Front Spoiler Refinish - Printable Version

Front Spoiler Refinish - Printable Version

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Front Spoiler Refinish - Rissy - 19 Sep 2012

Apologies if there is already a thread for this, I couldn't see one...

Now that the car show season has finished (for me) and I STILL don't know when i'm going to Belgium for work, I thought I might take the opportunity to start trying to remove the awful paint from the front spoiler and try to get it back to the rubber so that I can dye or something, as well as feed it with something to try and bring it back to an original looking finish. (since im not so bothered about it looking a bit pasty now until I finish the job)
Doing this means it wont crack again and will require very little work to keep it looking good (as well as being resistant to stone and other road debris impacts which obviously causes the most cracking of a painted finish - i'm pretty sure these things should not be painted in the first place, but instead be treated like any other rubber trim)

So, I bought some Cellulose Thinner from Halfrauds, and have had a play with that this afternoon. It seems I have about 4 layers of paint on there. One red primer, followed by black paint, with another coat of white primer, and then the final top coat of black paint again. Whilst the Cellulose Thinner is having *some* impact, it's very slow and hard work even on one coat at a time.

...So, I was wondering if anyone else had any experience stripping paint off these things, or any hints and tips for the use of the Cellulose Thinner, or indeed, experience of using something like heat gun at the same time....to try to make the job a bit quicker and easier. ? ?

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Rissy - 20 Sep 2012

...So i've traded in the Cellulose Thinner for something more powerful.......Elbow Grease.
(With some added sandpaper of course)

Starting with P400 Paper, and a lot of rubbing, I'm managing to get the paint off, surprisingly quickly in fact!
It leaves the spoiler looking bloody awful, but then I've tested on one side only, after getting back down to the rubber, and no paint left, using P100 Paper, and then P1500 Paper to follow (This gets clogged very quickly, so might get some P1200 stuff instead), then to follow up, I tried using some T-Cut and then some polish (since i've lent my "green snot" to a mate right now - but will use this when I get it back - what's left of it of course! lol!)

I have to say, although not perfect, but still looking better than with the shoddy paint job, it's looking quite good. I think with some more perseverance, I could really get it looking quite nice, and with the fact that it will be unpainted, with just the rubber, I'll never have to do much more than a bit of a wipe with some green snot now and again....hopefully.

I'm standing by my thoughts even more now. The lower front spoiler, should NOT be painted. With today's products available, there should be no need to paint these things, but instead, just treat them, and continue to treat them every so often to keep them looking fresh. Will save a fortune on paint jobs! I'm not sure when i'll get the job finished, but I will hopefully one day get a before and after shot put up for you to see.

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Guinney1971 - 20 Sep 2012

we keep our De's black bits looking nice with Autoglym's vinyl and rubber care,
more commonly known as 'green snot'.

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Chris Williams - 21 Sep 2012

I know everyone has there own ideas, but I find STP 'Son of A Gun' works really well for feeding the plastic and rubber parts. Difficult to find but it really works well.

Chris

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Rissy - 21 Sep 2012

...So it seems from the feedback, that people are NOT in the habit of painting their front spoilers then? ...I guess it was just mine, or i'm one of the few where at a previous time the spoiler has been painted by another individual. :roll:

The "Son of a gun" product you mentioned Chris....I've never seen or heard of that before. I think my only concern with that would be that it produces a "Deep Gloss Shine" which is not how the spoiler should be....unless of course, like the very early cars and their bumpers, this part also was finished to a shine, rather than the later cars having more of a matt/satin finish....?

I'm honestly not sure which category my car (Vin1458) is supposed to be, but personally, I prefer the more Matt/Satin look for both the Bumper finish and the spoiler too. The Autoglym "Green Snot" produces just that look, if that's how the original look was. I recently used it on my louvres, and it brought them up looking lovely, not gloss, but not flat faded matt either. More of an expected original Satin type look. Nice. :wink: (It also has the UV/AV protection in their to ward off fading due to the bleaching effect from the sunshine too)

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Rissy - 24 Sep 2012

....So i've been at this spoiler, pretty much all weekend. I've made some nice progress I think, and am on the home straight. I had to revise my sanding regime, and have used the following in the order provided.

100P Sandpaper (dry) to remove all the paint
240P Sandpaper (dry) to get rid of the scoring and major scratches left over from the 100P sand paper (This is a pretty important stage as the 240P seems to be quite a nice grade to start smoothing out the spoiler and start making it feel nicer to the touch - getting rid of the scoring and scratches and giving it a more uniform feel/look.)
400P (wet) to smooth out even more
Unfortunately, although I know your not supposed to skip any more than 2 grades of paper at a time, I didn't have any 600P, 800P 1000P, or 1200P sandpaper, so had to jump straight to 1500P (wet) at this point. Still seems to bring it out nice though.
2000P Sandpaper (wet) to really start giving it a nice smooth finish and bring out a bit of a sheen from it again.
Then at this point, I switched to artificial steel wool (green plastic stranded pad type things). I'm still of mixed feeling about this, but once again, i'm doing it wet, and lightly. I've only done one half with this, and can't see much difference, a little only. I'm still wondering if in fact it's putting more scratches in again, rather than smoothing out further. Not much of a difference I think, but I WAS losing daylight at this point too.....jury is still out. I may have to retreat and use the 2000P over that half again...

Basically, I'll very soon be at the point where I'm trying to decide how to finish it off, and to get rid of that Sanded look. The sanded look brings the spoiler out looking sort of grey in colour, rather than black. Don't get me wrong, the colour was REALLY grey in the earlier stages with all the sanding, and has been getting darker and darker with each step down in smoothness, but now I think I'm at the stage where I'm struggling to get it finished to the smoothest finish (when I say smooth, I mean that finished look which suggests moulded rather than sanded), which will restore it to as black as possible. If I use some Tyre finish spray, it helps significantly (my friend still has my green snot, so haven't tried that yet) but I'm wondering if anyone else has any ideas for giving it that final going over before I resort to using Bumper/Trim restoring finishing fluids/sprays.

I know you're not supposed to sand rubber, as it's moulded to shape and is finished automatically in this way, but having no choice to get the paint off, I think considering, it really isn't doing too bad at all. I'm quite pleased. It already looks better than what it was with all the flaky and cracked paint. I would just like it now to finish off nicely to my satisfaction. So, anyone have any ideas? A way to give it than smooth rubber "skin" which looks non-sanded, and will hopefully bring it back to being more black than grey?

(The original finish on these Spoilers has a sort of texture, but due to all the sanding, my texture is completely gone. Mine is smooth as a babies bum now)

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Guinney1971 - 24 Sep 2012

I'm wondering if you can use a plastic primer, then maybe spray with 'stone chip' paint, then
give it a coat of Halfords Plastic Bumper Paint - I know you're trying to avoid the painted route
but if you want the texture back, that may be your only option.

TBH, most people wont notice that your spoiler doesn't have a texture, not many people get that
low down to the front of a DeLorean Wink

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Rissy - 24 Sep 2012

I'll never get the texture back, it's gone. Sanded out. Never to return. You're probably right about people not noticing, and to be honest, if it looks nice, then I don't care either. My mate from work had a good idea for trying to "seal" the outer skin. Although i'd have to be careful not to melt it, or burn it, I *could* use a heat gun, to soften the surface, maybe just enough to make it "form" or whatever the term might be. I'm not sure, it could be a bit dicey. I'll try with the sanding route, and finish it off with some green snot, and see what it looks like. If it's ok then, then i'll probably just live with it. Any which way, it definitely looks better now than it has ever done since I bought the car.

As you say, i'm trying to avoid the painted route, no matter which paint. I don't want to have to sand this thing again in the future!

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Rissy - 25 Sep 2012

Ok I've finished. (At least for now.) Pretty happy with the results at this point (even though I've lost the original texture), so i'm gonna leave it the way it is now. I had to relent in the end and buy some 800P and some 2500P wet and dry paper, and go back a few stages to get the finish nicer. So basically, the order now contains:

100P
240P
400P
800P
1500P
2000P
25000P

I didn't use any steel wool stuff afterwards. I couldn't be bothered having to undo any negative result of using it, although i'm sure it would have been slight. No use of a heat gun either. (I think I may have been dicing with death if I had warped or melted the spoiler in anyway as a result of trying the heat gun. - I think with the results I got, it proves it's not really necessary)

Saved myself over £300 minus the cost of my personal time (about 3 or 3.5 days in total) and the cost of the sand paper.

So, as promised, for prosperity, here are some before, midway, and some final shots of the spoiler. No paint, so no possible flaking or cracking in the future. Phew. Enjoy.

[Image: SL381333.jpg]

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - JamesRGUK - 25 Sep 2012

Looks pretty sharp to me, I love painting jobs, loads of prep and then you spray and within a few minutes everything looks fantastic.

And if you cock it up you just rub it back and start again.

J

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Chris Williams - 26 Sep 2012

Looks really good to me Mr Green

on another point.... James do you still do the switch decals?

Chris

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - stunned_monkey - 26 Sep 2012

This is how Lex once looked. (NB those aren't birt $hits, but paintball hits). All th eblack bit sof the car were dreadfully faded and porous. None of the trim waxes I tried ever restored it for longer than 5 minutes esp on the rear bumper. I genuinely hope you have better luck, cos it looks the nuts.

[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - JamesRGUK - 27 Sep 2012

Chris Williams Wrote:Looks really good to me

on another point.... James do you still do the switch decals?

Chris

Hi Chris,

yeah I've got a load of them somewhere, pop me your address and I'l get a set in the post.

james_rg(-at-)hotmail.com

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Rissy - 27 Sep 2012

...Cheers for your comments guys. Cause I've got the bug now, I'm starting to do the same thing with the nose grill too (made of the same stuff as the spoiler) See if I can take that back to a paintless finish too. Although, this one is much harder to do since the paint and the red primer is right in all the grooves as well as on easy to access outer faces, so this may have to be done over a longer period of time, and with a lot more patience. :roll:

I have a feeling that all the black bits have been painted i.e wing mirrors, and air vents on the side although these don't look bad at all, so I can leave those (these are plastic, not rubber, so that would explain the difference).

It's mostly just the spoiler and nose grill I'm unhappy with (The spoiler more so of course, hence treating that first), especially since they are the rubber parts.
Without having a firm feeling, I'm pretty sure the bumpers are of a similar, if not slightly more rigid version of the same material again, but as these seem to have been painted, rather than simply moulded in a set colour, back in the 80's, then I guess I'll have not much option but to try to take off as much of paint on those the best I can, and then re-spray them again.
This is of course a big job, and wont be done for some time yet. I'll be tempted to try to do this myself when I do too. I've always done my own spray painting in the past, and have always been pretty pleased with the end results.

I just wish the cellulose thinner I bought would have done a better job at dissolving the existing paint on these items, cause it's a total ball-ache with all the sanding and finishing off involved. It's just as well I'm a pretty patient guy. 8)

Re: Front Spoiler Refinish - Guinney1971 - 28 Sep 2012

Crikey Martin, I never knew Lex had been shot at!!