How to Blend Clear Coat (Base / Clear) - Spot Repair

This is a 3 stage pearl white mazda that is having a spot repair performed on the front bumper cover. It it being sprayed with BASF RM onyx waterborne paint and RM DC5600 clear coat. The clear coat is blended and polished to an undetectable transition. This repair will hold out well but ideally the entire bumper cover should be painted the highest quality job. This was repaired by blending the clear as the customer requested an economical repair. The price differs from about $175 this way to about $500 to do the entire bumper cover. The way a three stage paint works is the first part of the paint is a solid color sprayed to cover the primer. Once that is done a pearl coat is sprayed overtop to give it a deep pearl effect. It is all topped with a clearcoat and the clearcoat is blended using a clearcoat blender (UBR200). The blender is mixed into some activated clear coat also. The entire job is polished at the end to remove the slight roughness caused from the clear tapering out.

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[Refinishnetwork]

I've got quite a few of them I believe. It's really no different then on a light color, it's usually much easier because you don't notice imperfections in the blends like you would on a light metallic color.

[garyhess]

I did body & paint work for about forty years, nice work. Iam now doing finishing in two cabinet shop for the last twelve, like it a lot.

[Refinishnetwork]

@uavito94
Sometimes the customers aren't willing to pay for it. In this case the car was being returned off-lease and either we did it this way or they'd bring it to someone else to do it. Clear blends have come a long way, BASF will actually guarantee / warranty them on side panels.

[danlewis]

K. Thanks. I think the only thing I ever struggle with is leaving a little of a haze due to my fear of burning the edge of my blend. Guess I should just do a couple practice panels. I've been shooting complete on dark cars to prevent this!

[davelombardo]

it would be nice if you described your work step by step! prep, based, clear and blender.

[KnockoutInvesting]

For the price you pay this is a great deal. Unnoticeable

[tomnelson]

Well, this was informative for sure, I guess guys who can afford these expensive rides can pony up for a really first class paint job. Glad you're able to make a living patching up the screw-ups of the one per-centers. The rest of us will just have to keep shaking those rattle-cans and hoping the cat don't walk over the patch before the paint dries.

[Jabronie]

Great video! Doing this is hard especially on white tri-coats and you made it look easy! I have one question though. After you get coverage from your base coat and start applying the pearl how do you avoid the surrounding pearl areas from looking darker than the original color? In other words, let's say you need to apply 3 coats of pearl over your base to get the factory match. The pearl over spray that lands on the surrounding (already pearl colored) areas will most likely be a darker shade.

[Refinishnetwork]

@Djkyle65

Its a 3M double sided waffle pad.

[dollarbill]

I used Omni black paint and clear on a hood the other day. The paint came out great but the clear had super orange peel to the point point of almost 1/8" hail damage looking spots. Three coats of clear within 8-10 minutes was what it called for not sure why it came out like that. It was chilly out but we had heaters at 72 hours before clearing, wiped off with the grease and wax remover, air pressure was between 32-40 depending on if you were spraying. Any tip your could give me? Thanks

[justfortrading]

can you please explain to me whey you would buff before wet sanding? isnt the wet sanding going to eliminate anything the polisher left? and i agree with ballaslug, it would be cheaper and less time consuming just to clear the whole thing. and if anything polish after to ensure you have the best possible finish

[KNOBJOCKEYY]

This is the reason I started working for myself. If it's a private job some times people don't want to spend the money to get the job done properly, and on the other hand with insurance work the times are cut to save labour rates and you're forced to take short cuts to make your times, either way is a compromise on quality
I would like to see the blowins 6 months later on a black car, and would quite happily wager my left testicle ( My good one :) ) on spotting the fogged edge of each blowin

[mountainman]

A "how to" video with absolutely no description of any of the steps?
People are just supposed to guess what grade sandpaper you used, which blending solvents, what mix ratio?

[danlewis]

Any chance of you doing a blend video on a dark colored car?

[erosionhead]

What do you mean by activated clear? I'm facing having to do something like this on my friends car. I had my manager paint it and he didn't get enough color on one side of the roof. It's a 1972 Volvo p1800es the hatch back kind. It's a dark [ transparent green] Chromabase paint with high solids clear. I'm thinking 1200 the whole roof           [there are some other flaws] blend and clear the whole roof. Problem is I'm going to have to burn it in at the pillars because there's no where to cut it off. I always see these repairs [ fade out] on other cars. I'd almost feel better leaving a small soft line somewhere that's not going to fade out. the front windshield pillar is thin but the rear is wide. I understand it is best on vertical panels. I have a lot of time invested in getting this car ready to paint. I think I'm pickier about it than the owner. LOL.  Should I burn the front pillar at the top, mid way, or try to hide it at the bottom?

[kristoferturner]

guess you must be an expert then? he did a brilliant job here. each to their own methods.

[JBIRD]

love it does transtar 6363 can blender work good

[navenifickan]

what paintbrand are you using? and why are you wet-sanding instead of dry-sanding? just curios on how and why others are doing the job :)

[CoolasIce]

i don't know if I like the yellow pin striping. I guess it could grow on you though, . you know ?

[Crackdown]

awesome result! my car's bumper would really deserve a care like this.. great job ;-)