Faded red paint

[trickywoo]

Is there any way of recovering faded red paint? It has that slightly chalky look that seems very common to red cars.

Would a good polish / cutting compound be the way to go? Or is it respray time?

[shouldbworking]

Depends if its been polished to death before. Is the lacquer lifting? Normally you can save it a bit with t-cut and a bit of colour polish

[TaylotS2K]

my ex-girlfriend had a red corsa with faded paint. I used megs 83 polish and some Autoglym super resin and it bought the paintwork back to life, this was with a Megs g220 though.

I'd say try a decent polish first before going down the T-cut route.

Edited by TaylotS2K on Thursday 31st July 10:40

[PJ S]

What's the car and age?
If it's single stage/2K with no clearcoat, then it'll just be oxidised, and a good polishing would see it removed.
If it is clearcoated, then it'll need respraying.

[trickywoo]

Thanks

Its a '92 RX7 - not sure if they have clear coat?

I had a UR Quattro that went hazy - normal polish (Super Resin) made it look ok for a few days but it always went hazy again.

[thewave]

From DW, this is what can be achieved with a bit of hard work.

Edited by thewave on Thursday 31st July 11:30

[Roop]

My old Cinquecento used to suffer from this. Any polishes that are colour-restoring or have a slight cutting action will work. I'd say use T-Cut only if the above fails as the latter is pretty aggressive stuff.

Remember to add a hard coat after restoring the colour. A wax or polish that has some UV protection in it is good here as it's the UV that causes the paint to blossom in the first place.

Roop

[Roop]

thewave said:

From DW, this is what can be achieved with a bit of hard work.

Eh...? Removing wheel trims isn't that hard...

[Balmoral Green]

Does anyone else have this strange desire to get the T cut out and do one panel only when they see a very faded red car?

[BuzzinBilly]

Balmoral Green said:

Does anyone else have this strange desire to get the T cut out and do one panel only when they see a very faded red car?

I did half of my old next door neighbours bonnet
the car stayed like it as they couldnt be bothered to do the rest

[_daveR]

thewave said:

From DW, this is what can be achieved with a bit of hard work.

Edited by thewave on Thursday 31st July 11:30

It always amazes me how well a car can be turned round. Unfortunately not without spending £200 on a machine!

[thewave]

_daveR said:

It always amazes me how well a car can be turned round. Unfortunately not without spending £200 on a machine!

I'm pretty certain that level of correction can be obtained by hand, but it would take a LONG time.

[andyuk911]

Try Megs Stage 1 Crystal paint cleaner(from Halfrauds) to start .. that should help alot

[Stu R]

andyuk911 said:

Try Megs Stage 1 Crystal paint cleaner(from Halfrauds) to start .. that should help alot

won't do much at all. you need a half decent cutting compoud really.

[_daveR]

thewave said:

_daveR said:

It always amazes me how well a car can be turned round. Unfortunately not without spending £200 on a machine!

I'm pretty certain that level of correction can be obtained by hand, but it would take a LONG time.

I spent a good day on our Tornado pink Audi with some poorboys SSR2, working 2ft sq sections at a time and did get a lot of the oxidisation off and the colour back to red. It's still very flat though and without any real gloss to the paint.
I've just topped it off with some AG SRP and some Duragloss 105 so that it's protected for now. Will have another crack at it eventually if I dont give in and buy a G220 or PC.

[driverrob]

My GTO had spent too long on the docks before being shipped to the UK. It took a fair bit of t-cut and polish to bring the entire body back to proper red. Now (4 years on) I use colour matched polish on the plastic rear aero and wing mirrors every 6 months to keep them the same shade as the rest of the car.

[dc53]

Stu R said:

andyuk911 said:

Try Megs Stage 1 Crystal paint cleaner(from Halfrauds) to start .. that should help alot

won't do much at all. you need a half decent cutting compoud really.

Yes it will Stu R, costs bugger all and will get it back to red and will give it a nice shine.

[Paulo.dicanio]

Bilt Hamber autobalm would be a very good thing to try first. A very good All In One product i.e it is a last stage protection also, which leaves a deep glossy finish which certainly rivals more expensive natural "beauty" waxes IMO. Although it doesn't contain any abrasives so isn't a polishas such but there is some very hi-tech chemical cleaning happening. Contains fillers so it also does an exceptional job of masking swirl marks.
I transformed a very faded Porcshe 944 into this....



sorry no before pic but imagine something along the lines of the Astra.(the photo by no means does any justice to the finish achieved unfortunately) Also I think there is a thread on here where someone has used Bilt Hamber on a severly oxidised old volvo. The results are amazing and managed to take some much better photos then me!! Worth having a search for...(or maybe someone will be kind enough to link it?)
At under £20 it is real bargain should be a definate in any car cleaning enthusiasts cllection.

[PJ S]

http://www.pistonheads.co.uk/gassing/topic.asp?h=0...

[Mr2Mike]

_daveR said:

It always amazes me how well a car can be turned round. Unfortunately not without spending £200 on a machine!

I helped a friend cut back his Triumph 2000 Estate a few years ago. It was a light blue, and probably in a worse state than that Astra, paint like sand paper. We spent an entire weekend cutting it back by hand and it looked very passable afterwards. It can be done, but you'll need some stamina in your arm muscles!