Robert Cairns
Forum Replies Created
- Posts
Hi Sagicun, having worked Solvent and Waterborne in the past, they both have good and bad points.If your guns are old its likely that they’re set up to give a better finish to solvents, the newer sprayguns tend to have a W in the name somewhere as they are engineered to atomise waterbase better. It is easier to get a more uniform finish to silvers with WB as the metallic pieces “lay down” better and you dont get the patchy look when you spray some passes a little heavy/ dry/light Also solvent has a habit of going on darker with inexperienced hands as they cant judge wetness as well, WB is better at this and staying the colour it is on the tin. You can work on dry solvent if you have dirt etc in it but not on WB till after top coat has gone on and you have to rework the lot!.However WB is strange to put on as it seldom lookes the right colour till it dries, you need to put a light coat on first then a wet coat. then you need to move some clean warm air across the panels to dry them as the water in the mix evaporates. You must make sure that it is all dry before putting on the lacquer top coat.Solvent is more forgiving in this respect but can bite back , putting on too thick a coat too soon can “model” the silver and the particles drop out of the paint, not a problem with WB. Hope this helps ! Rob
Ah now , you’re leaning on an open door there! As a smart repairer, i have to constantly manage my customers expectations, and work out whilst giving the quote, how im going to blend in the colour…swages, corners, etc, how tough the colours going to be…. light golds for instance are seldom right bumper to body on a straight from factory car,We have an Audi A4 in Europe that has a three way join at the rear that in Silver can look like 3 diff complimentary colours, and it isnt even a pearl finish! A lot of my work comes from end of lease cars that have to be examined by a paint expert, sometimes with a paint thickness gauge so i would be confident of blending in within a hand width on a scuff on a corner but maybe have a larger blend area on a flat door.Of course i also have some elderly customers who also think I do magic work, but quite how they will see a blend area when they didnt see the bright red and yellow 10 ft high and wide bus in the first place i dont bother to ask! :blush: Best wishes Rob