996 paint 'flaws'

[RT]

I have recently purchased an 02 C2 in polar silver.

Tonight I was detailing the car, and noticed 3 really odd patches on the drivers door.

Each is an oval, about 1cm max size, and looks like a very thin splodge under the lacquer.

You can just feel them if you run a finger over them, they have undulated edges, but only distort the light slightly from certain angles - hence why I never noticed them before now.

I have 2 theories:

1) They are very poor PDR repairs, where the repairer has made an oval set of microhighs (unlikely as I cannot see any marks to the back face of the door panel).

2) They are some sort of paint flaw - I guess they could be splodges of primer, colour coat or lacquer - it's hard to say.

I'm really not sure what to do with them.

Anyone else ever seen anything like this or know what to do? I will check with my paint meter tomorrow for thickness, but am loathed to wet sand or flat them back as the splodge may not be in the clear coat!

Thanks

[Slippydiff]

I wouldn't try wet flatting them, if as you say they are high spots, you'll flat the tops off the high spots and polish through the clearcoat in the process.

The fact you can feel them would tend to indicate a problem in the clearcoat rather than in the basecoat. The base coat is normally so fine as to not leave defects that you can feel through the clear coat (unless it's something obvious like a piece of dirt or a hair)

Edited by Slippydiff on Thursday 26th July 01:21

[RT]

Well - had a closer look with the paint meter, and they are definitely paint flaws, not a PDR.

The high spots measure about 130 mics, but the rest of the paint is 90-100.

Still not sure which coat they are in, so am loathed to do any more polishing.

Any advice?

[steve996]

I noticed a couple of very similar sounding paint flaws on my last car, (02 996). Like you I was unsure how to deal with them so I just left them and to be honest I only ever noticed them when doing some really close-up polishing.

I know this doesn't get you any further ahead but possibly it does add weight to the theory that they may be a "feature"....

[RT]

Interesting - thanks Steve.

I'm almost certain they are a 'feature' - and thinking like that helps psychologically!

Given that thre are 3 within a few cm of each other adds weight to this I think - the spray nozzle did something funny I think.

Like they say - mental therapy is cheaper than a respray!

Thanks for taking the time to post.

[Slippydiff]

RT said:

Well - had a closer look with the paint meter, and they are definitely paint flaws, not a PDR.

The high spots measure about 130 mics, but the rest of the paint is 90-100.

Still not sure which coat they are in, so am loathed to do any more polishing.

Any advice?

Unless they're driving you totally insane, leave well alone.
If you're really inquisitive, a decent bodyshop will be able to tell you exactly what the defect is and which coat it's in.
Failing that, they say a picture paints a thousand words ...........