Orange Peel - A slow victim of the DA?

[Blackthorn One]

I sense this is factory clear coat you want to remove orange peel from, which is extremely thin to begin with. If you do this, the most likely best case scenario is that you will significantly thin the clear to the point of diminishing its longevity greatly. Bob said as much.

Also, this orange peel might be subduing the appearance of any waves in the bodywork that came out of the body stamping dies.
You need to think really hard as to whether you want to thin this factory clear just to remove orange peel.
Ideally, you should sand out all the orange peel and re clear it.

[allenk4]

If you don't feel comfy wet sanding, use a "velvet" or "denim" buffing pad (as Mike stated) by CarPro to knock the OP down. It is slower, but give them a shot if you've never sanded/buffed before. Work great on a rotary, but also worked well on my 3401.

If you have never sanded or buffed...I would not suggest trying to remove or diminish OP.

Wait until you have 100 hours on a machine and if you still want to attempt it, go ahead.

I have used the CarPro Denim on a small section of my truck. It worked great with M105, but you will be nervous the entire time. Watch the heat.

Last night a fellow AutoGeek, put a paint thickness gauge to my truck and I was alarmed not only at how thin Factory paint is, but how the readings were so different from one section of the car to another.

Proceed with caution on OEM clear.

[hernandez.art13]

You could have it sanded and then shoot 2 or so coats of additional clear. Then you'll have more clear to sand down the orange peel.

Side Note: so you had low reads Kyle? Time to Opti Coat it.

I'll text you...

[allenk4]

You could have it sanded and then shoot 2 or so coats of additional clear. Then you'll have more clear to sand down the orange peel.

Side Note: so you had low reads Kyle? Time to Opti Coat it.

I'll text you...

4 to 4.5 on vertical panels

[Gokite]

Yea. New Mazda cx5. Even if the foam pads conform, they will always take off more from the peaks of OP vs the valleys but it sounds like it is a negligible difference.

I am not a DA guru, yet...I have a GG6 right now. I guess I will stick with the current OP I see. I just see some incredibly crisp reflections on some photos here of even old cars so I figured I'd ask...

[Gokite]

You can see the severity of the OP here:

[Blackthorn One]

I would consider sanding under the door handle to make it smoother. There you could get almost all of it out because it looks very shallow, yet rough. You could get about 75% of it out with very little material taken off from what I can see. The roughness would bother me.
Maybe a 25% to 50% would be more advisable.
The rear quarter OP is so deep you would be unwise to sand it out.
I think you should learn to live with the quarter the way it is.
Eventually yes, it will be a slow victim of the DA. 25% might be taken off with a DA. It isn't bad enough to go after at the expense of cc thickness at this juncture IMO.

[Gokite]

Disappointing to hear this. I was hoping there was a way for me to do something about it not requiring such expense or risk. Thanks for your help everyone.

[allenk4]

I would consider sanding under the door handle to make it smoother. There you could get almost all of it out because it looks very shallow, yet rough. You could get about 75% of it out with very little material taken off from what I can see. The roughness would bother me.
Maybe a 25% to 50% would be more advisable.
The rear quarter OP is so deep you would be unwise to sand it out.
I think you should learn to live with the quarter the way it is.
Eventually yes, it will be a slow victim of the DA. 25% might be taken off with a DA. It isn't bad enough to go after at the expense of cc thickness at this juncture IMO.

Careful giving definitive advice based on one cell phone photo.


If you correct only the area under the door handle, will it make the adjacent areas look that much worse?


"You could get about 75% of it out with very little material taken off from what I can see."

How can you tell?

[Blackthorn One]

Careful giving definitive advice based on one cell phone photo.


If you correct only the area under the door handle, will it make the adjacent areas look that much worse?


"You could get about 75% of it out with very little material taken off from what I can see."

How can you tell?

"From what I can see" is the the operative phrase. from that angle, it looks as I described. However, he can see the car from all angles. If the peel looks deeper than that from other angles then he has the advantage, and needs to be more cautious.
As far as the quarter looking worse after he does the door, to ME, the door looks worse right now, so doing the door will make them look more even.

If this is to be done at all, it should not be sanded down to the deepest valleys of the peel. The high parts of the peel relative to the valleys are what bothers, so if one is very conservative and stay far away from the deep parts, I think improvement could be made at rather moderate cc loss.

Perfection is unrealistic here but a small improvement seemed to be what he was looking for based on the thread's title.

As I said initially, I don't think that sanding factory clear is practical. What if scratches happen later and you would really need that greater thickness to sand down to remove scratches?
Paint needs to be a certain thickness to have longevity, and factory paint tends to be thinner than show car's paint.