Re: Saving the original paintwork and trunk emblem - 1951 200 barn findand

Posted by Jason75 On 2019/3/16 3:24:35

Quote:


Thank you!

My first goal was to bring the antique single stage paint back to life without abrasives. I feared that the dry, brittle, antique paintwork would not survive any abrasives in the dry state it was in as well it would after being "fed" with the trade secret oils found in Meguiars #7 show car glaze.

I applied a very heavy (wet) layer of #7 working it in with a stout terry towel to remove some of the dead, oxidized surface paint. I kept reapplying every so often (setting an alarm throughout the night) to prevent the #7 from drying, I kept it wet with product for #36 hours. the wet coat on for a long operiod of time allowed the oils to basically migrate into the porous single stage paint

I then worked the #7 off by hand (important) with a terry towel to remove more dead paint.

Once that was complete I used CLR 3/1 dilution with water and a mild scotch bright pad to remove much of the surface rust.

I wanted the patina to appear as though it melted into the paint instead of sitting on top of the paint. The first step in achieving this was to wet sand with 1500 grit paper followed by 2000 grit. The goal was to get any areas of surface rust that sat proud, flush with the paint work.

Once that was done the goal was to:
#1 bring back some shine lost due to the oxidation and also from the scuffing that was instilled by the scotch bright pad.
#2 burninsh the areas of patina to create an illusion almost as though a clear coat was on top of the patina
- this would create the look I was going for of the patina melting into the paint.


For the compounding I used a random orbital and a compound imported from Germany called Menzerna heavy cut 400 and a microfiber cutting pad with heavy pressure at first and the incrementally releasing pressure throughout the compounding pass this heavy at first and light near the end technique was used for all compounding and polishing steps and allows the finish cut well at first and then to be burnished near the end

That was followed by a polshing step using the random orbital, Menzerna intensive polish and a medium cutting foam pad

The next step was again using a random orbital, this time with meguiars M205 finishing polish with a light cut pad to juice as much gloss out of the paint and patina as possible.


This was followed by Meguiars #7 and a light cut pad with random orbital

And finished off with a pure (non cleaning wax) carnauba

PLEASE NOTE: I wouldn't suggest this for everyone as there potential to really damage your paint.

Hope this helps!