A4 1.8tqm
New member
- Apr 4, 2009
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Here is some more work I've done on the 1996 BMW 328i that I've mentioned in previous posts.
Wet sanding by hand, a couple weeks ago-
The orange peel on this repainted hood is crazy! Apparently it was sprayed very thick, giving me lots of material to work with (fortunately there wasn't significant Solvent popping, like another panel I sanded). Also it seems that it was not painted in a clean, painting booth environment, from all the dust/nibs i found while claying.
I taped off a section of the hood to do a test spot. The car was washed with citrus wash and clear and clayed before beginning any work.
I started with 800 grit wet/dry paper on a soft sanding block, sanding in straight lines in a side to side motion. This was very aggressive and made quick work of the orange peel. I only sanded to the lowest point of the majority of the orange peel, leaving room for error and for damp sanding with the pneumatic palm sander later on. Then I hit it with 3000 grit paper, I know, I know that's too big of a gap in abrasiveness, well 800 and 3000 is all I had on hand. This time I sanded in straight lines from front to back, alternating the direction between grits really made it easy to tell if the previous sanding marks were removed. It took a LONG time to remove 800 marks with 3000 grit, but I eventually got there. To remove the sanding marks I used Menz Power Gloss on a 6.5" LC Cyan Hydro-tech pad (great combo BTW) onmy Flex 3401. I did not polish any more than this combo, I was amazed how well it finished!
Some pics-
Now I know I made a lot of extra work for myself by not having the correct selection of sand paper to work with, but I got good results!
On to the Pnuematic palm sander-
Lucky me, my friend wants me to test out all his new goodies! The Viking VT4200w, this little guy is heavy, it feels very well built. I think it's a $250+ tool. We went to Wesco and picked up a 6" Hook-It 1 soft interface pad and a 25 pack of p1500 3M trizact clear coat sanding discs (Love these discs!) I referenced http://www.autogeekonline.net/forum...fing/23865-if-has-paint-gets-polished.htmlfor for the damp sanding technique. Now this palm sander, unlike the Megs DA in Mike's thread, DOES NOT rotate. It just moves in a tiny circular pattern, like you would do with your hand.
The stuff, these pics were taken after doing the work-
Sanding discs-
Loop side of hook-it 1 disc-
Abrasive side, this is after many passes, still look pretty good!
Abrasive close-up, the same used sanding disc-
We chose a 6" soft interface pad even though the backing plate is 5", the overhang gives a very soft edge so the paper doesn't dig-in into any body lines.
Barely touching, very soft (not like I'm going to sand at this angle though).
I taped off the edges to be safe-
Tape line from hand sanding-
Close-up, orange peel half removed-
Near the tape line, orange peel removed. these discs give a very uniform finish, I know Menz PG will have no prob here!-
Edge-
Tape removed and carefully sanded-
Menz PG on Cyan HT, after the initial section pass' (done by my friend Chris) I revived the polish with a light spritz of Pinnacle Pad Lube and re-polished it myself until it flashed clear-
The Marring free finish I got after the second pass was astounding!
I used flaws in the paint to help get manual focus, PG finishes swirl/marring free?
There's some marks, I knew PG wasn't perfect.
Well that section is all I've got for now, time to go do some more work, well, more like go have some more fun!
Thanks for looking!
Dave
Wet sanding by hand, a couple weeks ago-
The orange peel on this repainted hood is crazy! Apparently it was sprayed very thick, giving me lots of material to work with (fortunately there wasn't significant Solvent popping, like another panel I sanded). Also it seems that it was not painted in a clean, painting booth environment, from all the dust/nibs i found while claying.
I taped off a section of the hood to do a test spot. The car was washed with citrus wash and clear and clayed before beginning any work.
I started with 800 grit wet/dry paper on a soft sanding block, sanding in straight lines in a side to side motion. This was very aggressive and made quick work of the orange peel. I only sanded to the lowest point of the majority of the orange peel, leaving room for error and for damp sanding with the pneumatic palm sander later on. Then I hit it with 3000 grit paper, I know, I know that's too big of a gap in abrasiveness, well 800 and 3000 is all I had on hand. This time I sanded in straight lines from front to back, alternating the direction between grits really made it easy to tell if the previous sanding marks were removed. It took a LONG time to remove 800 marks with 3000 grit, but I eventually got there. To remove the sanding marks I used Menz Power Gloss on a 6.5" LC Cyan Hydro-tech pad (great combo BTW) onmy Flex 3401. I did not polish any more than this combo, I was amazed how well it finished!
Some pics-
Now I know I made a lot of extra work for myself by not having the correct selection of sand paper to work with, but I got good results!
On to the Pnuematic palm sander-
Lucky me, my friend wants me to test out all his new goodies! The Viking VT4200w, this little guy is heavy, it feels very well built. I think it's a $250+ tool. We went to Wesco and picked up a 6" Hook-It 1 soft interface pad and a 25 pack of p1500 3M trizact clear coat sanding discs (Love these discs!) I referenced http://www.autogeekonline.net/forum...fing/23865-if-has-paint-gets-polished.htmlfor for the damp sanding technique. Now this palm sander, unlike the Megs DA in Mike's thread, DOES NOT rotate. It just moves in a tiny circular pattern, like you would do with your hand.
The stuff, these pics were taken after doing the work-
Sanding discs-
Loop side of hook-it 1 disc-
Abrasive side, this is after many passes, still look pretty good!
Abrasive close-up, the same used sanding disc-
We chose a 6" soft interface pad even though the backing plate is 5", the overhang gives a very soft edge so the paper doesn't dig-in into any body lines.
Barely touching, very soft (not like I'm going to sand at this angle though).
I taped off the edges to be safe-
Tape line from hand sanding-
Close-up, orange peel half removed-
Near the tape line, orange peel removed. these discs give a very uniform finish, I know Menz PG will have no prob here!-
Edge-
Tape removed and carefully sanded-
Menz PG on Cyan HT, after the initial section pass' (done by my friend Chris) I revived the polish with a light spritz of Pinnacle Pad Lube and re-polished it myself until it flashed clear-
The Marring free finish I got after the second pass was astounding!
I used flaws in the paint to help get manual focus, PG finishes swirl/marring free?
There's some marks, I knew PG wasn't perfect.
Well that section is all I've got for now, time to go do some more work, well, more like go have some more fun!
Thanks for looking!
Dave
That kind of orange peel is just not acceptable. Although I do understand your perspective that if something needs to be done right, there is no better person than oneself to do it. I do hope you extracted a major discount from the body shop. A body shop owner or supervisor who lets this one go out the door needs to be expelled from the industry.
