If the clear coat on your paint is sun damaged, so that your car looks like it has a coating of frost on it, and you can't afford a new paint job right now, I have a quick fix for you. The "magic" ingredient you need is this: I got this a few years ago along with some touch-up paint I bought online, and, unfortunately, I can't find where I got it anymore. But I found that both paintscratch.com and paintworldinc.com have other brands of clear coat blender that may work as well. An automotive paint dealer should have the Dupont stuff.
The procedure is this: First, feel your paint, and if it feels a bit rough, sand it lightly with 1500 grit wet sandpaper. Next, wipe the area, including a bit of the surrounding area, with a paper towel moistened with isopropyl alcohol. This will remove any dust, dirt, and car wax. Then spray the area lightly with the clear coat blender. It is very thin, so it is important to spray lightly. Any build-up at all will run. But it dries almost instantly, and you can use more than one coat. It lays down flat, and does not produce any "orange peel" at all. And it blends with your old, frosty clear coat and makes it clear again.
[This message has been edited by TopNotch (edited 06-06-2012).]
This is very curious. I like the idea, So it is basicaly clear coat, and it blends with the clear coat alerady on the car so you won't have any lifting later? How does it get rid of the white spots? Any pics? Thanks
I could take "after" pictures, but I didn't take any "before" pictures, so you wouldn't know what it looked like before. The normal use of this product (clear coat blender) is for after you have re-painted a boo-boo and clear coated it. You usually get a noticeable "halo" around the repair area. You spray this where the halo is, and it blends the new clear coat with the old, removing the halo. I put some on a repair a couple of years ago, and it never lifted, so I wouldn't expect it to in this application.
This "fix" will not work if your clear coat is so badly damaged that it is peeling. One way to tell if it will help is to put water on the damaged area. If it looks better while the water is there, the fix will help. The "frost" is caused by tiny air bubbles in the clear coat. the water temporarily fills them, so the frost goes away. The clear coat blender permanently fills the air bubbles.
But could you not sand that peeling clear coat down to the paint itself, and then spray this stuff on?
Trying to do that without damaging the un-coated paint would be difficult. And you might want to use regular clear coat instead of blender. The blender could be used as a final step.
This stuff isn't clear paint. It's a solvent that softens the clear that is on the car and 'melts' it somewhat. You are not adding anything. If your clear is gone then you need to repaint but if your clear is cloudy what is usually happening is your clear is seperating from the base color and you are seeing the air in between. This stuff just softens the paint and when it dries it settles out. Unfortunately when you have clear that is losing it's grip on the base color this doesn't fix that...it just helps to allow the air to escape from under the clear. That clear that's left still isn't holding onto the base color and eventually it will seperate again. It can leave your clearcoat looking better but it's a temporary fix....not a long term fix. If you put too much of this stuff on it will destroy your existing paint and you will need to paint sooner.
If the clear is starting to flake off, can the paint be saved by light sanding and using a regular clear coat?
No. If the clear is flaking off you have base color that's exposed to sunlight and the elements and that damages paint. What you will need to do is sand the surface to get rid of the contaminated paint and any loose paint that's left so you have a nice, smooth surface for the new paint to stick to. The old base color isn't good enough anymore to just clear over but you can add a coat or 2 of color over the sanded base color to bring back the proper color and coverage. Then clear.
No. If the clear is flaking off you have base color that's exposed to sunlight and the elements and that damages paint. What you will need to do is sand the surface to get rid of the contaminated paint and any loose paint that's left so you have a nice, smooth surface for the new paint to stick to. The old base color isn't good enough anymore to just clear over but you can add a coat or 2 of color over the sanded base color to bring back the proper color and coverage. Then clear.
Mark the paint guy
As I recall the base coat/clear coat finishes from the late 80's were not very good. When sanding the color coat, what grade of paper is best to remove comtaminated paint without removing too much paint. Can you "blend" clear of do you have to clear the entire panel?
This stuff isn't clear paint. It's a solvent that softens the clear that is on the car and 'melts' it somewhat. You are not adding anything. Mark the paint guy
It does contain some paint. If you spray it on a bare metal surface, it is sticky. And if it does not contain paint, why does the can have a mixing ball in it, and you are required to shake before use?
As I recall the base coat/clear coat finishes from the late 80's were not very good. When sanding the color coat, what grade of paper is best to remove comtaminated paint without removing too much paint. Can you "blend" clear of do you have to clear the entire panel?
The biggest problem with the base/clear from the 80s was the delamination. It was good paint.....it just wasn't sprayed properly. If you wait too long between the base color and the clear it won't bond properly and will seperate over time. The other issue they had, along with Ford and Chrysler, was a primer issue. The paint didn't bond to the primer properly and in some cases sheets of paint would fly off of the car. Cool thing to see unless it was your car.
Blending clear is possible if done right. It does take some skill or you'll mess up the original finish that you are trying to blend into. PPG makes a really nice blending solvent that does work well soth some other paints but if you have a paint system that you use other than PPG then you'll want to use thier brand of solvent. The PPG number is DX 840.
It does contain some paint. If you spray it on a bare metal surface, it is sticky. And if it does not contain paint, why does the can have a mixing ball in it, and you are required to shake before use?
You are correct. My apologies. This is not the same as the PPG blending solvents that I was thinking of. This is clear paint but it's very thin clear paint with a high solvent content so you don't have the 'dusting' at the edges. You can use this for repairs over good color base but if you have flaking paint you still have to sand the original color to a point where you have good foundation and then spray at least one coat of base color so the sanding scratches don't show under the clear. Then you can use this over it as a final clear but I'd suggest something a little more substantial if you can. This can be used as a final clear, though, if you don't wetsand and buff a lot.
I had the same situation with my older burgundy car and could not afford a new paint job like everyone seems to recommend. The clear coat was peeling VERY BAD on the hood and roof. I'm amazed at the posts that say "just get a new paint job" to solve this problem; like everyone has an extra thousand $ sitting around. With my hefty health insurance premium increase due to Obamcare (68% higher!), there is not a lot of extra cash for a paint job.
A few months ago I applied a product that I came across that did a pretty good job hiding the ugly white splotches where the clear coat failed. It worked great on my older burgundy car and I've also applied it to several black cars as a test. It covered the damage for around 2 months until my wife ran the car thru a car wash again instead of hand washing. The white spots returned, but I reapplied the product (it took 5 minutes) and the spots went away again. It's not anywhere like a new paint job, but I can't afford that so this process was very acceptable to me, inexpensive and quick. Even if I have to apply this product a few times a year, I'm happy to do it to hide those horrible splotches. After applying the emulsion to the hood and roof, the area was not as glossy as the rest of the car, so I applied two coats of Carnauba wax and that really brought out the shine. It looks pretty good now for a car from 1995.
There are a few YouTube videos of this product being applied. Go to Youtube and search for oxideoff or loxide to find them. Hope this helps someone. Check out my before and after pictures of my car at: http://s217.photobucket.com...Repair?sort=3&page=1
[This message has been edited by mark5280 (edited 05-13-2014).]
I agree with Mark on 95% of this. I dont use that brand, but Ive never seen a blending solvent with any clear paint in it. Its usually just a high penetrating solvent that will soften an older clearcoat to allow new paint to be blended in. It dont work that well for that either, so i dont use it...I just clear a whole panel. Its expensive too...I think the SW blending solvent is like $40 a quart. If your clear has white spots, it not attached to the base color there. Only fix is to sand it off, reapply base color and clear. You also cant just reclear over the original base. If it has white spots and you spray new clear over it, all you do is put a shiney new clearcoat over the white spots which still show.
For a super quick fix, like just for a car show to get by, you can use ' ONLY ' Old English Furniture Polish. It hides a lot of bad issues, but only lasts a day or two at most.
I've got a black Fiero here that could certainly use a treatment.
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