wet sanding, buffing, polishing

[72camaross]

Hey guys,

I thought I would ask the pro's (you) since I'm venturing into something I've never done before. I was asked to help run a buffing and polishing business and I can say I've never done it before. I have a friend who has done it and he is going to help me with the first few cars but I thought I would ask ahead of time for any advice, tips, tricks, or websites to help me learn about what I'm going to be doing. He said sometimes they wet sand as well which I also have never done. I know there will be lots of mistakes along the way so I'm just trying to find out as much as I can beforehand. If I do screw up too bad my other friend owns a body shop that will gladly paint over my mistakes! (like burning through etc..)

Thanks for any input guys/girls!

Joel

[MuscleRodz]

that is not something I would want to practice on a customers car with. Get some junk yard fenders if you have to. Those mistakes can be very expensive learning curves.

[NOT A TA]

http://www.autopia.org/

[72camaross]

Yeah I should have mentioned I won't be starting on customers cars. It will be mine, family, friends who really really trust me haha

Thanks for the link John!

[wiedemab]

Just a few things from my perspective - - - When wet sanding, make sure you keep your paper extremely clean, and I mean extremely. If you get something under the paper you will leave scratches that may be too deep to buff out. I also dry and inspect the area pretty frequently. You only want to sand off enough to take out the orange peel and no more. When hand sanding we usually start with 1000, then 1500 and sometimes 2000 prior to buffing on it. We have a little DA sander set up with velcro pads that we sometimes go all the way to 3000, which it pretty much smoother than your hand. A word of caution about the DA sander - it's much more difficult to feel anything under the paper and dirt under the paper will again wreak havoc. We normally only use the DA for hitting dirt nibs in isolated spots and hand sand otherwise.

I'm still learning every time we do a car - Dad is much better having done it for 40 or so years.

[72camaross]

Thanks for the tips Brandon! I hope I don't have to do any wet sanding but if I do I'll call in the painter to have someone watch me! I could really wreck things there. I'll definitly keep reminding myself to check for dirt!