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Originally Posted by fastdave  When do I color sand to remove the orange peel? Before the clearcoat? How many base coats and how many clear coats? |
Definately wet sand after the clear. If you wet sand the base coat, especially with metallics, it ould effect the color. Orange peel starts at the prep work too. That is why you need to wet sand the primer as well. I wet sand primer with 320g. This is smooth enough to faltten out the primer but anything finer could create adhesion problems. After primer I use sealer (as slose to the base coat color as possible). Do not sand the sealer. Then apply the base coats and then the clears. You can start to sand the clear around 4-6 hours if the car is baked, around 12 if the car is air dried. Start with 800g (if the orange peel os heavy) and move up to 1500 minimum (prefferable to go to 3000g such as with 3M Trizact system). Change directions when bumping up in grits (this will make it easier to see which grit you need to go back to if there are some scratches that will not buff out). Also, for a truely smooth finish you will need to wipe the car down after every coat with a tack cloth. Tack after the primer, sealer, and base coats but do not tack after the first coat of clear is applied. We usually blow the car off three times, tack rag it twice, and degrease it twice (Using DuPont wax and grease remover) before applying each prime, seal, and base coats.
The ammount of paint depends on a few things. First, the paint system. DuPont Chromabase applies a thinner basecoat and will need an extra coat in order to achieve proper color. The color itself can effect that as well. Metallics by nature are a lot harder to spray and you will need to be sure to use the ammount of coats and gun pressure recommended by the paint manufacturer. The ammount of clear coats depends on what you are planning on doing with the paint job. If you intend on wet sanding, you will need a little more clear coat than if you were not. As a general rule of thumb, I use 3-4 coats of base coats and the same for clear coats. On a two stage system, you should never go over 11mils. paint thickness (this is not millimeters- that would be almost a half an inch). 11mils. is approximately 1-2 sealer coats, 3-4 base coats, and 4 coats of clear. If any more paint is applied the paint will fail prematurely.
By the way, two stage IS INDEED a different paint and yes, the two stages is in referrance to the two different products past sealer that is required to achieve proper application0 base coat and clear coat. A single stage is in referrance to a paint system that is a single spray system. This applies to most common single stage syetems that has the color and clear coat added, and the less common systems such as DuPont HotRod Black that is flat in color and does not use clear coat. Finally, we have the three stage and multi stage paints. This is a system that utilized three different products in order to create the color and effect. These systems include pearls, michas, marblizers, and candies/Kandys. The third stage is applied betweenthe base coat and the clear coat. We use these products a lot in custom paints. Marblizers are a custom effect that we mainly use for accessories or stripes and House of Kolor Kandys (I am not retarded, that is how House of Kolor spells it) are what we use for everything from all over paints jobs to real fire/true fire. Lib is partially orrect though, single stage usually usues reducers while two stages require hardeners, but not always. Chromabase two stage uses only reducer for the base coats while KolorKure uses a reducer and activator for it's single stages.
Sorry about the lengthy post, but I hope this helps.
Rob
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1998 Saleen S-281 (Metallic Purple)
ProCharger P-1SC supercharger with sheet metal intercooler,Stage II Methanol injection,D.S.S. Level 20 short block .040+ balanced/ blueprinted,310 Stroker,Patriot Motorsports heads,Diablosport chip custom tunedn,Comp Cams (custom grinds)...and so on...
What is 2 stage paint? 
