SLH

Some idiot dragged something across about 12 inches of my RR fender the other day. Most of the small scratches came out with just a little polishing compound. But one scratch went all the way through the clear coat and into the red.

That will take some work -- and some touch-up paint. I don't want to get the whole car repainted for one scratch...

Anyone have experiences with touch-up painting scratches in this paint system? Materials, methods or techniques?

lesz

Different people have different standards with regard to what they consider to be a "satisfactory repair", but for any paint repair bigger than a pinhead-sized stone nick, you are not likely to get what I would consider to be a satisfactory repair with touch-up paint, and that is particularly true with a metallic red.

Pearl white colors are generally considered to be the toughest colors for which to get a good paint match, but metallic reds aren't far behind. The problem is that, how the paint reflects light depends on the direction in which the metallic flakes are lying, and an area that is touched up is going to have those metallic flakes lying differently than they are in the factory finish. The result is likely to be that, if you look at the repair from one angle, it is going to look to be too dark, but, if you look at it from a different angle, it may look to be too light.

With a scratch like the one you described, refinishing the panel is likely to be the only way to get a high quality repair, and even that, with the red, will require some care and skill. What likely would need to be done would be that the finish around the scratch would first need to be sanded smooth. Then, some color would need to be sprayed on the area where the scratch is, and, then, it would need to be gradually blended into the surrounding area so that any differences in how the flakes are lying would not be noticeable. Then, the entire panel would get new clear coat. A skilled paint technician should be able to minimize the area that gets new color added, which, in turn, allows him/her to minimize the size of the area into which that paint needs to be blended.

If you do try to use touch-up paint, the key to having it look "less bad" is to keep the level/height of the paint on the touched up scratch as close as possible to that of the rest of the paint because, if the edge of the touched-up area is higher or lower than that of the surrounding finish, the edge of the repair will catch light differently and will look lighter or darker than the rest of the finish. When I touch up even small stone nicks, I start by trying to get the paint as close as possible to the same height as the rest of the paint. What makes that hard to do is that, as the touch-up paint dries, it will shrink quite a bit. Once the paint is dry, I then try to smooth out the edges of the repair with a moderately aggressive polish or with a bit of wet sanding with 2000 grit automotive sandpaper. However, if you do that, you need to be very careful because working the area too hard will burn through the clear, and, once that happens, refinishing the panel is the only option left.

Good luck.

Arty101

You may want to consider the Drcolorchip System, there's a lot of discussion on this. Do a google search. Although I haven't personally used it, it appears to be a lot less hassle and damage to the existing paint and worth a try. Good luck.

lesz

I watched the video on the Dr.Colorchip website. It looks like a pretty neat product. I'd like to have the opportunity to see what the results look like in real light with the human eye. I'm guessing that the repaired stone nicks are not quite as "invisible" in real life as they would appear through the lens of the camera on the video.

There are quite a few threads on the Club Lexus forums discussing the Dr.Colorchip method/product. After reading a number of those threads, I can make a few comments. First, it would seem that the product is more suited to repairing pinhead-sized stone chips than it is to repairing larger areas. Also, there are some who seem to be quite satisfied with the results from using the product. There are others who are somewhat disappointed, and there are some who are quite disappointed. My guess is that the difference between those who are satisfied and those who are disappointed has to do with different expectations and with how particular people are about maintaining fits and finishes that are as close to perfect as possible. I suspect that those who expected that the repair would be undetectable even when viewed from close distances are the ones who are disappointed, and those who are happy if the repair isn't readily noticeable when glanced at from a distance of 20 feet are the ones who are satisfied with the product. Even those who are satisfied with the product say, though, that the repair is still noticeable when viewed from close distances, and they confirm that the product does work better on the small paint chips than it does on repairs that cover a larger area. As I said earlier, the key to doing the best possible touch up is to fill the area of repair to a level as close as possible to the level of the rest of the paint and not to add paint past the edge of the paint chip. Some seem to believe that the Dr.Colorchip product makes it easier to do so, but, with some care, you can do the same thing with regular touch-up paint.

One tip that I learned long ago about using regular touch-up paint is to trim the brush so that it tapers down to a very narrow point. Doing so allows you to have more control over where you put the paint and, thus, gives you a better chance of being able to "color between the lines", so to speak.

One of the threads that does a more complete job of discussing the Dr.Colorchip product is here.

https://www.clublexus.com/forums/aut...view-pics.html

SLH

Thank you, Les and Arty.

I found some videos of people using the drcolorchip products... The thing I notice is the squeegee... Several people recommend using a squeegee to put the paint only in the scratch or chip (after a careful decontamination with prep solvent, of course), then some dry time, then more prep-solvent on a polish cloth to remove the excess from the surrounding area. Several recommend the 3M "wetordry" squeegee, which is made for wet-sanding, to spread the paint.

That seems like it might work. This scratch is only a fraction of a millimeter wide -- I could just ignore it, or maybe add a little clear coat as protection. But a little color-coat under that clear would be better, I think. At worst, I can still decide to get the whole panel done, later.