he said to use a polishing compound and not a cutting compound so I guess I'll try the M205 like you guys suggested before.

Thanks!

My other question pertains to wet sanding: Here's the side of my door:

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I know the spots in picture 3 and the white spot in picture 1 will have to be repainted so forget those.

Should I just keep trying to wet sand them out? As you can see the scratch in the 2nd pic I've tried to wetsand out already and it didn't work very well.

Ideas?

Thanks guys
 
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