What is Orange Peel and can I remove it with a Porter Cable DA Polisher?

[rainmancp]

What is Orange Peel and can I remove it with a Porter Cable DA Polisher?


I have orange peel on most of my car. I got my car repainted back in December. It's been rainy and cold until recently in my area. I noticed the enormous amounts of orange peel on most of my car.

What is the cause/reason of orange peel?
Like poor preping and (or lack of) clean surface etc?

I only have a 7424 and according to this How To its gonna be a long process to fix the orange peel.
I did consider bringing it back to the paint shop, but it's been 6 months which I was told it needed 3 to cure, but didn't really notice it until recently. I rather try to repair it myself or bring it to a professional correction local guy. Any thoughts? Opinions?

Oh and just for my noobness Orange Peel is when you can see wavy orangepeel like surface on the paint? Paintshop told me I can just use a swirl remover to get rid of it, which isanother reason not to bring it back to them.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Re: Articles by Mike Phillips

I have orange peel on most of my car. I got my car repainted back in December. It's been rainy and cold until recently in my area. I noticed the enormous amounts of orange peel on most of my car.

What is the cause/reason of orange peel?
Like poor preping and (or lack of) clean surface etc?

I only have a 7424 and according to this How To its gonna be a long process to fix the orange peel.
I did consider bringing it back to the paint shop, but it's been 6 months which I was told it needed 3 to cure, but didn't really notice it until recently. I rather try to repair it myself or bring it to a professional correction local guy. Any thoughts? Opinions?

Oh and just for my noobness Orange Peel is when you can see wavy orangepeel like surface on the paint? Paintshop told me I can just use a swirl remover to get rid of it, which isanother reason not to bring it back to them.

I'm going to move your post so you can have your very own thread instead of tagging your question about "Orange Peel" onto my thread that lists the articles I've written.

Not a problem that you tagged your question onto an existing thread but the best way to get all the attention and answers you want for your topic is to start your own thread.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

I have orange peel on most of my car. I got my car repainted back in December. It's been rainy and cold until recently in my area. I noticed the enormous amounts of orange peel on most of my car.

What is the cause/reason of orange peel?

It has more to do with how the paint is mixed and sprayed.

I only have a 7424 and according to this How To its gonna be a long process to fix the orange peel.

Orange Peel is removed by first sanding the paint flat and then putting the paint through a series of compounding and polishing step to remove the sanding marks and restore a high gloss, swirl-free finish.

It's a ton of work, more complicated than most people "new" to machine polishing should tackle and the best tool for the compounding and polishing work is a rotary buffer.

It can be done with a tool that has a free floating spindle assembly but it will take longer especially if the paint has already fully dried and hardened.

I did consider bringing it back to the paint shop, but it's been 6 months which I was told it needed 3 to cure, but didn't really notice it until recently. I rather try to repair it myself or bring it to a professional correction local guy. Any thoughts? Opinions?

Depends upon how important this car is to you... is it a 1963 Corvette Split Window? Or a Toyota Camry?

You're talking about a lot of work to sand and buff and this assumes there's enough clear on the surface to safely sand and buff. Repainting will also take time and money.

So what are you working on and how important is it for this car to have a show car finish? The reason I ask because after answering questions like this for years now I often find out I'm talking to someone working on something really cool or just a daily driver that when they consider the work they decide it's not that important.

The best solution would be to print this thread out in Landscape Mode and go back to your painter and tell him you're not happy with your options.

Removing Orange Peel should have been done a few days after the car was moved out of the spray booth, not 3 months later.

• How much did you pay for the paint job?
• Did you pay for a "show car finish"

Sanding and buffing even when done quickly at a body shop still requires time, material and labor and most people don't want to pay for this above and beyond what the paint job cost.

These are things you need to discuss before you have the car painted, not afterwards.

Oh and just for my noobness Orange Peel is when you can see wavy orange peel like surface on the paint?

Yes.

Paintshop told me I can just use a swirl remover to get rid of it, which is another reason not to bring it back to them.

That answer is dishonest.


Picture of the car?

 

[RaskyR1]

I would also add that it IS the job of the body shop/painter to match the texture of the factory finish. They are getting paid to restore your car to the pre-accident condition. At most high quality shops this usually means nothing more than sanding out a few dust specs as the paint will often have the same or similar amount of orange peel as the OEM paint.

Regardless that it's been 6 months I would still bring it back as it should have a lifetime warranty anyway. Keeping in mind of course that you will likely have to remove some swirls yourself once you get it back.


Rasky

 

[rainmancp]

Depends upon how important this car is to you... is it a 1963 Corvette Split Window? Or a Toyota Camry?

You're talking about a lot of work to sand and buff and this assumes there's enough clear on the surface to safely sand and buff. Repainting will also take time and money.

So what are you working on and how important is it for this car to have a show car finish? The reason I ask because after answering questions like this for years now I often find out I'm talking to someone working on something really cool or just a daily driver that when they consider the work they decide it's not that important.

It is certainly not a show car, it is more of a weekend car. It's an Acura RSX, they used PPG paint.

The best solution would be to print this thread out in Landscape Mode and go back to your painter and tell him you're not happy with your options.

Removing Orange Peel should have been done a few days after the car was moved out of the spray booth, not 3 months later.

• How much did you pay for the paint job?
• Did you pay for a "show car finish"

I paid $2,000 to get it repainted, dings removed, patches, and various other bodywork
I expected it to be good quality. The job they did was great fixed a lot of problems I had, this orange peel was the first problems I've noticed

Sanding and buffing even when done quickly at a body shop still requires time, material and labor and most people don't want to pay for this above and beyond what the paint job cost.

These are things you need to discuss before you have the car painted, not afterwards.

Picture of the car?

I didn't know it required sanding/buffing after it was painted. I hadn't taken it outside the garage bc of the lack of sunny days and rain we've been having this whole year. so of course that was my fault to not discover the problems earlier.

I would also add that it IS the job of the body shop/painter to match the texture of the factory finish. They are getting paid to restore your car to the pre-accident condition. At most high quality shops this usually means nothing more than sanding out a few dust specs as the paint will often have the same or similar amount of orange peel as the OEM paint.

Regardless that it's been 6 months I would still bring it back as it should have a lifetime warranty anyway. Keeping in mind of course that you will likely have to remove some swirls yourself once you get it back.


Rasky

I doubt any paint job would have lifetime warranty work.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

It is certainly not a show car, it is more of a weekend car. It's an Acura RSX, they used PPG paint.

PPG makes great paint and the Acura RSX is a great car... I always say if it's important to you then it's important to me...

I paid $2,000 to get it repainted, dings removed, patches, and various other bodywork. I expected it to be good quality. The job they did was great fixed a lot of problems I had, this orange peel was the first problems I've noticed

Sounds good so far, the orange peel is normal in this industry, really good painters have really well dialed in paint booths and paint systems, plus their own talent are able spray paint as flat as glass so no orange peel is present and thus no sanding is neccassary...

I didn't know it required sanding/buffing after it was painted.

See my remarks above...

I hadn't taken it outside the garage bc of the lack of sunny days and rain we've been having this whole year. so of course that was my fault to not discover the problems earlier.

Yeah... sometimes that's just how things go...

Couple comments...

You don't remove orange peel with a swirl remover, you remove swirls after compounding with a swirl remover, or wear-n-tear swirls and scratches using a swirl mark remover.

Orange peel is removed by sanding the paint till it's flat and then you put the paint through a compounding and polishing process like this,


If it has paint... it gets polished...


Here's another thread that might interest you,
Wet-sanding - Fresh Paint vs Factory Paint

And there's probably some other topics of interest in this list,
How-To Articles


I'm finishing an article on "Damp-Sanding" that you could use as a guide to tackle the project yourself and possibly use your Porter Cable to remove the sanding marks but it will take longer than using a rotary buffer but it can be done, see this thread...

Removing Orange Peel & Sanding Marks with the Griot's ROP and the Wolfgang Twins

And this thread,

Surbuf MicroFinger Buffing Pads now at Autogeek!


First thing to do would be check with the body shop, tell them what you've learned about orange peel, heck print this out and show the head guy if you like. See if they'll work with you but here's the problem.

Doing "high quality" work is time consuming and if the see you already as a problem or a profit losing venture, then they'll likely have some low-level employee sand and buff your cars paint and you'll be left with Tracers, or Pigtails, depending on how they sand by hand or machine, then you'll be left with rotary buffer swirls throughout the paint because the norm is they don't remove the swirls, they just mask them,

See this article,

Tracers Tracers - RIDS - Pigtails - Cobweb Swirls - Rotary Buffer Swirls - Holograms - Water Spots - Bird Drooping Etchings - Micro-Marring



And do a search using these terms,

Horror Story

(You'll pull up threads with horror stories from other peoples results letting the body shop buff their car's paint, sad but the norm)


So if you want it done right, print this out and show the painter and for the only purpose of asking him how much clear they sprayed? You want to know if there's enough coats of clear or enough material, or enough film-build, (whichever term you or he likes best), so that you can safely sand and then buff the paint.

You hope he sprayed 2-3 good coats of clear minimum. More is better, less is risky. Sanding the paint means sanding off some paint and the compounding and polishing process will remove some more paint.

You need enough paint to and and buff AND still have enough left over to provide UV Protection for the basecoat over the service life of the car.

Hope that helps...

Maybe post your dilemma to some other detailing discussion forums and see if you get answers like these and compare to see if I'm on the mark...

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Keeping in mind of course that you will likely have to remove some swirls yourself once you get it back.


Rasky

Rasky's right...


:dblthumb2:

 

[the_invisible]

I wouldn't say that any machine polishing is going to remove any orange peel. However, after five years of gentle machine buffing and swirl removing techniques, I see a noticeable reduction in orange peel on some areas of my paint.

This should not be a shock to anyone. As you remove clear coats to eliminate or reduce the appearance of scratches, you are removing the bumps and lumps in the clear coat. This effectively removes some of the orange peel.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

I wouldn't say that any machine polishing is going to remove any orange peel. However, after five years of gentle machine buffing and swirl removing techniques, I see a noticeable reduction in orange peel on some areas of my paint.

Somewhere on this forum or MOL I've posted a picture of a 1958 Chevrolet Belair where I did in fact "decrease" orange peel simply by using an aggressive compound with a wool pad and buffing for a long time, so sure it can be done but the "proper" way and the best way to actualy go about the process of "removing" orange peel is to flatten the paint by sanding.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

In fact, here's the thread,

Use M105 first to cut orange peel?


And from page 2 here are the pictures...

Here's the car and the results mentioned above...

Didn't forget about you... over the weekend I dug up my scanner but couldn't find the power cord for it so I took some digital pictures to try to give you a little hope...

This is 1958 Chevrolet Belair that I compounded heavily from the center chrome trim up including the hood, roof and deck-lid. The owner didn't want to spend any more than $300.00 so wet-sanding was out off the table.

The pictures don't show the results as well as looking at the results in person but you could definitely see there was less orange peel on all the paint above the long stainless steel trim running down the car and the paint below the trim.

Close-up, cropped out section...

That was a huge car to buff out...

Note the use of newspaper even back then to cover and protect the wheels and tires during the buff-out...


So can orange peel be removed or lessoned by just machine compounding? You bet, been there and done that... but wet-sanding is the right way...

 

[rainmancp]

very interesting, so i think i will try it the wet sanding way

i will wash my car and try to get some pictures up so you guys can see how bad or not so bad the orange peel is. it might just be my imagination

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

very interesting, so i think i will try it the wet sanding way

If possible, ask your painter how many coats of clear he sprayed...

Also, when you get ready to do this ONLY sand a small section and see how hard it is to get your sanding marks out...

I've been typing this for years....

It's easy to sand paint... that's putting the scratches in... the tricky part is getting them out....

 

[Donnym]

Just thought I would add my 2 cents into the conversation.

Almost ever paint job has some orange peel in it. The more severe orange peel typically comes from having the wrong air pressure at the spray gun resulting in poor atomization of the paint. When you use compressed air to spray paint you are actually breaking the paint up into very tiny particals or "dots", the smaller the partical the finer the finish will be. If the air pressure is to low the bigger the "dots" will be and thus the orange peel effect. It really should be the responsibilty of the body shop but wet sanding and then compounding out the scratches is really the best way to remove them assuming like Mike said, there's enough clear coat to work with.

 

[RaskyR1]

I doubt any paint job would have lifetime warranty work.

Actually any reputable shop will offer a lifetime warranty on workmanship. My father has been doing body work for over 40 years now and actually owned his own shop for 10 of those years. It's the hack shops that likely won't stand behind their work.


Cheers,
Rasky :cheers: