Sanding Clear Coat
- Thread starter JC Daniel
- Start date
It depends what I'm starting with, and what final result I want. Clear with wave needs a coarser grit than 2000 or you're wasting your time. Clear with minor orange peel and trash, 2000 is fine. Using a block initially does help highlight dust nibs, and will flatten the clear slightly more than a da. On a normal nice collision type job, where I want the texture to match, I just hit it with 1500 on a da dry to highlight dust nibs, block those out with a small Tolecut block, 3000,8000, buff. Really no need to block after the initial grit, because you're just refining scratches.
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Starting with something a little coarser like 1000-1200 initially makes a big difference in the end. Block with 1000 to flatten and remove most of the orange peel, 1200 to finish removing orange peel and completely remove 1000 scratches, then just refine the scratches. Stay off edges or tape them with the coarser grits.
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Jim C
Oldtimer
all good info. i will say that once you have it blocked with the 1000-1200 and its flat, from that point your wasting your time blocking the grits after that. block to get flat then da all the other grits. once its flat its flat. the da with 2000-8000 grit isnt going to change what you did with the block.
Jim C
Oldtimer
i almost never block my clear. i use a da for the whole thing. dry for the initial sanding so i can see what i am doing then wet from there on. if you have urethane wave to work out then you need to block. if not and the clear came out level but its just peely then you can just da the whole thing IF your comfortable with that.
I have tried almost every combination of dry and wet, hand and da. To me, the key is to make sure the 1000 grit scratches are completely removed. One way of doing that is to alternate between hand and da. For example, hand block wet with 1000, checking your work frequently to avoid oversanding. Leave a small amount of peel for the 1200 to get out. Then you could da 1200 dry which would allow you to see when all the peel is gone, and to make sure there is no straightline (1000) scratches remaining. At this point 1500 Tolex wet on a da works great, or you could run over it with 1500 wet by hand to see if there are any da scratches remaining. 3000 takes the Tolex scratches out pretty well. As Jim just posted above, if there is no wave to work out, I usually start with 1000 da dry. I have had good luck doing that followed by 1200 wet by hand. When all the 1000 da scratches are gone, you have it whipped.
One other tip I could add, especially with the Universal, is to let the clear dry in the sun as long as possible before buffing. I just recently (on the same PITA '85 truck) had sand scratches reappear after buffing. The clear had sat 3-4 days, then I sanded and buffed the same day. Those parts (2 fenders, 2 doors) went outside every day for the next few days, when I noticed some sand scratches reappearing. The tailgate I sprayed and sanded at the same time was not buffed until 3 days later. After 3 days in the sun, no scratches have reappeared on it. My suggestion would be to let it sit in the sun as long as possible after spraying, then again after sanding, before buffing.
jcclark
Oldtimer
For all my collision repair work a random orbital with 2000 grit (dry)
is all I ever need.
If it has a sag or dirt in it I may start with 1500, but 2000 and buff
makes it better than factory so that's good enough.
I don't sand all the peel out, that would be to slick and not match original.
is all I ever need.
If it has a sag or dirt in it I may start with 1500, but 2000 and buff
makes it better than factory so that's good enough.
I don't sand all the peel out, that would be to slick and not match original.
Are you using the assilex instead of the tolex? The assilex seems pretty aggressive to me, grit for grit.
