Ok...long story short, I took a Rock in the passenger side door on the wonderful Las Vegas freeway. It took a pencil eraser size chip down to the metal out of the center of the door.

I got some touch up paint and put several layers on, but as it dried the bottom edge is now standing out further than the original paint. Any ideas on how to buff it down to make it less noticable without scratching the clearcoat around it?

 

Wet sand it

 

good stuff from our member autopia:

http://www.bettercarcare.com/articles.php?articleId=27

take your time with this!!

 

Yeah like I said, wet sand. The first time I did this, I did it on my brand spanking new RX8!

I was scared as hell when my paint was all scuffed up in a HUGE area after sanding (be sure to mask off the area, I should have).

Here's some pics of what I did.... Final result is on page 2 I believe. Silverstone should be easier to get perfect. That Velocity red was a biatch.

http://www.rx8club.com/showthread.php?s=&t...ight=paint+chip

 

You can also try Langka . I haven't tried it but have heard good things about it.


Mark

 

I filled a chip on my fender that was about the same size a while ago. A couple things I noticed:
- The color didn't match perfectly. I used Honda touch up paint. That wasn't that surprising, given there is a lot of metallic in Silverstone.
- When I look closely at the results, I can see the touch up sticking out of the base coat like some strange storm cloud. It is the touch up paint sticking up where there is usually clear coat. I'm talking about staring at the chip from an inch or two.

When I stand back and look at it from a few feet, the storm cloud effect is not noticable, just the discoloration of the touch up paint. I did more of less what wanabe's link describes, with a little less patience than the toothpick approach. They aren't kidding about how quick the rubbing compound works. It only took me about 5 passes by hand.

I suppose this all means wet sand it. I used 2000 grit, but I can't imagine 1200 being too aggressive. The rubbing compound cut faster than the 2000 grit.

Hope this helps.

 

The Langka looks to simplify things. Thanks for the tips. I'll give it a try!