sigh, i need a lint free cloth! help me fix my screw-up

ok guys, i screwed up right away, i wiped the tank down with mineral spirits, and what i though would work as a lint free cloth, well now there are littel hairs all over it, so whats a guy to do? use an aircompressor once it dries? i need help, also whats a good lint free cloth? i dont have any cheese cloth, whatever that is... where do i get some?

 

shooter, walmart & every place has the microfiber towels, they work great & are not expensive
good luck,
Gregg

 

Go buy a tack cloth, which is what you should have used in the first place. You should be able get one for a few bucks at Advance Auto, NAPA, or even Wal-mart.

 

Tack cloths, as Tom suggested, ARE cheesecloth treated with a neat semi-tacky stuff that will not leave anything behind. And he is also right in that is what you should have used in the first place.

Wipe it down with lacquer thinner (mineral spirits are oily) on a clean terry towel, followed by the tack cloth and then DO NOT TOUCH IT with your grubby little fingers.

MICROFIBER is evil!!! I just discovered this when I use it to polish a piece of BRAND NEW chrome and was rewarded with MICRO-SCRATCHES!!! It's fine on plastic and clear coats (I guess) I THOUGHT it was the greatest thing since beer in a can but I was bad wrong. Soft cotton terrycloth is the ONLY way to go for polishing. Microfiber is useless for pre-paint prep as it is NOT lint-free either.

 

Coffee filters?

 

well, i went ahead and painted it, i rubbed it down with 220 grit breifly a bouple of times, and used an aircompressor to blow it off, ithought i got it all off when i shed a light to it... wrong... some spots of little hair, so the primer says to wait 30 mins to sand it with 400 grit, i will do that, see if i remove the hairs..... dont you just love when you get off on the wrong foot?
should i jsut spray the damn thing with aircraft remover and wipe it all down? then tomorrow re do it right.

Also, what do i wipe the tank off with if i sand the primer? laquer thinner?

i hate my impatience... i do have something to do though, i have a loose ground wire going to the connector for my ignition, so if i wiggle the key violently, it goes off, not good!

 

hmm coffe filters? possibly, but will i get papery residue? cuz my tank is pretty coarse, from the sandblasting, not smooth, like it is when i sanded ti with 220

 

ok, so you guys fill in the blanks:
When i start out with a new tank, i will prep it wil lacquer thinner and tack cloth. i will allow it to dry for at least one minute. I will apply 3-4 light coats of self etching primer. If i sand the primer, i will use ____ wet or dry sand paper, wet. to wipe off the water and soap residue i will use____. After it is dry i will apply 3 light coats of base paint, 4 light coats of red metallic paint. i will tape the red area where i want it. then i will apply 4 coats of gloss black.

questions:
1. do i sand inbetween coats of paint, or use 1000 at the end of the last black coat.
2. then after i apply clear coat, should i sand the clear coat, then use a rubbing compound, wax, and buff it.

pleae, i wantto get some base paint on tonight, unless i should re-do the tank

 

I sanded mine with wet 1000 grit until it was pefectly smooth. I promise, wet 800 or 1000 grit will take off more than you think it will. Stay away from any grit less than 500, and I don't like dry sanding at all. When I wet sand a part, I run the water hose on it while I sand. You don't have to do that, but keep the part wet. Not just wet paper. you want to wash away what you sanded off. I have done it with a squirt bottle.
Believe me, I'm no expert, but this is what I did:
1. spray tank with primer
2. sand tank with 1000 grit wet looking for low and high spots they will be easy to see when the water dries
3. bondo and spot puddy small spots that the spot filler primer won't cover and sand smooth
4. prime tank again
repeat 1-4 until there are no imperfections

5. spray on color very thick, but not thick enough to run
6. spray on several coats of clear.
7. let dry for the proper time for the paint, my laquer paint was dry enough the next day, read the paint lable
8. wet sand (with running water) very lightly with 1000 grit to knock off the high spots, then wet sand with 2000 grit until the paint is all constantly dull (this is how you tell there are no high and low spots) don't worry you will polish the clear back to a perfect shine
9. polish with machine polish by hand or with a high speed buffer (you can use rubbing compound before the machine polish but don't use it with a high speed buffer or you will burn through the clear coat)
I polished mine by hand for about 30 minutes and I could see myself in it.
10. depending on the paint you can wax now, or you may need to wait about a week or even a month for the paint to completely dry before you wax.

don't forget to wipe it after sanding, or after it has sat for a little while and could have accumulated any dust.

you can get cheese cloth in the craft section at walmart. or autozone/advanceauto parts sell pre paint prep wipes in single packages.

Good luck, keep your patience. Painting my bike was a big learning experience. You can't learn without screwing up a little. I had plenty of screw ups before I got it right, and it still isn't perfect.

 

i just put aircraft remover on the tank... ill jsut have to spend another $9 on primer..

 

Fizt
Your first mistake was to think that beer in a can is one of those great breakthoughs of our time. So when you compare it to microfiber cloth, can it really be that great??? I think not.

 

OK, fine. Sliced bread. Schooter; Turkey's instructions are pretty much right on the money. He's right about the sandpaper too; 200 wet OR dry is gonna give you some pretty deep gulches to smooth out. I would START at 600 or 800 WET and go UP from there as per Turkey's procedure and you'll get good results.

 

lol, shit, i put on 2 coats of aircraft remover, didnt get it all off, so im going to sand it, but the 220 sure seemed to make it ALOT smoother than the sandlasting, and the primer on the sand blasting was smooth.
so after im done sanding it, i just wipe it off with tack cloth. man, it seems insane to me to sand clear coat, but what ever.
also, what is machine polish? and where do i get it?

 

should i use a micro fiber cloth to apply the polish and wax?

 

machine polish is just a really fine grit rubbing compound.
Use a terry cloth, an old 100% cotton t-shirt or even better a cloth baby dieper to polish and wax. I don't really like the Microfiber either, unless it is brand new, and you havn't layed it down on anything. Microfiber seems to pick up every spec of grit, dust and metal shaving in my shop like a magnet. It might be great for dusting your coffee table, but I don't use them on my bike. Cotton is just the best choice to me.
You have to sand the clear coat because it won't be perfectly smooth spraying it, especially with a rattle can. This concept will seem crazy until after you have done it. You will be able to feel how rough it is after it drys and before you sand it. Just be really careful when you sand it. You may want to only sand the clear with 2000grit first to see if that will take care of the orange peal/ roughness. if it doesn't you can always hit it lightly with 1000 or 1500. Throw that 220 grit away so you won't be tempted to use it again. sanding it with concrete will get it smoother than sand blasting.

It will look good if you take your time. It is better to use a grit that is too fine and sand longer than a grit that is too course and screw it up. believe me, I've done it.

 

Best advice I've seen in a while thanks Turkey. The take your time advice applies to most everything.

 

The idea in wetsanding the clear coat is because it is almost impossible to get the clear coat to flow out perfectly flat. You'll probably have little bumps that give the finish the look of an orange peel (thus the term 'orange-peel') Here's a good example of the what my tank looked like before the initial wetsanding after clear coating. You can even see the ridges along the pinstripe.

You can see it has a nice gloss, but not a mirror finish...

The trick is to put enough coats of clear on so you can sand out the little bumps and get a smooth finish without sanding off ALL the clearcoat.The buffing compound (not rubbing compound) will remove all the scratches from the 1000 - 2000 grit sand paper and leave a gloss finish. On this particular paint job I laid down 4 coats of clear, wetsanded, laid down 3 more coats then wetsanded and buffed. Here's the result...

The reason for all the clear coats? see that pinstripe, You could see a ridge there before because there are 4 more layers of paint alongside the stripe.(The stripe color was the first layer of paint I sprayed, then taped it off.) If I had just put 2 or 3 coats of clear you would feel a dip in the finish where the stripe is. But by doing it the way I did, you can't even feel the stripe when you run you hand across the finished part.

That ..my friend , is why you wetsand and buff

 

ok, well i got alot of my top tank sanded good, is it ok if its not completely bare metal, like theres a light green haze (color of my primer) over some of the tank, it feels smooth, i havent really touched the bottom of the tank yet, dont plant too, since that will get only like 2 coats primer and some black paint, ill sand it, but idk.

gosh, i just want to tanke the sand blaster to this again...... that was soo easyi may do it, from a couple of feet away..

 

Cheese cloth nearest autoparts store in the paint section

Sweet paintjob. I'mGoing with the cobalt blue metal flake for house of colors and add just as many clear coats as you did. maybe more metalflake every othe coat of clear.

 

well, i sanded the front chrome fender, and wiped it with tack cloth, and what do ya know? bubbles!! little circles started forming, yay! how the hell do i prevent it?

 

bubbles? or fish eye?

 

fish eye? it looks like i took little circles of tape, painted over them and peeled the off, so i'd call it fish eye

 

Welcome to the wonderful world of automotive painting!! 8O
Here's what I do when painting...
Whenever I get done wetsanding, the next thing I do is to wipe everything down with a degreaser/dewaxer. The stuff I use I get from Autozone is called Prep-all.Then I wipe it down with a tack cloth and blow it off with compressed air before I paint. I'll do this before I prime and before I paint....
Prep is 99% of any paint job.I know it's boring and you just want to get on with splashing paint but the better prep job you do the better the finished job will be
Good Luck...

 

"Coloring" or "painting" is ALL about bodywork. High-dollar, show-car/bike painters do their own bodywork for a reason......that's where the real action is. Moving a spray can or gun steadily across a surface at a constant rate, and at a constant distance, just isn't that hard after you've done it a few times.

Getting a non-perfectly smooth piece of metal to be perfetcly smooth and perfectly straight.....well, now that's a skill.

 

My guess would be that you did not rough the fender enough for the paint to adhere or there was some kind of grease, solvent still on the part.
How warm was the fender?
As someone else pointed out I would not even try painting in less then 60F degrees.
Paint takes a hell of a long time to cure in 20 degree weather.

 

ya, ithink it was cold...

but to wipe off the degreaser i can use any old rag? and then go over itwith a tack cloth?

 

Any old CLEAN rag... I use shop towels and have never had a problem. The degreaser will evaporate pretty quickly so when you wipe with the tack cloth everything should be nice and dry....

 

you can use any old rag, as long as it is clean and grease free. It sounds to me like you didin't get all the grease/oil off of it. I didn't have any problem at all painting my chrome fender. paint thinner, or laquer thinner, acetone(not the sented kind your mom takes her fake nails off with), are the best thing to degrease it with.

Yes it is ok if some of the old primer is still on there, as long as it is smooth. Don't sandblast again. Smooth and no bare metal showing is what you are looking for in a primed tank.

The chrome will take the paint fine, but you may need to spray it with adhesion promoting primer. I sprayed mine with it and it took very well. It is a clear primer, so I used it when I recleared my rims after bead blasting.

Maybe you should try this. Wash the fender in soapy water then when it dries wipe it with your laquer thinner, paint thinner, or even better use pre paint prep wipes from autozone. let it dry, then prime.

 

Hey Schooter...any updates on the paint job???

 

just primed it, had some hairs poking through, tokk my hand and wiped them off, got to sand it and stuff.... been busy, sorry, ill post updates on my build page in other motorcycles