Bondo Help, I Have No Idea What Im Doin

im not a body man so i cant tell you...you may get more replies in 5.0 talk section...good luck

PM Paul Perreca, he does paint & auto body repair for a living.

mix the bondo and spread it over the chip lightly...enough to fill it up. use a scraper/spreader. Let it dry and use a longboard with id say 220 or maybe a little coarser and smooth it out. if the hole still isnt filled then just reapply and repeat. dont go overboard with the bondo though. NOW if its just a little chip i dont see why you cant use some spot putty......so much easier.

heres one thing ill say dont use a low grit use a high grit and take your time dont aplly alot at once , i lkie to wet sand too

Yup, spread it out over the chip as smooth as you can. Let it dry for like 15 minutes i think it says on the can. Then sand it down. I did my aunt's honda accord like that, started with like 800 grit, then 1000 then 2000. Take your time though.

yeah but from the sound of your post, you are painting your car so why dont you sand everything down. You dont need 2000 if you are going to paint the whole thing over. Youd use 1000, 1500 etc if you are just touching up, but If you use bondo it still needs paint over it to match obviously which means you need to get some paint and then clear over that. But like I said, it sounds like you are painting your whole car so just sand everything down with a DA or better yet strip it with chemical stripper (better idea) and you wont even have a chip, itll all be flat.

If you are painting the whole car I'd get someone to do some metal work to fill in the chip...Bondo just doesn't cut it as far as a good finish in the end.

lol wow some great ideas there.

If its a paint chip, such as a rock ding (but no dent) get yourself a sanding block with some 400 grit wetsand paper, and wetsand the area about 4" above, below, and left and right side of the chip. To "block" the chip out. What it will do is feather the edges of the rock chip out so that its not noticeable. Bondo or even spot putty should not be applied over paint. Bondo should be applied only to bare metal, and or epoxy primer. Best bet to get the surface down to say fix a nice big dent is to use a DA sander with 80 grit on it and rough featheredge the surface. This means hold the DA flat untill you smooth the edges of the area to be bondoed. Then take an angle grinder with like a 36 grit grinding disc and finish the paint off in that area and take it to bare metal. Apply filler in THIN coats. And blocksand with 80 grit. Guidecoat each coat with either 3m or SEM brand guidecoat. This will show up any imperfections and irregularitys in the surface. If the block is held flat and guidecoat is sanded off an area but is still there on an area that the sand paper has been used on, that is what is called a "LOW SPOT". Apply another thin coat of filler (bondo, rage gold etc) over the whole area and sand down again. The bondo needs to match the height of the original substrate(base, clearcoat whatever). After you guidecoat and it all blocks out well, check your edges to see if they have feathered. This is where it can become tricky somewhat. Because you dont want to sand TOO far, because then you need to apply more filler, but if you dont sand enough its going to look like some retard did the bodywork lol. When you have the edges done, its time to check for pin holes and apply glazing putty to fill them, or minor low spots. Sand this with 80 and 180 grit. Then apply your epoxy primer, again be careful not to sand too much. I like to have extra bondo still left to sand when i apply my glazing putty so i dont sand too far. After this, apply 1 or 2 coats of epoxy primer, taking this out about 3" either side of the bodywork (so its over the normal SANDED paint). Then wait a few hours and apply a primer surfacer. I highly recommend sherwin williams SPECTRA PRIME. Usually two coats in plenty, if prepared right. Then blocksand that with 400 wet or 320 on a DA sander (depends on the panel) Apply a sealer, and let that flash and apply your basecoat. DO NOT SEAL untill you're READY to spray basecoat just about.

Hope this helps. Also you can wetsand the sealer with say 400 wet, to help level the surface and help get rid of any hair, or bugs, or dirt or whatever ends up in there. Apply the basecoat and get rid of any dirt etc in it with 1000 grit paper (wet). Fog another light coat on there. Metallics will probably require two more coats of base, because of how the metallics lay down. Let that flash and apply your clear coat. 2 coats should work out fine.

For those chips you sanded down, you might not have to do the bondo thing, can be hard to get perfect, just get some high build primer, theres no need to bondo minor dings anymore, you will love the high build primer trust me.

if it is a small spot try to feather edge it out like metioned above or u can use a product called icing it is just like regular body filler except it is a lot runnier so it fill out minor imperfections better never wet sand bare body filler it will start rust quicky most body fillers are made up of clay and talc and they absorb water

If you still have the original paint on the car you don't have to strip it down to metal. Just scuff it realy good so that the paint bites into it. If there are already a couple paint jobs on the car, you will need to get rid of the top layers. The layers of primer/paint/clear shouldn't be more than 12mm thick.

good question. i'm pretty much doing the same thing. i'm buying a sander/polisher to go over the whole car, bondo then scuffing it up good. then hitting it with P30 primer which has a nuroflex. it's better for flexible plastic and i heard you could basically flex it 180degrees and it won't chip or crack. it's costs about $300 for a shop to spay it.

I'm not really sure what you meant but if you're saying you sanded the chipped areas all the way down to the metal that's not a bad thing. Better to do some metal finishing and/or use filler primer if you can instead of using a bunch of filler... the less filler you use the better.

Body work

Are you really sure you want to strip your car to metal? I would highly recommend otherwise. Stripping is nasty work and you can't do it in your driveway because you have to prime it after you finish stripping it and that's illegal in most urban areas and then you have to worry about overspray getting on nearby cars. If you must, you need access to a shop or a 2 car garage where the car can remain indoors until done and a good compressor. You have two choices, dry strip or chemical strip, both are messy. If you dry strip you will need a dual action sander AKA a D/A, lots of 100 and 180 grit paper, duct tape to protect trim and glass and you will have to remove as much trim as you can and wear a respirator or at least a dust mask and do one panel at a time, just in case you get busted or have to use the car. Use the D/A to sand the paint off with 100 grit then go to 180. Any bondo on the car will have to be re-done and any damage or dents should be fixed now. After everything is well sanded with 180, you need to etch and clean the metal with metalprep or OSPHO, that will remove all traces of surface rust from the humidity in the air then use an air nozzle to blow dirt out of all the crevices and tape up the car 36" all around from where you are going to be priming and cover the rest of the car with tarps or something otherwise you will have industrial strength overspray all over the rest of your car. Use a good 2-part primer-surfacer and wear a respirator!. The primer will have a pot life of around 3hrs so when you are done you must discard the unused primer and clean the gun immediatetly otherwise the stuff will harden inside the gun and ruin it. If you have a helper you can do one side of the car at a time instead of one panel at a time. you can't afford to have bare metal on your car for any length of time as it will rust in a heartbeat. Chemical stripping is basically the same exept you use aircraft stripper and don't let it come in contact with rubber bumper covers or plastic items and don't let it go under metal mouldings (it will rust) or go into crevices, put it on and let it work and the paint will bubble up, the use a bondo spreader to scrape the old paint off. The fumes are horrendous and if it gets on you it will burn big time. You are really better of leaving this job to a pro. Good luck!

Bodywork

Consider yourself lucky to have a good place to work. Spray can primer that is "over the counter" at parts stores won't work for your application. You need to go to an autobody supply store and get aerosol etch primer, that's what we use when we have to prime small repairs and don't want to bother the painters. Those cans can get expensive however; Unless you are changing the color, taking the doors/hinges off is making extra work for yourself because you will have to line everything up before you paint...next time leave the hinges on the car. At this point I assume you have a friend who knows how to paint...Priming you can do and it's good practice for painting. If your car has original paint on it, stripping is a big waste of time because the factory went through a lot of trouble to make that paint stick with electrostatics and baking at high temps. You need to feel the body all over to search for dents and waves and that is an acquired skill, otherwise you can guide coat the primed areas with spray can black paint. Block sanding will reveal all flaws and remember when using the D/A, to hold it FLAT on the surface, otherwise you will make waves. Take both bumper covers off the car and paint them seperately from the car. I would recommend PPG Deltron DBC basecoat/clearcoat. Prepping the car for paint will either make this job or break it...bad prep ruins more paint jobs than anything!

Bodywork

Oh, I almost forgot, my 5 rules of painting: 1) Paint doesn't stick to dirt. 2) Paint doesn't stick to oil/grease/moisture. 3)Paint won't stick to un-scuffed/sanded surfaces. 4) Paint doesn't care who or what it gets on (overspray). 5) THE most important: Paint does NOT go around corners!.....You'd be surprised how many professionals forget that one. Good Luck! BTW, I painted my first car (1966 Mustang GT) in 1978 with nitrocellouse black lacquer and buffed it out to look like glass

Good stuff auto body. I am thinking on prepping my own car to save me some $$$ when I paint it.