clay bar wont help bring out the color any more. all a clay bar does is pull dirt out of the clear honestly. his best bet is to wet sand the car and start brining it back up with some compound then work your way down to a sealer... got to get rid of the faded paint and start fresh
Wait a minute,............you want me to wetsand it down to the sealer?
It'll be grey then.
This is a base/clear. To get to the yellow requires I sand through all of the clear. No worky.
That would give the thread's title more meaning than he had ever bargained for.
You know Nick,...that's not a bad Idea,........it'll only mean I'm still painting this car for what,.....the next year or so?
I've decided that there must be something in the air in Iowa,........cause that's just crazy talk.
I'm past the paint, at least for this summer. It is a driver. All of that obsessing I've done for a clean under carraige will be for nothing after I drive it a few times in the rain.
If I keep this car, I may deal w/ a total repaint sometime in the next year. But I'm done w/ it sitting on blocks.
You are right about that.
Lets call this installment my "Good From Far, But Far From Good Cobra Completion Compilation", or my GFFBFFGCCC for short.
I actually coulda did this several days ago,...but those wheels,............man I hate those black wheels. Originally, I just planned to get a 1/4" yellow pinstripe,..and add it as an accent to the sea of black,...but the pinstripe was cheesy, transparent, and another shade of yellow.
"No" said the finger.
Next plan called for using the leftover yellow I have from the bumper paint,...so I started prepping the rim lip (about 1/2" wide) for the paint. But as usual,....not being able to leave well enough alone,..I thought "I wonder how hard it would be to sand off that paint,....and expose the aluminum and just polish that instead".
So I started sanding.
That lasted 5 minutes before I moved up to my DA,.............but it kept trashing the paper when it banged against the rim lip.
So I got out the drill, and chucked up one of those paint stripping wheels.
Within 30 seconds,...the wheel jumped and hit the spoke and "F'd it up so bad,...I got forced into plan "C".
Off to AZ to get some rattle cans of "Wheel Paint" and the requisite clear that goes on top. It costs 7.00 a can,....I get two cans each.
Now you might be thinking that maybe two cans wasn't gonna be enough for four wheels,...and it isn't. If you intend to paint the WHOLE wheel. I decided that the part you cant see could stay black,......after all,...it was just gonna be one more place that I'd have to keep clean if you could see it. So I masked to the back side of the spokes. A feat easier said than done, I might add. You have no idea how hard it is to try and pull a consistent straight line w/ no frame of reference, on the inside of the wheel.
But I managed,......it just took for freakin' ever. Then came the hard part.
When we ArmourAll our cars,.....besides the interior,....what else typically gets the treatment?
That's right,....the damn tire sidewall. And you can bet your ass that that armourall was all over the wheel,...and the tire,....and paint and armourall don't like each other.
So I cleaned and cleaned the damn tire and wheel I used Dawn,...I used that Purple power junk,....I used lacquer thinner.
The tape still would not stick to the tire.
This process went on for another couple of hours until I was finally satisfied that I would be able to mask off the tire. Another 90 minutes and all four wheels were masked and papered to protect the stuff that I didn't want silver.
Now this silver wheel paint is loaded w/ metallic,...and it takes about 15 minutes to get remotely dry enough to add another coat. The instructions stipulate that I should mist two light coats,...and one heavy coat after that,....all while waiting 10 minutes between coats.
I did just that.
The metallic still sagged and ran.
But it is polyurethane based,.....and it actually leveled out and started to shine. I dusted the fourth fifth, and sixth coats in clear and let them b itches dry two days.....I bolted them on the car today.
For a painted wheel,....they didn't turn out too bad. At least that's the way I see it.
At least I got rid of that stinkin' black.
Here's your before reference:
Here's you A.M. reference ( That's After Mike for you lay folks out there)
Remember,..the shady side doesn't show the color mismatch as bad.
But I took a sunny side as well:
That front bumper is trash...covered in bug guts that never got washed off,...the paint is stained clear through to the base. But again remember,.......DD,......GFFBFFG.
I also evidently put it in the weeds. I cut 5/8's of a coil off all four corners,..thinking I was gonna drop it about 3/4 of on inch. These pics are taken just w/i 2 hours of it sitting on the tires. I hope it don't drop any lower,..I already hit my first snake w/ the k member
All in all it ran great so far. Temp went to the halfway mark and stayed there. I didn't put my foot in it yet,...it has reg gas from when they filled it at Carmax. I gotta run that junk out before I put it into boost. It is louder than I want my cars to be but for now I'll let that be. I got to get a plate for it,...working from 7 AM to 6PM doesn't leave anytime to stand in line at the DMV.
I actually coulda did this several days ago,...but those wheels,............man I hate those black wheels. Originally, I just planned to get a 1/4" yellow pinstripe,..and add it as an accent to the sea of black,...but the pinstripe was cheesy, transparent, and another shade of yellow.
"No" said the finger.
Next plan called for using the leftover yellow I have from the bumper paint,...so I started prepping the rim lip (about 1/2" wide) for the paint. But as usual,....not being able to leave well enough alone,..I thought "I wonder how hard it would be to sand off that paint,....and expose the aluminum and just polish that instead".
So I started sanding.
That lasted 5 minutes before I moved up to my DA,.............but it kept trashing the paper when it banged against the rim lip.
So I got out the drill, and chucked up one of those paint stripping wheels.
Within 30 seconds,...the wheel jumped and hit the spoke and "F'd it up so bad,...I got forced into plan "C".
Off to AZ to get some rattle cans of "Wheel Paint" and the requisite clear that goes on top. It costs 7.00 a can,....I get two cans each.
Now you might be thinking that maybe two cans wasn't gonna be enough for four wheels,...and it isn't. If you intend to paint the WHOLE wheel. I decided that the part you cant see could stay black,......after all,...it was just gonna be one more place that I'd have to keep clean if you could see it. So I masked to the back side of the spokes. A feat easier said than done, I might add. You have no idea how hard it is to try and pull a consistent straight line w/ no frame of reference, on the inside of the wheel.
But I managed,......it just took for freakin' ever. Then came the hard part.
When we ArmourAll our cars,.....besides the interior,....what else typically gets the treatment?
That's right,....the damn tire sidewall. And you can bet your ass that that armourall was all over the wheel,...and the tire,....and paint and armourall don't like each other.
So I cleaned and cleaned the damn tire and wheel I used Dawn,...I used that Purple power junk,....I used lacquer thinner.
The tape still would not stick to the tire.
This process went on for another couple of hours until I was finally satisfied that I would be able to mask off the tire. Another 90 minutes and all four wheels were masked and papered to protect the stuff that I didn't want silver.
Now this silver wheel paint is loaded w/ metallic,...and it takes about 15 minutes to get remotely dry enough to add another coat. The instructions stipulate that I should mist two light coats,...and one heavy coat after that,....all while waiting 10 minutes between coats.
I did just that.
The metallic still sagged and ran.
But it is polyurethane based,.....and it actually leveled out and started to shine. I dusted the fourth fifth, and sixth coats in clear and let them b itches dry two days.....I bolted them on the car today.
For a painted wheel,....they didn't turn out too bad. At least that's the way I see it.
At least I got rid of that stinkin' black.
Here's your before reference:
Here's you A.M. reference ( That's After Mike for you lay folks out there)
Remember,..the shady side doesn't show the color mismatch as bad.
But I took a sunny side as well:
That front bumper is trash...covered in bug guts that never got washed off,...the paint is stained clear through to the base. But again remember,.......DD,......GFFBFFG.
I also evidently put it in the weeds. I cut 5/8's of a coil off all four corners,..thinking I was gonna drop it about 3/4 of on inch. These pics are taken just w/i 2 hours of it sitting on the tires. I hope it don't drop any lower,..I already hit my first snake w/ the k member
All in all it ran great so far. Temp went to the halfway mark and stayed there. I didn't put my foot in it yet,...it has reg gas from when they filled it at Carmax. I gotta run that junk out before I put it into boost. It is louder than I want my cars to be but for now I'll let that be. I got to get a plate for it,...working from 7 AM to 6PM doesn't leave anytime to stand in line at the DMV.
I'm digging it. You did the world a favor by ridding it of another Mustang with black wheels.
Thanks,...I'm happy w/ the way it turned out.
I just got back from a drive. I love it. Windows down,...it's noisy as hell. sounds like every damn 4.6 Mustang w/ Flows. Windows up, quiet enough for the wife to ask why does it do this,...why does it do that.
It runs great, and I still haven't put my foot down.
Perfect.
Stance is nice, but I like the black wheels.
Sounds like you should drive with the windows down.
Sounds like you should drive with the windows down.