1972 Cutlass - Wet-sanded and Ceramic Coated - PBL Diamond Paint Coating

[Mike Phillips]

1972 Cutlass - Wet-sanded and Ceramic Coated - PBL Diamond Paint Coating








At my recent 3-day car detailing class we detailed 14 cars in 3 days including wetsanding a 1948 Chevy Suburban Streetrod and a Dodge Ram 3500 Pickup Truck. For these two truck the class learned a technique I call,

Scuff & Buff

Check them out... they look great! And the majority of the people in this class had never wetsanded a car before nor used a rotary polisher with a wool pad to buff out a car.







Out of the other 12 cars detailed in this 3-day class, we used one of the student's cars to learn Production Detailing. This is Ryan's 1972 Oldsmobile Cutlass AFTER the class buffed it out.




Looks great huh?

Yes it does. But - this custom paint job had a lot of orange peel, dye-back or shrink back that revealed prep work in the primer as well as other surface texture defects.


Orange Peel









On the other side of the trunk lid you could see D.A. Sanding Marks, called Pig Tails in the underlying coats of paint. The pig tails are actually UNDER the clearcoat and if there's enough clear paint over the basecoat we'll be able to remover or at least improve how they look.








Here's the pig tails...








Because I already had 2 vehicles for the wetsanding portion of the 3-day class, I invited Ryan to bring his 1972 Cutlass back to Autogeek where if he let me use the trunk lid for two LIVE Detailing Classes showing how to hand sand and how to machine sand, I would help him to wet sand all the rest of the body panels using the Scuff & Buff Technique to safely level some of the orange peel and other surface imperfections and the ceramic coat the paint.

He said yes.

Next I'll share a few pictures and the LIVE Detailing Class videos we shot that are very educational followed by the final results.

[Mike Phillips]

Continued....


Here's the finish after scuffing with 3M Trizact #3000 by Hand.






















Here's after compounding and polishing with Pinnacle Advanced Compound. We used FLEX Cordless PE14 with RUPES Twisted Wool Pad to cut out the sanding marks and followed with the FLEX Supa BEAST with a RUPES 180mm Yellow CP Foam Pad to polish and remove the holograms.

























Here's everything we used...




















Here's final results...





























Thank you Ryan for trusting Autogeek with your beautiful 1972 Oldsmobile Cutlass!

[Mike Phillips]

Continued....


On Autogeek.com

In more or less the order we used the various tool, pads, products and sanding discs...


3M Trizact Hookit 6 Inch Foam Discs P3000, 3M 02085 foam discs, paint finishing discs

Griots Garage BOSS 6.5 inch Innerflex Pad

FLEX PE-150 Cordless Rotary Polisher, cordless rotary polisher, battery powered polisher

RUPES Twisted Natural Wool Pad - 6.5 Inch

Pinnacle Advanced Compound

https://www.autogeek.net/speed-maste...pad-wheel.html

https://www.autogeek.net/pbl-diamond-prep-spray.html

https://www.autogeek.net/pinnacle-paint-coating.html

https://www.autogeek.net/diamond-surface-coating.html

https://www.autogeek.net/storm-gray-12pack.html

[Mike Phillips]

And here's the 2 YouTube videos we made using this car,


On Autogeek - Hand wetsanding with Nikken Unigrit Finishing Papers




On Mobile Tech Expo - Machine Damp Sanding with 3M Trizact #3000




Here's a full video on the Scuff & Buff Technique






And here's my full write-up on the 1937 Ford Wood we wetsanded using the scuff and buff technique.

How-to Wetsand using the Scuff and Buff Technique - 1937 Ford Woody

[Mike Phillips]

More...


Here's the link to an explanation about paint defects in fresh paint by forum member John aka 2black1s who by background is a professional painter and knows a lot more about this topic than yours truly.

die back

[Rsurfer]

At Mike P. If the pig tails are under the clear as you stated..how can you remove or improve them by wet sanding the top of the clear coat? Is it because the top clear coat is outlining the pig tails in the base coat?

[2black1s]

At Mike P. If the pig tails are under the clear as you stated..how can you remove or improve them by wet sanding the top of the clear coat? Is it because the top clear coat is outlining the pig tails in the base coat?

I'm not Mike but I'll try to answer your question anyways...

The pigtails originated in the underlying coats. Either the primer surfacer (most likely) or in the color coats if they were sanded (less likely). Then as the color and clear are applied they tend to fill the pigtail scratches but never to the point that they are completely level at the paint's surface.

So, the pigtails are still visible at the surface, but the fact that they originated "below surface", is where the description "UNDER the clear-coat" comes from. They are a scratch pattern "in the paint" rather than a scratch in the surface of an otherwise flat finish.

Regardless of where or how the scratch originated, removing them at the surface is the same process... Sand them smooth and then polish.

Another consideration when working with metallics is that even though you can sand and polish the surface smooth, there is always a chance that the scratch pattern will still be visible because the metallic particle distribution is irregular within the underlying scratch and will reflect light accordingly even though the surface is perfectly smooth. The scratches in this example were not that bad so there's a pretty good chance that is not the case here, but it is possible.

Hope that explanation helps.

[Rsurfer]

They are a scratch pattern "in the paint" rather than a scratch in the surface of an otherwise flat surface.


So how do you remove them by removing paint from the top coat?

[2black1s]

They are a scratch pattern "in the paint" rather than a scratch in the surface of an otherwise flat surface.


So how do you remove them by removing paint from the top coat?

Let's try this again... They are a scratch in the underlying coat(s). When you spray a coat of paint over the scratch, the scratch is still there, it's just filled in a bit with the paint you sprayed. Continue spraying and the scratch becomes "buried" in the paint, but it still shows up at the surface. You can sand and polish the surface to remove the visual indications of the scratch at the surface, but the scratch is still buried, or encased, within the paint film thickness even though you can no longer see it at the surface.

That's why it was described as "UNDER the clear-coat". It's "in the paint". It's not from the surface being scratched after the paint was applied.

The only way I could explain it any better than I've already tried would be with a drawing or sketch. Maybe I'll work on that.

[Rsurfer]

Let's try this again... They are a scratch in the underlying coat(s). When you spray a coat of paint over the scratch, the scratch is still there, it's just filled in a bit with the paint you sprayed. Continue spraying and the scratch becomes "buried" in the paint, but it still shows up at the surface. You can sand and polish the surface to remove the visual indications of the scratch at the surface, but the scratch is still buried, or encased, within the paint film thickness even though you can no longer see it at the surface.

That's why it was described as "UNDER the clear-coat".

"On the other side of the trunk lid you could see D.A. Sanding Marks, called Pig Tails in the underlying coats of paint. The pig tails are actually UNDER the clearcoat and if there's enough clear paint over the basecoat we'll be able to remover or at least improve how they look."

I understand what you are saying, but how can you remove the pig tails by sanding the top clear as stated above?