# Removing ceramic coatings prior to painting



## Paintguy (Oct 31, 2005)

Hi all, long time since I've been on here.

As a professional painter that's seeing a rise in the number of ceramic paint coatings, I wondered if there were any special procedures that need to be followed to remove it.

Would a regular high strength solvent degreaser be adequate or does it need a more specific product?

Cheers,
Andy.


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## Alan W (May 11, 2006)

Most will require machine polishing to remove and some high end coatings can only be removed by wet or dry sanding.

Alan W


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## chongo (Jun 7, 2014)

Alan W said:


> Most will require machine polishing to remove and some high end coatings can only be removed by wet or dry sanding.
> 
> Alan W


Evening Alan:wave:

I believe that ceramic pro needs to be wet sanded to remove the coating, as they are usually layered :thumb:

But back to the question, just as Alan has said, it would need some kind of abrasive polishing by machine to be fully sure you have removed the coating :thumb: you will know this afterwards by wash the vehicle and if the water is lying on say the bonnet like a wet blanket then you will know it's fully removed :thumb:


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## Barbel330 (May 3, 2016)

I'm a painter too. It is normally all gone from a panel after the regular prep work has been done as the coating is super thin in reality. Grey scotchbright and scuff paste is usually plenty abrasive enough to get rid of it, 1500 or 1200 deals with it easily but as said above, you can tell if there's any left by looking at the water behaviour of the panel. You can also tell just by the feel of the panel when wet flatting. It feels like the flatting paper is skimming over the surface rather than biting like normal if you get what I mean? It ruins your wet and dry quicker than an uncoated panel too.


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## Alan W (May 11, 2006)

chongo said:


> Evening Alan:wave:


Hey Mick, how ya do'in'? :wave:

Further to our comments above ceramic coatings will degrade over time but as you may not know how old they are their removal by abrading the surface will still be required.

Your regular preparation procedures, as described by Barbel330, should be sufficient in most cases.

Alan W


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## Paintguy (Oct 31, 2005)

Thanks chaps.

We haven't come across it so far but I wanted the info in my back pocket just in case. Doesn't sound like it'll be as much of an issue as I thought.

Our prep guys mostly work dry, 500 on painted areas, 1000 on blend panels, but if we get a car in the future that's particularly stubborn and seems like it may have been coated I'll ask them to wet scotch with scuff paste as well, just to be sure.


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## SamD (Oct 24, 2015)

Paintguy said:


> Thanks chaps.
> 
> We haven't come across it so far but I wanted the info in my back pocket just in case. Doesn't sound like it'll be as much of an issue as I thought.
> 
> Our prep guys mostly work dry, 500 on painted areas, 1000 on blend panels, but if we get a car in the future that's particularly stubborn and seems like it may have been coated I'll ask them to wet scotch with scuff paste as well, just to be sure.


If I come across a car like that I use the prep and bend stuff on my scotch


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## stangalang (Nov 27, 2009)

If you are painting surely you will already be doing more than a solvent wipedown already? You will need to key up the surface at the very least? Coatings don't penetrate a substrate they only physically hold onto a surface so I would honestly believe standard paint prep will be more than sufficient


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