# Wetsanding Class at Autogeek - 1971 GTO - The Black Orange



## Mike Phillips (Jan 26, 2007)

*Wetsanding Class at Autogeek - 1971 GTO - The Black Orange *



















All taped off and ready to go!



















Two Grit Guard Universal Detailing Carts & Pad Washers all set up ready to go. Two is better than one!


















*Dampsanding*
This is a match made in car detailing heaven. This mini dual action polisher works flawlessly as a 3" dampsander. It makes sanding close to edges safe and easy. It makes sanding small thin panels faster and easier.

With this combination of polisher and 3" sanding disc with an interface pad for conforming to the shape of the panel you can quickly and easily sand out a minor or small defect with surgical precision in an isolated area with only a small footprint.

A few more shots of the 3" Griot's Garage Mini Polisher being used to dampsand...

*Orange peel and mottling near the front of the roof line...*









*Close-up...*









*Sanded with #1500 in this picture, follow up was #3000*









*Compounded...*









*Not perfect but getting there... *









*Used the PC with 6" sanding disc for the major portion of the roof and rear quarter*
*panel. About 90% of **the orange peel was sanded off so I snagged another 5% to 6%*













































*Will get the other side of the roof tomorrow...*




































*Removing Sanding Marks*
The Griot's Garage 3" Mini Polisher is also able to rotate the Meguiar's microfiber discs. This is a 3" microfiber cutting disc removing #3000 Unigrit dampsanding marks.

It works but it's so much faster and effective to learn how to use a rotary buffer if you're going to sand down and buff out an entire car. If you're just doing spot repair then it's doable.



























































































:thumb:


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## Mike Phillips (Jan 26, 2007)

Time to break out the trusty PC 7424xp










We teach how to use air DA Sanders too...


















Sergio and Tavares tackle the roof with the G110v2 and PC 7424XP









You should always be looking across from your work area and sometimes that means lowering yourself down to the panel.




























This is me working intricate areas using the 3" Griot's Mini Polisher as a *dampsander*....


















Lots of rotary buffer work after the sanding...



















:thumb:


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## Mike Phillips (Jan 26, 2007)

This GTO was painted Wednesday night before our Sunday class and has a *lot* of orange peel which should really give our students a great experience learning how to hand sand and machine dampsand.





































The students from that class did an awesome job of sanding and buffing the paint and more importantly learned the techniques required to undertake a full wetsanding project especially with a car that had extreme orange peel

The goal of the class is not to make each person an expert, that's not realistic in a one=day class. The goal is to bring up each person's _*comfort level*_ with the terms, products and techniques used for wetsanding paint and using rotary buffers.

Trying to go from incredibly horrendous orange peel to a show car finish in 6-7 hours with a group of people that are all new to the wetsanding process is a worthy goal but realistically, after the class there was still a lot of sanding to the lower panels left to do and a thorough compounding to make sure all the sanding marks have been removed.

Over the weekend I finished all the sanding, cutting and polishing and I'm happy to say the horrendous orange peel has been removed, the paint polished to a high gloss and she's ready to be returned to the owner. Here's a few pictures before the car leaves today...














































*Group shot of the Advanced Class Extreme Makeover Team







*

Here's a close-up of the Extreme Makeover Team for the GTO

_From left to right..._

Dan, James, Tavares is behind Sergio and myself, then Robert, behind Robert is Nick, then Dan then Eric












































:thumb:


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## stangalang (Nov 27, 2009)

Great work, awesome car. Regarding the paintwork, did you have it purposefully sprayed badly for the benefit of the class? It just seemed a good job but a bad finish if that makes sense?


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## Mirror Finish Details (Aug 21, 2008)

Good thread and good read MIke.


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## ronwash (Mar 26, 2011)

Graet work,love the wetsanding thread.


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## Mike Phillips (Jan 26, 2007)

stangalang said:


> Great work, awesome car. Regarding the paintwork, did you have it purposefully sprayed badly for the benefit of the class? It just seemed a good job but a bad finish if that makes sense?


A friend of mine painted it in his garage under horrible conditions. He brought it to me and asked if I thought it could be saved and for suggestions on how to go about sanding and buffing it out.

I told him I had a class coming up on wetsanding and if he agreed to letting me use it for training purposes I'd see if we could save it. When he picked the car up he couldn't believe we transformed it from un-salvageable to show car. While he wasn't happy with his paint results, it worked out good for a training class.


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