this might be a stupid question but oh well. Well a month ago i just got my car painted deep blue metallic and i have alot of orange peel. My paint is glossy but it doesn't have the mirror shine. Is there any way i can get some of the orange peel off without wetsanding the car. If i have to wetsand my car how much will it cost.

 

Did they buff or wetsand or anything after the paintjob?

 

i don't think so. They said that the paint was still soft when i got it so i doubt they did anything. they only had my car for 3 days so it was a quick job

 

not sure how much a shop would charge.....me and my dad do all of my wetsanding and buffing at my house....that's what really makes a paint job slick and shiney as hell..

 

some orange peel can be removed that way....in most cases your out of luck as that has to do with the painter and their experience.

if they didn't wet sand the car at all.........which most shops should and will do after painting....then that could take care of some of it and bring back the shine.

but, you will still have orange peel especially if it's bad like you say it is.

 

here is what a paint job looks like before it's wet sanded...

notice how it is still shiney, but reflections are blurred.

 

...

 

now look after it's wet sanded....even in the dark the reflections are alot more crisp.

 

a good way to tell if a car has orange peel without even getting up to it is to see how the reflections are brought out.

a car with orange peel will have serious waves in the reflections, this also has to do with bad body preping but just another sign.

i'd go and find a custom car that has a paint job like you would like and ask them what they did or who did the work.

good luck.

 

here's some orange peal for ya

 

heres a good shot of my bad orange peal verse a few cars after mine with nice buffed and polished paint. well the one car after mine has stock factory paint but u get the point.

we didnt have time to wet sand and polish my car out and the paint booth climate controls werent working so when the ar got sprayed it was 105 and the painter said he was having a small problem with the paint drying to quick.

and on the shot of my fender thats one area that didnt get enuff paint and is kinda ruff.

 

not to much orange peel here on the top of my 91

 

sorry i took so long to post back i was on a trip. so most likely i have to wetsand my car to get the mirror like shine. heres a pic where u can see the blurriness (if u look preety hard).

 

Yep, that needs to be wetsanded and buffed.....it will make a HUGE difference!!

 

You can do this yourself if you have a buffer just start out with 1000 grit wetsanding paper then wetsand with 1500 grit paper and finsh up 2000 grit wet paper then buff with 3M buffing compond then finsh a glaze and it should look great (that is if it is BC\CC)

 

HTF do you wet sand????
Do you just use special sandpaper, soak it in water, and have at 'er???
Or is there a special technique?

 

Grab a garden hose and let it trickle in the area you're sanding. I use a foam sanding pad and wrap the paper around it. Also good to have a bucket with some soapy water if you don't want to use the garden hose plus you can use it for rinsing. Always keep it wet and if you hear a buzzing noise stop! Rinse the sandpaper and the area you're working on. I've always been told not to sand in circles, just in one direction. Don't sand on top of high points or sharp edges cause you'll go right though the paint in a couple of strokes. You'll know when the paint is nice and flat after you've let the car dry, the paint will be dull with no shiny spots. Well, that's about all I can think of atm hehe.

 

Orange peel isn't the reason that paint doesn't shine. With good paint, even if there is orange peel, you should be able to read a book in the reflection. Even though the surface is bumpy, it should be very shiny. If the paint isn't shiny, it either went on too dry, or it's cheap paint. Since putting it on too dry usually causes orange peel, a lot of people only see orange peel on cars that don't shine.

Kandied's pics seem to indicate something different to me than what he's saying. In his first pic, the basecoat isn't even done being applied, so you're seeing the paint with no clear coat. The base coat of a two stage paint paint won't shine no matter what you do to it if you don't have clear over it. But, paint that's put on too dry will also give that sort of appearance. Once the dry paint is wetsanded and buffed, it'll shine just fine. If it's dull because it's just a cheap low quality paint, wetsanding and buffing will help, but it'll never give a mirror finish.

 

This ias a pic of my car in base coat in the booth still. The side reflection is messed up by the reflection the glass caused, but look at the top of the Sail panel and edge of the rear quarters. You can see how it is a dull shine. This is what base coat looks like...

 

Same shot after clear coat

 

This is straight out of the booth... no wetsanding at all. He uses a product called vario. The vario clear is amazing. Cars come out super slick w/o any buffing! But you have to be careful cause it is very easy to run!

I wish I had some better shots of the clean reflection, but I tend to shoot the car away from things to avoid reflections...

 

I use 3M it seems to last longer then others look over the paint to see if you have any runs or trash if you do you can get a paint padal and cut it down to 3 inchs and wrap it with 1000 grit wet paper and block them out and go easy