Paint Rock Chip Repair
06-20-2011, 09:59 AM
#1
Burning Brakes
Thread Starter
Paint Rock Chip Repair
As I go over my relatively new (to me) C2S, I am finding more and more rock chips and a few places where a rock pit was deep enough to get through the zinc coating to begin the formation of a pin point rust spot. I need to get all of this repaired.
There are now a few products on the market to repair rock chips; but, to the best of my knowledge, all of them are visually imperfect.
Short of having a total repaint of the areas, with the possibility of not being able to match the color (Arena Red), are there any DIY products or techniques out there that would allow me to make the repairs in my home garage?
Tough question; but, I thought I would ask the forum. Someone may have an answer!
There are now a few products on the market to repair rock chips; but, to the best of my knowledge, all of them are visually imperfect.
Short of having a total repaint of the areas, with the possibility of not being able to match the color (Arena Red), are there any DIY products or techniques out there that would allow me to make the repairs in my home garage?
Tough question; but, I thought I would ask the forum. Someone may have an answer!
06-20-2011, 09:29 PM
#5
Drifting
I'll re-post a repair I did a while back. May be more than you want to tackle but it works.....
I had this horrible chip on the rear fender lip of the Carrera. It was the size of a pencil erasor, perhaps sightly larger. Chipped right down to the primer. But it was one of those blister types where the edge leading up to the open hole was raised and looked like a miniature volcano.
I touched up the hole with factory touch up. I slowly layed it paint over the course of a week. I would thin it with laquer thinner to make it flow better and use a 000 art brush to lay it in the best I could. It matched but the texture was wrong and it wasn't flat due to the volcano-effect surrounding the filled in chip.
I tried flattening it with Langka but it destroyed the metallic effect. I then built it up again and wet sanded it flatter and tried touching it up one last time with the brush. It wasn't bad. Still, the volcano look was distressing.
I decided that I had to flatten the volcano more and while picking on it some more, part of the chip, apparently a loose paint-blister, popped off! So now I had a hole twice the size of the one I started with. This was almost dime size now!
So after a lot of cussing, ranting and pacing around the car, I decided to take laquer thinner and get all the paint out of the chip and start from scratch.
I went to the art supply store and bought myself an air brush. I have some extra paint from when the dealer painted my new euro front bumper cover this past Spring. So I thinned the paint 50/50 with laquer thinner and began to layer in paint in the chip. I cut varying size holes in a postcard using an adjustable leather hole punch. I shot the airbrush through the card at the chip and moved the card around the chip filling the area evenly. I did this for a whole day slowly building up the paint thickness. Finally I sanded it smooth with 2000 grit sandpaper. It was perfectly flat and smooth. Then I started spraying over the chip. Spray and sand. Spray and sand.
Naturally whenever I touch the metallic paint I destroy the metallic look so when I got it perfect I gave it one final "beauty" shot.
This required me to not only spray the touch up spot, which had grown to the size of a quarter, but I had to blend it into the surrounding lip. I was lucky in that I could keep the repair on the vertical lip. It gave me a natural edge to blend up to. But I still could not mask it off in a traditional sense. I tried and it left a hard edge. (I had many attempts that were "erased" with thinner or compound) What I ended up doing was cutting a template of the curved lip that I was painting and taping it to spacers I rigged so the masking was 1/2" off the surface. This way I could angle my spray and get the area I needed to spray but it would never create a "hard" edge. It feathered out nicely. The farther away the paper was, the more feathered it was. I sprayed an area the full height of the lip and about 6" long. It is very solid in the center 2" and it feathers out the rest of the way.
My next issue was protecting the metallic. I couldn't touch it or it changes the look. It didn't have the gloss of the surrounding paint. I bought two types of some airbrush paint made for touch up put it looked really yellow-ish and on my test panels (I painted half a dozen metal test panels metallic silver-blue with extra paint and tried different clear coats and techniques) it was un-impressive and very orange-peely. Finally I went to the auto paint store and bought some Dupli-Color spray clear in a can. The paint looked pretty good on my test panels but the spray pattern from the can was over 4" wide. I could never control that for my little touch up job. So I sprayed the Dupli-Color in the airbrush bottle and then airbrushed that onto the test panel.....it worked!
So that's what I did. I finally finished up by spraying the clear. I sprayed as heavy as I dare to get it as smooth as possible. Tomorrow I will compound the surface "just a little" to improve slickness. But for all practical purposes I am done!
I wish I had taken a "before" or "during" picture. But I had no idea what a big process this would be or that it would turn out so incredibly well. If it hadn't, I would never have told you!
I was so upset with this big mess and my wife was so pissed with my complaining that one day she just erupted: "Just sell the damn car!" Well, I guess I can keep it now. Phew!
FYI, the chip was in the center of the picture right on the curve of the lip.
I had this horrible chip on the rear fender lip of the Carrera. It was the size of a pencil erasor, perhaps sightly larger. Chipped right down to the primer. But it was one of those blister types where the edge leading up to the open hole was raised and looked like a miniature volcano.
I touched up the hole with factory touch up. I slowly layed it paint over the course of a week. I would thin it with laquer thinner to make it flow better and use a 000 art brush to lay it in the best I could. It matched but the texture was wrong and it wasn't flat due to the volcano-effect surrounding the filled in chip.
I tried flattening it with Langka but it destroyed the metallic effect. I then built it up again and wet sanded it flatter and tried touching it up one last time with the brush. It wasn't bad. Still, the volcano look was distressing.
I decided that I had to flatten the volcano more and while picking on it some more, part of the chip, apparently a loose paint-blister, popped off! So now I had a hole twice the size of the one I started with. This was almost dime size now!
So after a lot of cussing, ranting and pacing around the car, I decided to take laquer thinner and get all the paint out of the chip and start from scratch.
I went to the art supply store and bought myself an air brush. I have some extra paint from when the dealer painted my new euro front bumper cover this past Spring. So I thinned the paint 50/50 with laquer thinner and began to layer in paint in the chip. I cut varying size holes in a postcard using an adjustable leather hole punch. I shot the airbrush through the card at the chip and moved the card around the chip filling the area evenly. I did this for a whole day slowly building up the paint thickness. Finally I sanded it smooth with 2000 grit sandpaper. It was perfectly flat and smooth. Then I started spraying over the chip. Spray and sand. Spray and sand.
Naturally whenever I touch the metallic paint I destroy the metallic look so when I got it perfect I gave it one final "beauty" shot.
This required me to not only spray the touch up spot, which had grown to the size of a quarter, but I had to blend it into the surrounding lip. I was lucky in that I could keep the repair on the vertical lip. It gave me a natural edge to blend up to. But I still could not mask it off in a traditional sense. I tried and it left a hard edge. (I had many attempts that were "erased" with thinner or compound) What I ended up doing was cutting a template of the curved lip that I was painting and taping it to spacers I rigged so the masking was 1/2" off the surface. This way I could angle my spray and get the area I needed to spray but it would never create a "hard" edge. It feathered out nicely. The farther away the paper was, the more feathered it was. I sprayed an area the full height of the lip and about 6" long. It is very solid in the center 2" and it feathers out the rest of the way.
My next issue was protecting the metallic. I couldn't touch it or it changes the look. It didn't have the gloss of the surrounding paint. I bought two types of some airbrush paint made for touch up put it looked really yellow-ish and on my test panels (I painted half a dozen metal test panels metallic silver-blue with extra paint and tried different clear coats and techniques) it was un-impressive and very orange-peely. Finally I went to the auto paint store and bought some Dupli-Color spray clear in a can. The paint looked pretty good on my test panels but the spray pattern from the can was over 4" wide. I could never control that for my little touch up job. So I sprayed the Dupli-Color in the airbrush bottle and then airbrushed that onto the test panel.....it worked!
So that's what I did. I finally finished up by spraying the clear. I sprayed as heavy as I dare to get it as smooth as possible. Tomorrow I will compound the surface "just a little" to improve slickness. But for all practical purposes I am done!
I wish I had taken a "before" or "during" picture. But I had no idea what a big process this would be or that it would turn out so incredibly well. If it hadn't, I would never have told you!
I was so upset with this big mess and my wife was so pissed with my complaining that one day she just erupted: "Just sell the damn car!" Well, I guess I can keep it now. Phew!
FYI, the chip was in the center of the picture right on the curve of the lip.
06-21-2011, 08:53 AM
#6
button queen
For a bit less complicated approach, try this:
https://rennlist.com/forums/993-foru...paint+chip+DIY
I'm +1 on Dr. ColorChip too!! Perfect color match.
https://rennlist.com/forums/993-foru...paint+chip+DIY
I'm +1 on Dr. ColorChip too!! Perfect color match.
06-21-2011, 06:08 PM
#7
Rennlist Member
I used Dr. Colorchip on my Arena Red nose and though not perfect, I at least do not notice the road rash when walking by the front of the car. I have one chip that is similar to what Brad describes, and the Colorchip helped it, but is still pretty noticeable. I'll have to see if I am brave enough to try his method.
