Paint finish
 

With painting weather finally arrived, I have finished (maybe??) painting my car enough to start putting it together. I started with Evercoat superbuild (pink stuff) sanded with 180, followed by Acyrlic urethane 2K high build DTM for dark color, sanded with 220 and 360 Scotchbite, followed by urethane single stage urethane, I think. The can just says Automotive Finishes. It is Martin Senour from NAPA, and mixes 8-4-1 with reducer and hardener. Note on the attached pics that the header cover panel reflects light like a mirror, while the gas tank and cowl are much more of a matte-like finish. Primer on the cover panel was applied with a foam brush (no-one will see it), and all the cowl and hood parts were sprayed. The cover panel has a smooth as glass feel, but the other parts obviously need smoothing. From pictures in Restorer and on the MAFCA facebook page, most self-respecting cars are pretty shiny--see recent FB shots of Alison's Pie Wagon. My question to you all is how do I achieve the shine? Is it a matter of polish and wax after the paint cures, or do I need to wet sand and re-coat. I was hoping to take the parts to a body shop for finishing, but they either wanted the whole car or were booked many months out, or both.

Re: Paint finish
 

I'm not familiar with that paint. Looks to me like it needs a "clear" over the paint. Did you ask the guys at NAPA? If not, I would go back to NAPA and ask them what process is appropriate.

Re: Paint finish
 

Hello, it may be base coat -clear coat, the base is the color and won’t have much shine until the clear coat is applied.You can vary the amount of gloss to represent unbuffed lacquer. Usually wet sand with 1500 or 2000 grit and buff. Picture of semi gloss clear as used on dashboard. The splash apron is just the base coat applied .

Re: Paint finish
 

I think it would be key to figure out from NAPA whether or not it is a single stage urethane or base clear before you take an approach. That will make a big difference as to what your next steps are.

Re: Paint finish
 

Wow, ...this does not look good IMHO.

To begin with, you really should have been given a tech-sheet with the paint so that you knew what cap and air pressure to spray at. Knowing the product specs would help us all in this. I will add some thoughts below, and then if you have any questions you can ask in another post.

• Some have mentioned it looks like the base paint of Basecoat/Clearcoat paint. While I am unfamiliar with Martin Senior paintline, I can say from my own experiences that all of the BC/CC paints I have shot have not used any Hardeners with the basecoat, ...and most come pre-thinned so that amount of solvents would not be needed. Therefore I don't believe this was a BC/CC paint.
  
  
• Next, you don't mention the brand, model, or type of spray gun you were using. What it does appear to me is the mix was incorrect for the ambient temperature and your spray gun. Knowing the cap size of the gun, and the tip pressure would have helped me/you adjust for better flow-out. Knowing the temp range of the solvent you used would also help determine what went wrong. Just looking at poor quality pictures, it appears the paint was sprayed with too high of pressure, was not atomized evenly, and was sprayed with too cold of solvent for the temps and air-flow.
  
  
• Finally, I am unsure of the paint quality you were seeking, but looking at the picture of the tank, it would not appear you were ready for finishcoat. The Super Build 4:1 is a great product that we are also using. The issue is you need a special spray gun with a large tip (-ours is a 2.2 tip size) to spray it properly. For us, we find the Super Build needs to be followed with a sanding sealer to get the surface slick, and because we spray PPG products, we use their K38. I have uploaded your picture pointing out defects that I think I am seeing.

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Re: Paint finish
 

Update: the paint is single stage urethane. The paint gun is a siphon-style with size 2.0 nozzle and I used 35 psi of air. I took the gun and the cover panel and dashrail to the NAPA shop to show the paint guy, and he said the paint gun needs to be cleaned, and I didn't apply the paint thick enough. The parts need to be sanded smooth at any rate. Will do so and report back.