I need a little guidance on cutting and buffing. My paint laid down real slick, but unfortunately it has some dust, a dog hair and a bug in some of the paint.
I put down 2 coats of clear, wet sanded flat with 600 grit, and then laid a flow coat of clear. I need to know if the following plan sounds good.
Sand out hair, dust and bug with 1200. Tape edge to prevent cut through. Sand with 1500. Remove tape. Sand with 2000 lightly (only a couple passes) hitting the edges. Compound with wool pad and polish with foam pad.
Here's the buffer I'm looking at which comes with a wool / compounding bonnet and foam / polishing bonnet.
I probably should've been a little clearer. Before my final coat of clear I sanded with 600 grit and then sprayed a wet coat of clear. A flow coat if you will. It laid nice and flat. Now I'm just looking for advice on cutting and buffing to remove dust. Paper grit to use, equipment, compounds, and polishes.
should have a selection of grits from 600 to 1600. The finer grits are safer but slow.
variable speed buffer w/ foam pad and wool pad.
i like 3m perfect-it 3000 rubbing compound followed by 3m perfect-it 3000 ultrafine machine polish.
one thing i do is surround a larger imperfection w/ low tack tape. use a short section of paint stick for block. easier to control wet sanding small area w/ paint stick block riding on tape.
some small imperfections will buff out just like the salesman said.
I bought Meguiar's Solo system. Comes with all the cutting/polishing pads you need, backing pad and universal compound. You can pick up variable speed electric polisher at HF.
there is a reason they make all the set up grits. skipping one just makes more work . i can assure you that over buffing trying to get rid of 1500 scratches will kill the clear. it will shine but just not be as clear and sharp .
Thanks for all the advice guys. I've been doing some reading and watching some videos. I'm just a little confused. I'm confused about the grits people are using, the compounds and polishes.
I see some people use 1,200 to 1,500, then buff with a heavy cutting compound, and then polish.
I've got advice to use 1,000 to level, then work my way on up through 1,500, 2K, and 3K. If I were to work through the finer grits is it still necessary to use such a heavy cutting compound as say 3M 5973 or Meguiar's Diamond Cut 85? Wouldn't I just polish it? Or does the cutting compound remove the sand paper marks even left behind from 3K paper?
I think I'm getting a handle on this, but just want to clear up a few things.
Here, this guy used 1500, compounded, and then polished. Although, I don't care for how his finish came out. The gloss I have now is shinier, and flatter.
And last, but not least, here they used 1K grit and then just used a cutting compound with a wool and then foam bonnet. Seems like they should've went further and used polish...
Well after you are finished with the 3000 Trizact you will have a shine you can see if there are any scratches left behind and then its very easy to buff the rest out
The soft interface pad works great on curves. Still be a bit careful on edges, it doesn't remove much material but if you're a little thin sowmwhere, it'll probably manage to make it gone instead of thin.
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