How to level paint on a plastic bumber

[EugeneGoldberg]

Greetings!
Tomorrow I will attempt to remove swirls and scratches on my black MB C300. I have noticed, that the bumpers there are made of plastic (and painted the same as the rest of the body).
I was wandering if it is any different process to remove scratches from the painted plastic surfaces, then it is from a clear coated painted metal. In fact, I'm not sure if those plastic bumpers even have clear coat. There are a few small spots, where the paint is off, and I can see some white color in places where the paint used to be. My guess is, that the white could be the actual plastic color, but, I'm not sure.
Any expertise on how to approach these bumpers?

-Eugene

[Setec Astronomy]

Yes, they should be clearcoated like the rest of the car. If you are machine polishing, be careful as these plastic parts of the car don't dissipate heat as well as metal parts and it's easier to overheat the panel which would be bad. Don't polish for protracted periods and feel the surface with your hand, if it's too hot to touch it's too hot to keep polishing.

[EugeneGoldberg]

Thanks, Setec Astronomy!
I will follow your advise.

-Eugene

[BillE]

One weird thing about plastic bumpers is (in my meager thoughts) if the 'scratch' is on the deeper side, the surrounding area is a tad higher than the original 'height'.

Sooo, when working out 'the scratch' all of sudden you are removing paint because of the those higher areas.

Make sense?

I found out the hard way.

Bill

[Paul A.]

Great information, as usual, from Setec! The only time i burned through was on a plastic rear bumper. I should mention it was with a rotary and 4" white pad but still...plastic does NOT like the heat generated by that approach. Fortunately i did that on my own car and fixed it after.

It was an invaluable learning experience and i have returned to a very confident level of polishing plastic as a result and treat it (i.e. Level the paint) in a similar way as the rest of the clear coated body paint.

Just less aggressively. It can be done but treat it more fragile.

[Pureshine]

Yes, they should be clearcoated like the rest of the car. If you are machine polishing, be careful as these plastic parts of the car don't dissipate heat as well as metal parts and it's easier to overheat the panel which would be bad. Don't polish for protracted periods and feel the surface with your hand, if it's too hot to touch it's too hot to keep polishing.

:iagree: Just take your time :)

[Vegas Transplant]

C300 bumpers...smaller bp's and pads.
Scratches...what's your definition? :Picture:

Makes sense to me BillE.