Another article from our friend and master painter and restoration expert, Carl Brunson.
It happens … your car got dented or scratched. With today’s paint systems that means the entire panel must be painted, according to most body shops, and that is the paint repair recommended by almost all paint companies. However, there is a way to do a spot repair, melting the edge of the new paint repair into the old paint finish, that works well and can save a lot of time and money. Now you are thinking: If spot repairs work so well, why isn’t it done all the time, instead of painting complete panels?
I am going to walk you through both types of spot repairs giving tips on how to keep the paint repair as invisible as possible. Here I will show spot painting the color, but clearing the entire body panels. You will also need to read the other article on melting the paint edges into the old paint in Hot Rod MD. |
Here is a Dodge Charger that was damaged on the quarter panel, just behind the door. You need to pay special attention to several things in the photo.
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Ok, now the Charger has the color and clear painted. Look at the masking paper, noting how the blue color is darker on the rear of the door and tapers into nothing about mid door. The procedure of spraying the blended color is generally called stepping the paint out. I do the “stepping out” process in three stages. After the quarter panel was painted I pulled the paper off the door and tacked it with a tack rag. Using the same air pressure that I painted the quarter panel with; I sprayed about 8-inches of the rear of the door using the same side-to-side motions as when painting any car. When the paint has dried (maybe 15 minutes with base/coat color) I tack the door off again carefully removing any loose overspray.
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Here is the Charger color-sanded and ready for polishing. Notice the tapering of the blue on the masking paper again. The main reason I am showing this photo is to explain one of those painter’s tricks that keep a good spot repair invisible. See the small white strip on the front edge of this Charger’s R/T stripe on the quarter panel? The very last thing I taped up before spraying the car was that small strip of the white decal with fine line tape.
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Here is the repair all polished and ready for all the trim to be put back on. As far as anyone looking at this car can tell, it was never damaged. This repair will last at least as long as the paint on the rest of the car. |