Is there a solution besides an official repaint for spidered paint on the nose of the car? It was dark out, I was on the highway passing a vehicle and was looking in the side mirror to see when I had room to pull back in the right lane, when I looked forward, there was a large garbage bag in my lane. I had enough time to swear but not swerve, so I ended up hitting the bag at approx 75mph, luckily(sort of), it was full of aluminum cans. I pulled over at the next stop and the paint now has a lot of cracks in it from where the nose flexed. I am a little P/O'd with myself with this situation. How much damage did I actually do to the front and is it possible to 'buff' this out? Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

Riley

 

If there are actual cracks in the paint, from the nose flexing, I'm afraid you can't buff those out. If you're real lucky, only the clear coat cracked, and you can have it re-shot with clear. Of course, that depends on if your paint is in good condition to start with.
Sorry about your bad luck, and hope you get her looking like new again fast.

 

You can try to wetsand down to the colorcoat and reclear it, but chances are it cracked the colorcoat too. You'll probably have to strip it and reshoot it or the cracks will return. If it's a small area, you might just have to take it down in that area and blend it in w/ the rest of the nose.

 

I sort of had a similar situation happen to me. What's the best way to remove the OE paint from the nose? Hand sand (ughh)? Soda blast? Chemical strip?

 

That's what I was pretty much thinking. I guess my next question would be right along the lines of leadfoot4.

 

Auto body supply houses have stripper for Urethane bumpers.

 

I've heard either "worked well", or "what a disaster" the chemical strippers can be on the soft bumpers. There seems to be no "in between".

 

You have to get the stuff for Urethane bumpers, not regular stripper.

 

just use sandpaper, you dont need to remove all the paint of the complete bumper just where it cracked. I think it would be really hard to just remove part of the paint with stripper and not have a reaction from the stripper when spraying the new paint. Its probably fast to sand it anyway.

 

I understand that, but I think that there are a number of "formulas" for making urethane bumpers, each one just a teeny bit different, and that 's what makes the chemical strippers a "crap shoot". A couple percent of chemical "D", and the stripper reacts with it, and the bumper gets mushy, a little more of chemical "J", and the paint sticks so well, the stripper won't budge it.

 

I would post this over in the car care section of the forum where some pro detailers hang out. They may have some ideas. You could also go to some paint shops and get 2 or 3 opinions. The more info you have before you start sanding the better. Good luck.
ps Don't beat yourself up over this. Accidents happen.

 

Well, if it's alright with leadfoot4, this thread could be moved.., is there an easy way to do this? By the way, thanks very much everyone for the information so far.

 

It's certainly OK by me, as I've been trying to get a good, definitive answer for this question for a while. Actually, I've got 3 cars in the family that have soft bumpers that need a refinish, due to age or road debris. Therefore I'd LOVE to find a way to effectively strip them, in preparation for fresh paint

 

Sanding is the SAFEST, it's tough on the compound curves and insets on the Vettes fascia covers. If it's a spot repair, sanding is the fastest/safest. If it's the entire cover, test some remover on the back side of the cover to see what happens. Soda blasting might also do the trick.

 

The compound curves are my issue, as well as trying to sand without putting any high and low spots in the bumpers. Yes, I have a couple of different sized sanding blocks, but the bumpers dot really have much flat area.

Whether or not soda blasting would work is something I'm trying to figure out. I've e-mailed a couple of soda blaster manufacturing companies, but although they've replied to me, they won't specifically say if their equipment will work or not.

 

I have heard that blasting can leave pits in the surface and when primed or painted the pits may have small amounts of air in them still. When the air under the paint warms up it expands causing a bubble.

I promise the quickest way is too sand it. you can strip a bumper in an hour with 180 grit paper and a da sander. you will not have any high/lows in the bumper from just removing the paint. Also will have to be primed before it gets painted anyway and the primer will have to be blocked as well which will eliminate any kind of high/low spots if there are any.

Eurethane bumpers show alot less defects in the prep work than a metal panel will.

If you decide to sand it the easiest way is too leave it on the car untill you have the majority of it stripped then remove the bumper and strip the edges of the bumper on a stand. They are not much fun sanding down when they are moving all over the place and the car will obviously hold it in place the best. I can easily strip 5 bumpers, prime them and block the primer in about 8 hours. not that hard if you have any questions and decide to do this yourself just ask. I have done a ton of them and can pretty much answer any question or find the answer too it

 

Sounds like it is time for a tigershark upgrade