Waiting to wetsand and polish

T

turbo6justin

First time SPI user, 3rd complete paint job, so very novice. I have sprayed 2 coats of black single stage and two coats of production clear mixed 50/50 with black single stage. Everything went quite nicely save a little orange peel and dust nibs etc (garage job). I am actually thrilled with where it is at. All the literature for both products talk about sanding within the first few days. Other than adding more work for myself what are the consequences of waiting weeks or months to wetsand and buff this? Winter is fast approaching here and I am trying to get as much of the paint work as possible done now but will likely have to wait weeks or even till spring to get to the sanding.

So other than sanding and buffing slower or harder if I wait are there any detrimental problems waiting?

Many thanks, I have tried searching for the answer here but can't find it.
 
The job will actually come out slightly better by waiting, because the paint will have completely cured, plus all the solvent will be out of it, so it will be done contracting, too. It will just be much more difficult to polish, as you already know. I don't have an issue waiting a long time to buff on a higher-end job, but then again, I use Universal Clear. I have never used Production Clear, but I have used Euro on collision work, and that gets much harder to buff after several days.
 
I use the matte clear at work, which is production with flattener. I wouldn't classify it as a hard to sand when fully cured either.
As crash said, better in some ways waiting. Waiting or even doing in stages over a long period of time isn't really a big deal. You could even do a light sanding with whatever your coarser sanding grit will be now and the rest of the stages of sanding & buffing later .
 
That puts my mind at ease. Since I am relatively new in this game if it sands a little slower that will be a good thing. Bad things happen a little slower that way. I am kind of scared of grit again bad things happen faster with coarser paper, so I was planning on starting with 1500 wet, then 2000 and then 2500 all using a soft 3m pad I have and am comfortable with. I have yet to do all the prerequisite research on polishing but I am leaning toward chemical brothers pads and compounds as they are reviewed favorably on hotrodders.com which after all brought me to SPI in the first place.

Am I way off in my sanding plans?
 
Being that these days many don't use the faster cutting wool pads to start and you can get much finer paper than you could years ago, I'd finish sanding finer first. You could also finish sanding dry with 3-m trizact or equivalent, which goes to 5000 & also makes it easier to see.

A little tip here;;; pay attention to how long you're sanding with each grit step. If you're leaning for safer rather than all out perfection with your inexperience, you can stop a little short of 100% flat with the first grit, spending more time with each of the next grits than the last. This will leave you a safer material thickness & you will be less likely to have coarse scratches not sanded out. You can sand a little more later this way if needed. Also if you have some courser areas, bumps, runs, etc it may save you time to lightly sand them just a little with a coarser grit before proceeding.
 
I have a piece of Norton 3000 that I can get locally and was considering the 5000 Trizact, but am I wasting my time hand sanding with the 5000? It looks like everyone uses a DA and a round disk.

I'll take your advice about switching papers a little earlier, sounds like a really good idea.
 
You can hand sand with them. It'll still cut back on rotary buffing , which takes a little more skill to be aggressive enough without burning through somewhere.
 
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