skimming the car.
 

Im doing a resto. of a 66 ford ranchero, parts are hard to come by, and the thing must have been hit hard in a few places then it was sat in the arizona sun for several years. any ways ive done most of the work with hammer and dolly and other non heavy filler methods. but im looking for the best material to skim coat the whole car so i can get her super straight. the last time i did this i used regular bondo brand filler. and it was such a pain in the ***. but that was a customers car and thats what they provided to me. i use mainly evercoat products so far z grip and the metal glaze. but ive been told not to use those for a entire skim coat. so im looking for other peoples methods, please include the way that you applied the product also with your recommendation please. Ive done this before in different ways but im looking for a better method. basicly a better product that you have some time to spread it on a entire panel at one time with one mix with out being a Olympic athlete ( it always hardens up on the mixing board or never get a chance to smooth it out ). thanks.

Metal Glaze is the perfect product for a skim coat. But if you don't want to spread then spraying "Featherfill" or "Slick sand" is the way to go. It's a polyester primer that is literally the same as spraying that polyester putty like Metal Glaze or "Glaze coat" which is the same as Metal Glaze but a different color.

But Polyester primer is a very cool product for such a job.

Brian

Brian got me onto Slick Sand. I too have a difficult time getting a good 'skim,' as I can't do it all in a single coat, and multiple coats just make the panel worse as it get more low spots it seems. The Slick Sand sprays on even of course and fills tremendously. You need a large tip (2.0 mm or greater) to do it. I bought a $40 gun with a 2.5 mm tip that I only use for Slick Sand in case it ever kicks in the gun if I don't get it cleaned out fast enough.

1967 Mustang Restoration: Slick Sand: Sprayable polyester surfacer/primer

whats the cost estamit, or how many gallons as i was told by the paint jober that it can be really costly, to do a whole car. with the spray able. last night i was thinking about just doing multiple coats of urethane primer and blocking, but i realised im to lazy to do this lol. and can the spray able be put on bare metal or does it have to be over epoxy. thanks again

The blog link I left you will answer a lot of your questions about it. Slick Sand runs $90/gallon and can be really costly if you were to do a whole car in it. I only did the panels that were the worst, (which still amounted to 90% of the car): hood, roof, both doors, trunk lid, both quarters. Only the fenders, valances, and tail light panel had normal 2k. I'd mix up half a quart at a time and it's gone in no time. It might get you 2-3 coats on a single panel. I only have a half quart left to spray one more door so I may have to buy another quart or so.

It CANNOT go over bare metal; needs to go over epoxy.

By the way, this isn't much different than doing multiple coats of urethane and then blocking...you still have to do multiple coats (probably), you still have to block, and it sands a lot harder than urethane. But fills a lot more.

3M platinum plus is a good filler to use to skim coat. Metal glaze/dolphin glaze is very expensive so what I do if it's around is mix it with the 3m filler. Metal glaze is best for cars that only get primed once and for production cars that get only primed once with thin primers. You just don't need something that smooth for every panel of the car...it's overkill.

Poly primer is another option, as mentioned, but I would never spray it unless I knew the car was pretty straight as I have techniques to get it straight rather than throwing $70 away so dings that I missed don't fully get covered with the poly primer, cause it won't do the work for you but rather sharpen up GOOD work. I never expect primer to do the work for me otherwise I'd better expect waves and dings.

im doing a show quality paint job, im trying to learn different ways. and theirs alot of peen marks from the hammer and Dollie, there's really no replacement panels that are obtainable to me, basically i want original and the expense was a lot. so i opted to do the labor route. im going back threw my original work and smoothing out some of the hammer work with a file and bumping, but its still gonna need some filler work. from what im seeing itll be alot less than before, it was a customer car. and i was doing the repair for a normal base clear nothing special paint job, well the owner got to far in debt with this one and two other projects he had going at the same time and thats how i got the car , so now that its mine and i plan on putting a show job on it. im going threw some different steps. bye grinding out my old work and redoing some of the metal work. hey you get what you pay for and that's what he wanted. so i think im gonna stick with old school and just use a spreadable filler, what ever coat fillers flow better, im not looking for glaze thats to thin for what i need. im looking for a filler. thanks then maybe ill do multiple pass urethane. after that.

I have to disagree with you on this one Henry, any time you can "ask your primer" to do less, you are producing a better job. I like to call that skim coat of polyester putty like "Glaze coat" or "Metal Glaze" a "Primer". Evercoat Don't let the name fool anyone, it isn't designed for only over metal, it is the EXACT same product as "Glaze Coat" only a different color. This is from the tech rep at Evercoat. I personally like the "Metal Glaze" over the "Glaze coat" mostly because the "Glaze coat" hardener is white! You can't see if it's mixed well, so I go with the "Metal Glaze" but you could use the "Metal Glaze" hardener in the "Glaze coat" as they ARE the same product only a different color.

I spread it like a "Primer" just as if I was spraying a primer. I want it as smooth as possible and treat it just as a primer. I don't care if it's a show car or a collision job. If I can apply only one application of primer, what is the difference? Or, apply an application of primer on that show job and block it and apply another, so what, you are asking the primer to do less, the primer has less solids so this is a good thing.

Less chance of shrinkage or sand scratch swelling with the higher solids products (the polyester putty) doing all the work.

Brian

Wurth Ultra Performance Premium Lightweight Filler and/or Wurth Premium Glaze. Great products but expensive and only available thru a Wurth dealer.

Evercoat Rage Extreme filler and/or MetalGlaze. Great products but expensive.

Tips: turn the cans upside-down overnight and stir them well. They are both ultra-light weight, the resin settles to the bottom.

Both are fairly thin but can be thinned further with glaze.

Both can go DTM or over epoxy prime.

DO NOT double-draw over them with your spreader, you'll create pinholes. Get your spreading technique down pat.

DO NOT try to sand them while still soft, let them set-up fully before sanding.

Start your heavy sanding with 80 grit, both can be finished down to 400 grit.

Welcome to the 21st century, these fillers are great BUT take some time to get used to. Good luck with it.

Anything that needs more than the thickness of your finger nail you had best be using body filler to fill and not glaze. Glaze should only be used for sand scratchs and a small wave or chip.

You must be doing tiny dents then cause it doesn't make sense to coat a whole care with those tiny jugs of metal glaze/dolphin glaze. That would cost you around $100 just to coat the entire car, and in this weather you're also fighting against it cause it wants to be on the floor dripping all over the place. He mentioned imperfections he's trying to cover, not something that's blocking out perfect or top coating....this sounds like something that just needs to be filled, then maybe afterwards getting top coated with a glaze. Even then I'd just use a GOOD filler like Evercoat Extreme or 3M Platinum Plus. I value your opinion, Martin, but there's not a whole lot of restoration shops coating the ENTIRE car with metal glaze when you're covering hammer marks or imperfections. If you're covering something you can't hand feel or have already filled and are topcoating then it's a different story.

exactly. This guy will be spending $160+ just topcoating and it still might not be straight if he chooses metal glaze at this point.

The Marson Platinum that Henry speaks of is fantastic stuff. I don't get the 'plus,' just the platinum, which is still very creamy and incredibly easy to sand. It's about half the price of Rage and I don't see what benefit I can appreciate from Rage to be worth the additional cost.

You are right Henry, but the polyester putty works so easily I would still skim coat large panels. I know that if I was doing the whole panel I would be spraying polyester primer before polyester putty though. You are right on all accounts in that matter.

But if you are doing a panel at a time, filler work then getting it into primer as most home hobbiest should so as to not be overwhelmed with a complete car, skim coating with polyester putty is just fine. I have done it a ton. First off, if you skim smaller areas and get them knocked out like below a body line only. Then do the upper section knocking it out, it can be spread in small enough areas to get it on there before it kicks. But if it was hot, oh heck no, you simply don't use that product because it isn't the right product to use under those conditions, just like a door ding isn't the conditions to use polyester primer.

If it's hot and you are doing large areas, polyester primer is the way to go.

But you can also thin your Rage with some Glaze coat so it flows out smoother. This is a recommended procedure by Evercoat.

SwValcon, I spread polyester putty over EVERYTHING I do, it is the final glaze coat. There is no reason to limit it to sand scratches, if it is used as the final glaze coat you have NO sand scratches to think about.

Brian

I will have to give it a try. If the polyester putty could be eliminated on larger panels as we are discussing that would be wonderful.:thumbup:

Brian