Old painter told me to sand less between coats... he was right

A guy named Frank with 30 years at a shop in Columbus told me I was oversanding my primer coats. I was hitting it with 400 grit every time but he said just knock the nibs off with 600 and leave the rest alone. Tried his way on a BMW hood last week and the metallic laid down way smoother with no sand scratches showing through. Anybody else been told to ease up on the sanding between coats?

3 comments

3 Comments

rivera.hannah7d agoMost Upvoted

Holy crap, that hits home. I was doing the exact same thing, hitting every coat with 400 like my life depended on it. One of the old timers at the shop I used to work at literally took the sandpaper out of my hand and told me to stop messing up perfectly good primer. He said the same thing, just knock the dust nibs off with 600 and leave it. I fought it for a while because I thought more sanding meant a better finish. After trying it on a black metallic truck, I never went back. Why do we all get taught to oversand in the first place?

the_cameron6d ago

Man, that old timer was looking out for you. Not to nitpick, but 400 seems a bit aggressive even if it was just for knocking down nibs, you know what I mean?

casey2686d ago

@the_cameron nails it with that 400 being too rough. The real question is why do so many of us start out sanding everything down like we're trying to erase the car? I blame the early internet tutorials, everyone parroting the same step by step without explaining the why behind it. Once you understand that primer's job is just adhesion and a uniform base, not a surface to polish down to glass, it clicks. The metallic flakes can't lay right if the undercoat has deep scratches dragging them around. That Columbus guy saved you a lot of frustration, you just had to trust the old heads who've seen what happens when you back off.