For those of you that have painted there own arches, what process did you use to sand the plastic arches? specifically, what grit did you start with and which did you finish with. Also, what type of sander did you use i.e. air or electric. thanks

 

I would like to know this also.

I was sitting int he garage the other day and had a thought. I wanted to take all the plastic fender pieces and see if I could get a fab shop to make them in sheet metal. That way I could tack them on the car, bondo them in so they look like part of the car. Just a thought..

 

I used a 6" DA air sander with 220 grit to start. You can use an electric also. Then I went to a 400. Then I wet sanded with 600. Clean it real good, use an adhesion promoter like Bulldog. Then I used SEM flexible primer. Put on 2 light coats, wet sanded with 800 grit. Put on another 2 light coats wet sanded with 1000 grit. Put on my color coat. The sprayed 4 coats of clear with flex agent. When cured, wet sanded with 2000 grit, then buffed and polished with 3M products.

 

When we paint textured plastic trim we don't sand the texture from the plastic. We apply several coats of primer, sanding between each coat until you have a smooth finish. Before applying any primer or paint to plastic apply an adhesive conditioner such as Bulldog to etch the plastic. This process will give you a much smother and consistent look after the topcoat is appied especially if the topcoat is dark such as black, dark silver, etc.

 

How much does that type of thing run? I'm interested in getting mine painted (PW) but don't want to pay thousands for it

 

I would probably go with a high-build primer as well, rather than trying to sand out the factory texture perfectly evenly. Also, depending on what the final colour is going to be, I wouldn't go all the way to 1000 grit on the primer before applying the colour coat. The primer needs a little bit of texture for the colour coat to adhere properly. I usually use 400-600 grit for the final sanding before applying colour.

I'll second the recommendation to apply an adhesion promoter on the plastic before shooting the primer, but you can skip the flex additive in the clearcoat. Modern clears are very flexible to begin with, and the hard plastic parts like the arches and door sills aren't getting bent in normal use. Flex additive is more important for parts like soft urethane bumpers that need to be able to bend/flex routinely.

 

Great short write up

 

Where are you located?

 

If you dont have to sane the plastic down then it seems like this is something alot more people could do at home. The prep work at least. Before you use the bulldog product do you have to do anything special to the plastic? Like wash it with soap and water really well? Anyone do a write up on this method of painting the fenders? I just hate looking at my IB car with black/grey fenders. The mini's I have seen with the arches painted look so much better IMO.

 

i live in MO, so not really looking for YOU to do it, personally. Just wondering, on avg, how much someone can expect to pay for this