Removed BSM on a repainted door...SURPRISE !
 

I removed the BSM's on my coupe. Passenger side looks perfect, Driver side not so good. Seems that at one time the original owner had some work done to the door and the shop who did it, did not remove the moulding before spraying. I now have a ghost outline/built up ridge of paint & clear where the moulding was. What I had plan on doing was wetsanding ( Oh BTW, I build, repair and restore guitars so I know all about spraying, wetsanding and buffing) starting with a 800 grit paper up to and including 2500 grit to remove the ridge and blend everything together, spray several coats of clear in the center of the door to build up the low spot, let it harden up and dry, wetsand the entire door and buff it out.

IMO this would be the logical approach but I'd like to hear from the Professionals on this !

The reasoning behind my logic was this. Right now, even after wetsanding the ridge line, I'll still have a depression or "valley" in the center of the door because the entire door now has who knows how many additional coats and even if I sand and reclear the entire door that depression will still be visible when viewed from different angles.

Yes or no?

My "non-professional" way of thinking was, if I spray 2 or 3 passes of clear along the center of the door after wetsanding and blending depression out, Let it dry, wetsand the area again to remove the overspray above and below the depression,in theory I'll have built up the "depression" hopefully to a point where I can now wetsand the entire door and it should be all even and hopefully no depression would show when viewed from an angle?

And if need be, I can resand and shoot the entire door with a couple coats of clear.

Or as a last resort I can say screw it and let a body shop handle it !

TTT

Any one got any ideas or suggestions ?

You won't get rid of any defects, low spot or otherwise-by trying to build with clear.

OK, So what am I looking at ?
Strip and repaint the entire door so that the paint thickness is uniform ?
I don't think a body shop would go that far, IMO

If the paint color matches perfectly, I would just wetsand the two ridges until flush, and buff the panel. If it looks bad, then you would have to sand down into the color coat, possible respray of the color coat, and then reclear the entire door.

Start with the first step, in the end if it doesnt work out or look right you would have to do the 2nd step anyways.

A body shop would prime the low area, recolor it, then clear the whole panel.

You can try the technique the poster above me outlined, but I would say thats a 50/50 shot of achieving the result you want.

Gonna try the wetsand and buff first.
If I don't get what I'm after, off the shop it goes !

Thanks Guys:thumbs: