sanding my car

[shaun_bayarea]

i recently got a paintjob at earl scheib that turned out horrible(see thread in 240sx forum) and long story short, he said he would repaint the car for me but i dont want there to be now 3 different coats of paint so me and a friend are going to be sanding the car ourselved and then just haveing the shop repaint it. my question is what is the heaviest grit sandpaper i should use? and should i wet sand it after i've taken off most of the paint? also how long to you think it will take to take a 240sx down to bare metal? i have until july 12th when my car is getting painted and i could work maybe like 3-4 hours a day and maybe 6-8 on my 2 days off

[MetaOrbit]

Don't know how long it would take, but I know from personal experience that sanding the original paint off of a 17 year old Ford F250 down to the metal sucks a big one. We used DA sanders for most of the job and it still took forever. Hand sanding...no clue. But factor in a LOT of time. Even on a small car.

[shaun_bayarea]

i was thinking it would take me about 50-60 hours but maybe i'm wrong...i have to sand down the paint that did last week which shouldnt be as bad because it's new but then i also have to sand down the old factory paint too. what grit did you use? i'm thinking about doing 400 grit and then when i get down to metal switch to 800 grit to smooth everything out. would you wetsand too?

[MetaOrbit]

i was thinking it would take me about 50-60 hours but maybe i'm wrong...i have to sand down the paint that did last week which shouldnt be as bad because it's new but then i also have to sand down the old factory paint too. what grit did you use? i'm thinking about doing 400 grit and then when i get down to metal switch to 800 grit to smooth everything out. would you wetsand too?

To be honest with you, I worked on it as part of a team. I don't know for sure what grits we were using as I had others directing me. As for the wetsanding...we didn't. I wouldn't think you'd want to wetsand till after you got some sort of new coating on the metal anyway..

[shaun_bayarea]

do you guys think i should sand it down to bare metal or just sand off the paint they just put on and sand down the factory paint a little so it will stick?.....how well will the new paint they put on stick if it's sanded down to bare metal?

[im two techno]

Use a DA and 400 grit sand papper on the DA. what kind of paint did the painter use? please tell me a good one.

[im two techno]

do you guys think i should sand it down to bare metal or just sand off the paint they just put on and sand down the factory paint a little so it will stick?.....how well will the new paint they put on stick if it's sanded down to bare metal?

NO DONT SAND TO THE METAL !

[shaun_bayarea]

NO DONT SAND TO THE METAL !

why is it bad to sand to metal?....would you just sand down the new paint and partly sand the factory paint?....i dont know what paint they use but i'm quessing it's probably pretty cheap since it's earl scheib

[im two techno]

Its very hard for me to tell because i cant see your car but if it were me i would sand to the base coat and add a new base coat and reclear. After i cleared it i would sand the clear with 800 and clear it again for that wet shine look;)

use a good paint like PPG or Standox,Sikkens most all paints that cost around 80 to 100 dollars a quart is good paint

Use a high gloss clear it should cost around 120 a quart.

[shaun_bayarea]

i'm not painting the car bro, i had it painted at earl scheib and the paint came out bad so there repainting it, i just dont want them to paint over the paint they just put on because then i would have 3 coats of paint on it. i'm just sanding the car and there repainting it in a few weeks.....so what should i do? sand down the paint they put on or sand all the paint to metal?...

[shaun_bayarea]

bump......does no one on here know?