Got my butt kicked today

[qwertydude]

So I detailed a friends car that got in an accident and got new parts and was resprayed. Well The painter was just some guy who did it in his garage and it was the worst paint I've ever dealt with. I mean it had visible orange peel in the color coat and the clear was so porous that it absorbed all the polish I put on it and never let it go. So I tried wet sanding to reduce the orange peel and the best I could do was get a glass smooth but cloudy look after polishing.



I mean I threw everything in my arsenal at that area and no dice. There were visible bubbles and contaminants in the paint. I've seen it happen before when painters don't use enough thinner and shake instead of stir the paint. All in an effort to save time. Looks like it was painted with a single coat of over thick paint and ended up trapping bubbles in it. And also that when paint is not thinned enough it will flash off in the air and form a kind of paint "foam" wherein the paint forms little balls in the air and they stick to each other which gives a semblance of a decent paint job, glossy and ok looking, until you try and polish it. Then it absorbs all the polish and clouds up, still glossy but cloudy. And from the look of the paint I believe the painter saw the result and just waxed the paint to give it some gloss cause it was beading like mad before I wet sanded it and he never waxed it because I told him not to wax fresh paint and that I'd do all his polishing/waxing when the car paint was cured, waxing fresh paint is a big no no in the painting world. I would have to say it was a worse paint job than an Earl Scheib $199 spray job. At least at earl scheib the paint they use can be wet sanded and polished. I had to actually leave the friend a note saying I'd get back to perfecting the original paint on the rest of the car next week, I spent a total of about 5 hours just doing the hood and front quarter panels.



This was the first time I could not get a decent polish on a car and I've even done badly oxidized paint with clear peeling off in sections and it comes out looking decent enough to pass for a well taken care of car.

 

[ABQDetailer]

Are you polishing or compounding? I doubt you can get wet sanding haze out with a polish alone. What type of paper are you using and what grits? What does the paint system say to use on this specific type of clear coat?



I doubt the OP is in the color coat. I would say the OP is in the clear coat or it's under the color coat due to a poor prep job.



90% of a good paint job is in the prep. It only takes a couple hours to actually shoot the car with color + clear.



I'm not 100% sure but I think the anti-post-painting wax application is a myth. IMHO it depends on the type of paint system used and you need to follow the product sheet/instructions for the paint system. If it says not to wax it for a month then I'd agree with that, but otherwise I'd say the clear is cured in a few days and you can do whatever you want to it. Granted I would not be waxing my car within 48 hours of shooting the paint...



It's really hard to understand the stuff you are describing as far as the foam and bubbles, etc. It sounds a lot like fish eye?



I seriously doubt it's worse than a $199 Earl Sheib job.



Color sanding, compounding, and polishing a freshly painted car is not a quick process. Prepare to spend 20+ hours from start to finish depending on how anal you want to be and what tools you have in your arsenal.

 

[qwertydude]

I wet sanded with a hard block using 3M 2000 grit, there were no low spots left after and the reflection from after polishing was sharp. It's not haze, read carefully, but cloudiness.



But yet I still saw lumps under the clear, at an angle there was no rippling in the reflection. I've been detailing cars for about 10 years now and learned a heck of a lot about finishing over at my uncle's paint and body shop, he does OEM quality work. It's where I also learned how to airbrush touch ups. I can spot a bad paint job, orange peel and bubbles in clear coat from a mile away. My friend could not tell me the type of paint, and said he paid only $150 to get the 3 panels painted, tell you something?



Megs M105 compound can take out 1200 grit. I did my dad's bmw painted with rock hard PPG aircraft clear in our backyard, wet sanded with 1000 then 2000 and the M105 took out those sanding marks even by hand. You can check out some of my previous posts, I took out wetsanding haze with just M105 and a coleman 6" random orbital.



I could tell something was wrong with my friends paint when I tried the M105 and it started making all sorts of tiny white spots in the paint and all the polish disappeared into the paint. That's when I decided to bring out the only thing stronger than M105, sandpaper. But I couldn't sand all the way through the bubbles cause they went down right into the color coat.



I can tell this car was not prepped right there was overspray on the doors the edges and seams had thin paint wearing down to the original. Which I'll deal with next week so his original panels can at least look and feel like new. If you do airbrushing or painting you'll understand what paint foaming is and how thinning and spray distance from the panel makes a difference. Believe me I've used rattlecan spray paint that came out better than this one. There are subtle differences in paint, thinning and spray technique that can affect the finish. Not just prep work but sloppy painting. There are more to painting errors than just runs, fish eyes, overspray and orange peel.



I mean just in urethanes alone with clear you have to add the right amount of hardener so you're finish doesn't end up feeling like gummy bears, thinner (actually for urethanes you use reducer) has to have the right blend for a particular paint and you have to mix in an appropriate amount, and not having a proper moisture trap can have disastrous consequences if moisture works it's way into paint. From my own experiences there must have been mistakes made in every level of prep and spray to leave a surface this bad. I'd of taken pictures but this was a spur of the moment request from a friend who was eager to have his car shine



The reason I say earl sheib paint is easier is because I've worked on those finishes, in fact this same friends RX-7 had been painted 6 months ago prior at Maaco. So I knew what to expect there. He was eager to make this new paint look like his RX-7. And as much as everyone including me hates those commercial quickie paint shops, they do use at least a decent quality painting system, by that I mean good equipment like good acrylics and urethanes, and decent spray guns and monkies trained just well enough that the paint doesn't flake off. They just rush with the prep and that horrific heatlamp drying. It "bakes on the finish" and bakes on the orange peel because the paint is not allowed to level out. Do it right and you shouldn't have to wetsand in between coats of paint. My uncle always let the paint level and flash off before moving the car or parts out of the paint booth.

 

[ABQDetailer]

My bad I guess I didn't interpret your post right. It looks like you got it all figured out and your just venting...



Sounds like a piss poor paint job for sure. Prep is key and your canvas will only be as good as the prep...

 

[qwertydude]

Thanks, ABQ I am just venting. 5 hours working on a car with no improvement to show for it is truly maddening. Good thing is that I was able to clay the entire car so it's contaminant free now. I ended up using up half a bar of clay because the paint was so contaminated with overspray and environmental fallout.