Dr. Colorchip Part II

[MarkD51]

An update, and perhaps some tips that might help others with the use of this product.

Some weeks ago, some may remember an initial mismatch of paint hue I had gotten. Worked with Mr McCool, sent him a Duplicolor Bottle as a Sample, and the match appears as right as it ever could be.

Evidently it appeared, this color, Summit White has a couple different mix color "recipes" floating around out there.

So, yesterday, feeling I had gotten some experience with the product a few weeks ago on some inconspicuous areas, set out to address the few ultra tiny little chips on the Tahoe's Upper Panels, and Hood. Temps yesterday morning was 62F degrees, and calm.

Most of these chips that I could find are no bigger than a pin head, to pin head sized at the most.

I first examined the entire vehicle with a fine tooth comb, and then simply used a small piece of Blue Painter's Tape 2" above, or near the chips, so I knew exactly where to find them quickly. I felt this was important, because it did previously appear that the Colorchip paints need to be applied, and leveled rather quickly. Previous attempts at about a 10-12 minute dry time was not working as easily as it should, and had found difficulty leveling any excess.

After taping above-near all found chips, I then used an Auto Body Prep Solvent to clean the chip, for better bonding of paint.
I went back, and wiped dry any residues left behind.

With the smaller applicators in the kit, and rubber gloved hand, I walked around the truck, mimic'ing the Colorchip Vids, and this took only a matter of a couple minutes time, applying right to the chip, smearing, and moving onto the next.

I noted some weren't getting enough fill, but patience persisted, and found that one can do multiple small applications repeatedly in one go, then move to the next.

This time I waited only 2-3 minutes at most before I went onto the next step, the SealAct solution, and the supplied white towel, which somewhat resembles a Handi-Wipe in texture.

A few drops, and started rubbing. I noted to get the best results, one should be looking from the side, to see the paint on the surface, and not to use too much SealAct solution, as too thick a film would mask the ability to clearly see the process. As the product was beginning to level, and the excess paint was starting to vanigh, I then lightened up on pressure, just letting the towel literally glide over the surface. I rubbed up and down, then side to side. Any hazing then, one then follows up with the Blue MF Towel supplied in the Kit.

I noted that complete coverage of the chip was ever so slightly lacking, and I believe White Paint may be one of the most difficult to hide-camoflage, as chips in a white finish generally look dark-black. That it is hard for a white paint to cover a black void.

So again, put on another fresh blue disposable glove, and set out again to repeat the process. Ahh, much better, and things were coming out quite nicely.

At that point, I decided to stop, and felt successful with my attempts. My thoughts were that at a later date, after the paint has cured, and dried fully, I could always again repeat the process if there were any chips that needed more paint to perfectly fill, and level.


On my 1997 Tahoe over the years, there were of course other chips that had been painted-repaired, albeit quite poorly, and this was with factory touch up paint, and the Langka Paint Touch Up System.

So, I tried a little experiment since I had plenty of time on hand.

One, was a small scrape-scratch on my driver's side Cal Vue Street Scene Side View Mirrors, and another horribly done job on a chip of the front edge of the hood.

The SealAct worked! While it took much more rubbing, and time, the Sealact was beginning to better level these old repair areas, some I estimate to be 5-12 years of age.

On the Side View Mirror, I was able to better level the Touch up with the SealAct much better than the Langka product ever could. From a foot away, I could no longer see the damage, or th evidence of a touch up, and this area was the worst on the vehicle.

So, that was one little discovery I made, the SealAct product will work on other types of Touch Up Paint. Removal of excess paint-blobs seems to take longer, but much better ease. Of course some of this paint has been on the vehicle a long long time, and of course is harder.

So, the SealAct it appears will work on basically all factory-store bought touch up paints. The advantage of Colorchip's Paint Formulas though are a speedy dry time, where one can do touch up in a much faster time frame.

After completion of the touch up at this point in time, with these more evident chips on the higher body panels, I removed the blue painter's tape, and I had a heck of a time re-finding where these chips once existed.

Another little tip I've found, is the little paint brushes, bottle, and cap had paint on them. I found soaking the brushes in Naptha (Lighter Fluid) will remove-dissolve the paint.

It is important to thoroughly wipe the threads on the glass paint bottle, and the inside threads of the cap with a paper towel, and naptha, because at a later date of useage, you may find the cap firmly bonded to the bottle.

Overall, I have to say in my findings, that the Dr Colorchip Touch Up System works very well, and versus Langka, I felt it was vastly superior.

In the past, I had noted Langka being much less forgiving, that with just a wipe or two, the touch up would be present, with still a blob, then one or two more wipes, and one would entirely wipe the paint from the chip. That Langka was much much harder to work with, and nowhere near as effective. Mark

[cartman57]

No pics of before and after??

[MarkD51]

No pics of before and after??

I'm very sorry that I did not further document this product, and this write up with any pics to show others.

The final results are quite pleasing, and I am very tickled with the product.

The initial sample of paint gotten from Dr Colorchip was a fairly considerable mismatch, but this I believe was not their fault at all, that they did exactly match the formula they had on hand of GM Summit White Paint. I've seen past evidence of this with once ordering touch up paint from "Paintscratch dot com", with the exact same mismatched "too greyish" color.

The supplied vids that Dr Colorchip provides are a good illustration of how the product works.

What the video may lack, or not expressly show, is the amount of time from application of touch up paint, to the useage of the SealAct leveling product. It is just about as fast as the video shows, just a few minutes at most, to begin the use of the SealAct Product.

The paint formulations are truly unique with their quick drying times, and can see the benefits of use for a pro detailer, who fights time to get their work completed.

The SealAct Product seems to perfectly compliment the Paint, working extremely well together. This was an area which I felt Langka just didn't cut it like Dr Colorchip does.

In defense of Langka though, it has been a good number of years since I bought their products ( I still have them on hand) but it is possible that there's been refinement to the Langka System? Perhaps others can comment, or one can read other's experiences of Langka.

One thought about the system, is that it doesn't make much logical sense to do lengthy, time consuming paint correction and sealing waxing of a finish, and then leave such damage on a vehicle. That this is the first step to achieving showroom results on a vehicle. Mark

[swanicyouth]

One thing I've noticed about touch up paint, and to consider in general. My Pathfinder is a 2001 in Bayshore Blue Metallic. I've bought a few different touch up paints, and am usually frustrated when I find them not to match - they are usually much darker.

Now, this vehicle has sat outside for 12 years. UV light has lightened the finish quite a degree. It's not noticeable, until you remove some trim. Under the trim, the blue is much darker - actually the exact color of the touch up paint.

So, paint manufacturers likely can't account for UV color fading in their recipes. This can lead to color mid-match. I've often thought of buying some white paint, and trying to titrated the blue to an exact match, or trying to eyeball up a closer color (which may be a more sensible alternative).

Body shops deal with this during a panel re-spray by blending the new paint into the surrounding panels. This is the correct way to do a repair, as it fools you eyes into not seeing different shades.

With touch up paint on an older vehicle, eyeballing the color you are buying may work better than buying an "exact match".

[MarkD51]

Very well said SY.

As I understand it, Dr Colorchip can further custom match a touch up paint, I assume they must possess some sort of process with an Optical Analyzer?

What this entails, I have no idea, but am sure they can get closer than off the shelf paints, provided they can somehow be sent a sample.
Mark

[Detailingdoc]

Great write up

Overall I am pleased with Dr Colorchip. The paint I doesnt match exactly but its close enough.

The one issue that I do have is that the supplied cloth to use with the seal act always leaves behind some marring in the area that I am using it.
I tend to wait about 10 mins before using seal act. Maybe I need to use it sooner to avoid having to use the cloth so much to level the paint.

[BillE]

I missed this thread when first 'put-up.' Well written.

Thanx for the update...

Bill

[MarkD51]

Great write up

Overall I am pleased with Dr Colorchip. The paint I doesnt match exactly but its close enough.

The one issue that I do have is that the supplied cloth to use with the seal act always leaves behind some marring in the area that I am using it.
I tend to wait about 10 mins before using seal act. Maybe I need to use it sooner to avoid having to use the cloth so much to level the paint.

After I got my second, better corrected 1oz paint sample from Dr C, I then set out to eagerly try the product, albeit, a cold, nasty day.

Thus I didn't spend much time with it, or did much in the way of critical touch up on the upper body panels, just some experimentation on the lower rocker panel, which has stone chips that were caused by rocks flung up from the tires.

I wrongly presumed, and didn't properly adhere to Dr Colorchip's instructions, disbelieving that the paint could be possibly cured enough in a few minute's time, and let the touch up sit for a period of 12-15 minutes I estimate.

That was a mistake. The paint actually proved quite durable and quite hard to remove with the SealAct product, and initially I was under the impression that the Dr C Paint actually etched-ate the surrounding factory paint.

It appeared then that it actually didn't etch the paint, but was quite a bear to remove excess paint with the SealAct product, that I needed to use quite a bit of that product repeatedly, and had to do quite a bit of rubbing as well to remove the excess.

In your particular instance, this "misuse" of too long a wait time to dry might explain why some slight marring might be experienced if one has to do an excessive amount of rubbing to level the paint, and to remove excesses of Dr C Paint around the chip?

Thus, my first initial thoughts of the product were less than favorable, thinking I now have a product that doesn't work as claimed.

That difficulty I then later found upon second useage was due to myself not properly adhering the Dr Colorchip's directions on using the product.

I recommend trying a shorter dry time, and begin leveling with the Sealact Product within a few minutes of application.

Once I reduced the wait time to dry, the use of the SealAct was much more effortless, that as the excess paint was beginning to remove, just the rag with a very small amount of SealAct without any pressure applied, and literally floating the rag over the surface did the final last bits of leveling, and perfecting.

As I believe I mentioned, I liked the quality of this system that it seemed quite workable, and forgiveable, and that it seemed unlike Langka, in that Langka had a propensity to too quickly remove the blob, and excess, that with as little as one too many wipes, the touch up paint was gone.

There may be some particular mastery involved with Langka, so other's mileage might vary, but personally, I never perfected the use of this product. The Dr Colorchip system IMO is superior. Mark

[NYV6Coupe]

Thanks for the excellent review & how-to Mark, just ordered some & I hope to do better than my usual blob fest

[VroomVroom]

FWIW...in no particular order.

Langka is definitely far less intuitive than the good Doctor. Kinda' like using, say, UPP vs. DGPS. For addressing small chips, there is no easier solution than Dr. Colorchip.

Matching GM's white(s) always seems to be an adventure. Summit/olympic has incredible variations. Two of my favorite local shops have stopped working with paint codes, and instead go with a combo of VIN and actual in-person testing. The other thing I've noticed over the years is that many aftermarket paint suppliers, for whatever reason, confuse summit/olympic (50/WA8624) with arctic (10/WA9567).