Wetsanded Through The Clear. Now What?

[jikelly]

So I finally have some paint on the stang again. I did a base coat, clear coat job. So the base and clear are on the car, and I'm doing the wet sanding now. So I started out with 1200 grit paper and went at one of the panels today.

Well I couldn't really tell how much clear I'd taken off except by feeling the panel. And I was gonna just hit this one spot once more time. Then BLAM! the clear wet dull in a little spot. I stared at it a while and I think I cut through the clear to the basecoat, which is a metal flake.

So, how do I proceed? Can I just spray another coat of clear over the spot, or do I have to respray the base and then clear?

Dang I've got to stop screwin up on this paint job cus I wanna get finished eventually.

 

[zookeeper]

If it were me, I'd sand the entire panel (gently) with 500 grit wet, mask off that panel and reshoot just that panel with clear. Be very careful with your first coat around the spot you sanded through because if you get too heavy with the first coat, it'll wrinkle. Just put on a medium coat, then a couple slightly wetter coats and call it good. You can blend in the edge where your masking paper stopped by lightly sanding the ridge with 1200 and buffing by hand. BTW, I usually stop short of completely flattening a panel when color sanding. I know the pros sand all the orange peel out, but I leave just a touch as kind of a "safety barrier". That way I know there's enough clear to buff. Also, tape all your edges before you start sanding/buffing so you know where to stay away from. The edges get enough buffing by accident to take care of them. Also, edges are much, much thinner than flat panels. Good Luck!

 

[Ronstang]

Sorry zookeeper but you cannot simply re-clear a panel if you have sanded though to the base coat because that spot will show right through the clear. The entire panel needs to be re-base coated first with at least one good coat and then 3-5 coats of clear added. The problem is the paint begins to get too thick. I prefer to sand the entire panel until I get to the primer and start over in a case like this. It is because of problems l like this I always put a little more clear on than the paint manufacturer recommeds because I am going to sand a lot of it back off.

 

[NasaGT]

For a pearl, candy or a metal flake I'd do as Ronstang says. If you shoot clear over the spot you've sanded, you get a slight color change at that location. If you don't mind the color imperfection, then you could sand the clear on the rest of the panel, and then re-shoot the clear. But you have to watch the paint thickness as Ronstang mentioned. Alot of times its easier to just start over on a single panel.

If it were a solid color, then I'd sand alot of the clear off and then just reshoot clear on the panel.

 

[jikelly]

Whoo, it is metalflake. Boy do I not want to sand off the panel and rebasecoat it. Boy do I really not want the finished job to look like crap either. So can I live with the spot showing through the paint? I don't know.

I guess I could clean it an spray a little clear to see how bad it will look. I only sanded through a little and it doesn't look like the flakes been moved, as it did where I had to sand out a run in the base.

I tried to get some pictures last night but my camera had a hard time resolving the image. Dang, maybe I'll leave the orange peel on the rest of the car.

Thanks for the replies.

 

[Platonic Solid]

Just as a point of reference question: How many coats of clear did you put on?

Also, Did the water turn blue (assuming a blue metallic basecoat)?