Please Rescue a Newbie... correcting home sprayed Clear Coat

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PGBCruiser

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Hello; and apologies if this has been answered a million times (I did check other threads) Feel free to post links if this is the case. Here's the short story... Florida sun damaging my roof (2002 PT). I sanded the damaged areas, repainted a few coats of base, then sprayed a 2K Clear (4 coats). A neighbor suggested "start where no one can see, then finish where visible." He nailed it. I've got a couple of spots I'm proud of for a newbie; but some serious need for correction on top - gritty feel, definite orange peel.
Do I wet sand, or dry sand to smooth things out (starting grit - final grit?)
I have a Meguiar's MT 300 for the compound, polish phase (introduced to me at Detailfest).
I did take some photos; but lighting distorted the look of the repair.
Thanks!!!
Peter
 
Hello; and apologies if this has been answered a million times (I did check other threads) Feel free to post links if this is the case. Here's the short story... Florida sun damaging my roof (2002 PT). I sanded the damaged areas, repainted a few coats of base, then sprayed a 2K Clear: 4 coats (both rattle can). A neighbor suggested "start where no one can see, then finish where visible." He nailed it. I've got a couple of spots I'm proud of for a newbie; but some serious need for correction on top - gritty feel, definite orange peel.
Do I wet sand, or dry sand to smooth things out (starting grit - final grit?)
I have a Meguiar's MT 300 for the compound, polish phase (introduced to me at Detailfest).
I did take some photos; but lighting distorted the look of the repair.
Thanks!!!
Peter
 
Reposted in "Ask the Experts..." I didn't know how to remove this post; but will check back in case there are replies. Thanks all. I'm new to the forum and I'm learning a ton - THANKS!
 
You should definatelly wet sand.

Starting with 1500 grit then moving to 3000.

If you can use either Meguiars Unigrit or 3M Trizac sand paper, those will give you the best results.

Once you are done wet sanding, compound the paint then polish.

If you are not sure how to do it, search Youtube, there are 100s of videos about this process.

And make sure to post pictures here ;)
 
Do you have any pics you could post so that we could see what it is you're dealing with?

I'm sure the mods will merge this thread with the other one ......
 
Thanks for the great advice... pretty overcast today so I may be able to get a couple of photos without too much light interference. I think I may be good with getting the repairs looking okay (this was a Band-Aid to slow down sun damage, not a pro repaint). Biggest issue will be smoothing the edges where the tape line was. I went pretty thick with the clear knowing I would need room for sanding.
Hope to add pics this afternoon.
Thanks again!
 
resized the only workable picture I could get... too much reflection from garage indoors/clouds outdoors. Hopefully it gives an idea of texture and level (higher than original paint). Have the Meguiar's sanding gear in the shopping cart if you guys think it will help. Thanks again!
PS... this is the worst area; I did much better on the other spot repairs!
 
PGBCruiser said:
Reposted in "Ask the Experts..." I didn't know how to remove this post; but will check back in case there are replies. Thanks all. I'm new to the forum and I'm learning a ton - THANKS!
Click to expand...


Basically you normally only create one thread per topic. Two identical threads in different locations can cause confusion. For both professional and legal reasons we never "delete" threads on this forum. Threads are either merged or moved, in this case I merged the idential threads you started in my forum group with this one.

No harm no foul just how forums work... :)



TFTADetail said:
I'm sure the mods will merge this thread with the other one ......
Click to expand...


:D
 
You can do either, dry sand or wet sand, just make sure the sanding papers or sanding discs can be used the way you want to use them.

I know some guys like dry sanding but I don't because dry sanding creates paint dust that I don't want to breathe and I don't like wearing respirators or even dust masks so I tend to wet sand instead.

If the tool you're going to use is the MT300 to remove your sanding marks then try to finish out using a high grit paper or disc to make the sanding mark removal process faster and easier as well as more effective.


:)
 
Mike,
first, thanks for merging the threads... I knew I goofed after re-posting; and appreciate your taking care of it.
Second, I'll go with wet sanding... while it seems that I might have a better sense of "when to stop" with dry, I like the idea of avoiding the dust and following your approach. I just purchased the Meguiar's Unigrit 6 Pack with grits starting at 1500 ascending to 3000 (A GREAT DEAL). Hopefully that will make things easier when I pull out the MT300.
Once again, thanks to everyone for all of the help and inspiration.
I learned a ton at Detailfest and here on the forum; time to put it to work!

I'll post pictures when I'm done...

Peter

PS... if there is a quick link on how to feather/blend the edges, feel free to point me in the right direction!
 
Last edited:
Just received my order from Autogeek... I think I scared the UPS guy!
Ready for the weekend; I'll be reviewing as much info as I can find on the wet sanding process, specifically when to stop with one grit and go to the next.

Of the 6 areas I painted, 4 look pretty good for a rookie, 1 is tolerable, and 1 may need to be repainted and finished at a later date.
I'll post pictures when I'm done.
Thanks again for all the guidance!
 
Okay folks, here's the latest:
Last night I wet sanded, compounded, polished and waxed the roof of my car.
First, a HUGE THANK YOU to those that gave advice or wished me luck.
Big thank you to Mike, not only for advice on sanding technique; but for reminding me to manage my expectations.

As this was a repair of sun damaged clear, in the most basic sense I succeeded. The white nightmare of sun damage is gone until I can afford a repaint.
As the old saying goes, you can't make chicken salad out of chicken poop.
My initial sanding was poorly done, the paint was poorly applied (all by me). The wet sanding helped and the MT300 was a blast to use; but aesthetically the roof ain't pretty.
At some point I may attempt to re-do the worst areas; but I have to paint my kids' room first.

Finished pretty late last night, so no pictures yet.

When I do get a chance (I only did the roof), I will use the Meguiar's MT300 on the rest of the car and post before and after pics under a different thread. For a first time user of ANY polishing equipment, it was very user friendly; and did a great job on the original paint on the roof.

There's my morning babble. Thanks again!
 
PGBCruiser said:
Okay folks, here's the latest:
Last night I wet sanded, compounded, polished and waxed the roof of my car.
First, a HUGE THANK YOU to those that gave advice or wished me luck.
Big thank you to Mike, not only for advice on sanding technique; but for reminding me to manage my expectations.

As this was a repair of sun damaged clear, in the most basic sense I succeeded. The white nightmare of sun damage is gone until I can afford a repaint.
As the old saying goes, you can't make chicken salad out of chicken poop.
My initial sanding was poorly done, the paint was poorly applied (all by me). The wet sanding helped and the MT300 was a blast to use; but aesthetically the roof ain't pretty.
At some point I may attempt to re-do the worst areas; but I have to paint my kids' room first.

Finished pretty late last night, so no pictures yet.

When I do get a chance (I only did the roof), I will use the Meguiar's MT300 on the rest of the car and post before and after pics under a different thread. For a first time user of ANY polishing equipment, it was very user friendly; and did a great job on the original paint on the roof.

There's my morning babble. Thanks again!
Click to expand...

A couple questions, you said you sanded the car first and did some base coat painting? Was that because you sanded through to the primer the base coat had faded?
Did you sand all the clear off the areas you repainted or just enough to blend the line between clear and non clear coated areas and get enough scratch on the remaining clear for the new clear to stick to?
I have paint experience and have read a little bit about the clear coat you used. I have a neighbor with severe damage he wants me to help him repair. My paint experience is with single stage. Thanks in advance for any input.
 
Dave,
I'll preface by stressing that I had never done this before, so I made a bunch of rookie mistakes.
I had white "spider webs" in a few areas and two Quarter sized spots where the clear was gone (base coat color showing up on my wax applicator).

I sanded the clear coat in those areas with "white damage" to get as close as I could to base (Chrysler Patriot Blue). In all sanded areas I applied base color from automotivetouchup.com. Not a perfect match; but close enough for the roof.
I found that the areas where I was most subtle came out the best. I never hit primer while sanding.

Because I wanted to force myself to keep a small job small, I taped off my sanding areas to avoid going beyond. That would account for the very distinct lines between repair and original paint.

I put on about 4 coats of 2K clear from Eastwood (went heavy as I knew I would be sanding later).

As I type this I'm realizing the mistakes I made...

I don't have enough experience to rate the 2K versus a standard rattle can of clear - although I painted my factory steel wheels when they began to rust using all Rustoleum "Stops Rust" products including clear, and I was thrilled with the results.

My two cents: if you are experienced, go with what you are comfortable with. My biggest obstacle was inexperience in each step.

Hope that helps a little!
 
PGBCruiser said:
Dave,
I'll preface by stressing that I had never done this before, so I made a bunch of rookie mistakes.
I had white "spider webs" in a few areas and two Quarter sized spots where the clear was gone (base coat color showing up on my wax applicator).

I sanded the clear coat in those areas with "white damage" to get as close as I could to base (Chrysler Patriot Blue). In all sanded areas I applied base color from automotivetouchup.com. Not a perfect match; but close enough for the roof.
I found that the areas where I was most subtle came out the best. I never hit primer while sanding.

Because I wanted to force myself to keep a small job small, I taped off my sanding areas to avoid going beyond. That would account for the very distinct lines between repair and original paint.

I put on about 4 coats of 2K clear from Eastwood (went heavy as I knew I would be sanding later).

As I type this I'm realizing the mistakes I made...

I don't have enough experience to rate the 2K versus a standard rattle can of clear - although I painted my factory steel wheels when they began to rust using all Rustoleum "Stops Rust" products including clear, and I was thrilled with the results.

My two cents: if you are experienced, go with what you are comfortable with. My biggest obstacle was inexperience in each step.

Hope that helps a little!
Click to expand...

Thanks,
I'm experienced with paint...not really re clear coating. Any and all information is helpful. This car is in much worse shape than yours from what you have described. Not real sure if I want to get involved in this or not. Thanks for sharing your experience.
 
The important thing is that you need to sand anything that will be painted first. If you don't the paint you apply will eventually peel off.

There are 2 ways to make sure it sticks:
1- Use 400 grit sand paper
2- Use either gray or red scotch pad

Personally I like the scotch pad for areas that are not damaged. Sand paper for repairs.

Learning to blend color repair is an aquired skill. It's very counter intuitive to leave the areas around the repairs unmasked. You should mask where the body lines are. You can use the areas between the repair and the masked lines to blend the color so that you don't get a line.

You should clearcoat the whole pannel, not just the repair.

Now that you are done with the roof, you have learned a few things, if you have other areas on the car to repair, it should come out better.
 
Thanks Calendyr!
For the moment I'm feeling a bit beat up (physically and mentally). Part of me needs a break, the other part has already started planning to re-do the job. I'm reminding myself that it is metal and paint - anything I messed up can be done again, this time with just a bit of experience.

I like the idea of the Scotch pads (I already have some) and clearing the entire roof - added protection so the area next to the repair doesn't get sun damaged next - and a better looking result.
When the time comes I'll have to study up on blending... I have a tremendous amount of respect for people who can do this kind of work!!!!

We're creeping up on that special time in Florida when it's ALWAYS above 90 degrees and humid. Not ideal for painting; but maybe I'll get a good weekend.
Thanks for the advice and encouragement, greatly appreciated!

Peter
 
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