Is It Okay To Sand Through Clear Coat?

[Zack Pomerleau]

I was wondering, if dust gets in, can we sand it out? Or no?

[anderekel]

The easiest way to put it is that it's okay to sand clear coat, however, you don't want to sand through, even if you have multiple coats of the same color it could change the shade slightly and that could be very annoying, so as long as the dust is on top of the clear, go at it with 600 grit and see if you can get it out.

[doug]

First... what kind of clear is it? Then, is your body dyed or painted? The answer to these is important.

In either situation it's best to NOT sand all the way to the wood. If you plan to sand all the finish off and start over it would be fine, but it doesn't sound like that's what you want to do. Just sand the dust out and be sure not to get down to the wood. If you have a piece of some junk in the clear and want to remove it, carefully pick it out with an exacto knife. Drop fill the spot before spraying any more finish.

-Doug

[Mickguard]

I was wondering, if dust gets in, can we sand it out? Or no?

If you're using nitro, chances are dust won't be a big problem --nitro flashes over pretty quickly, after 15 mins or so the risk of dust sticking in there is pretty small. Depends on how wet the coat is, but you don't want it to be so wet it'll drip anyway.

Just make sure the area you're spraying in is pretty clean with no wind. You can also spray outside.

[zyonsdream]

I was wondering, if dust gets in, can we sand it out? Or no?

If you're using nitro, chances are dust won't be a big problem --nitro flashes over pretty quickly, after 15 mins or so the risk of dust sticking in there is pretty small. Depends on how wet the coat is, but you don't want it to be so wet it'll drip anyway.

Just make sure the area you're spraying in is pretty clean with no wind. You can also spray outside.

I sprayed outside once and ended up turning my project into a giant fly trap... I'll never paint outside again.

[Mickguard]

I sprayed outside once and ended up turning my project into a giant fly trap... I'll never paint outside again.

You could turn it into a celebrity endorsement.

I've only sprayed outside during the late fall/winter.

But I set up a little mini-spray area in my garage, created an enclosure with plastic tarp. That really helped to eliminate any wind/dust problems. Of course I wear a respirator (and full clothing, gloves, even a huge snorkling goggles to keep stuff out my eyes). Spray runs rarely last more than a minute or so anyway.