How many coats of clear?

[Boss 5.0]

Originally Posted by elitecustombody

Between the shop owner and painter someone is not telling the truth.I'd try to get a better answer. What type and brand of clear are they using?

Agreed, unless they are respraying the door jambs as well....

When sanding and buffing a "show" car type of paint job. I let the car sit for a couple days, then sand open the clear with 800. Let it sit for another week to let all the solvent escape. Then sand with 1000, then 1200, then 1500, 2000 the 3000 Trizact. Very, very flat. A ton of work, but that is what it takes for that real nice flat straight look. I did a 32 Ford roadster last summer for a friend, spent 40 hours anding and buffing. Your average car, it would have been fine right out of the booth. But that isn'e enough when dealing with hi end hot rod paint jobs.

[64mali]

I'm sure your car is done now but this thread really interest me. If you talk to ten painters you'll get ten answers, then factor in the difference in materials from now to even five years ago. In my opinion, the bottom line is how the clear is sprayed not how much you put on. If you put too much and don't know how to san and pollish it's gonna look horrible. If you know how to lay it on, you can get away with a lot less work and have a beautiful paint job. If I'm gonna sand a car flat, I usually go three coats. Most of the new clears aren't meant to have more and you can run into solvent popping or poor drying. It can also be difficult to pollish out scratches if you start with a really course grit like 800 or 1000. To me, when you add a lot of clear, it can be difficult to not get the flat but material wave look. I spray my first coat like my last and use higher pressure and fine spray gun tip to break up the newer high solid clears. Some guys lay down a tack coat first, that just adds orange peel and doesnt really count as a coat. To me coats are defined by the mil thickness, not just a pass of a gun. You can lay 6 dry coats and pollish the hell out of it or lay 2-3 wet coats and have little work.