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Q: My paint job went okay, but I have some bumps and wrinkles. Is there anything I can do to improve my painted surface?
A: If the surface has very big bumps or wrinkles (even an ugly scar), it might be a good (yet painful) idea to repeat the painting process again. You can sand and/or strip off the existing paint and re-do the paint work. I go through the repeating process so often, now I just expect my first painting attempt to have flaws. ^_^
If the paint job came out okay with minor flaws, of course, we can always improve on that. The best way I found is to polish these flaws out with polishing cloths. I recommend to use various polishing cloths to do the job, but you can also do this by using similar high grade sand paper.
The polishing cloth has a soft padded backing and it allows you to sand and polish gently. Otherwise, it is just same as the regular sand paper. If you are looking for polishing cloths, the LMG polishing kit (micro-mesh) might be your answer. It has everything you need to do the task; it comes with various polishing cloths, polishing compound, swirl remover, and a cotton towel.
The polishing process is a time consuming work and you should not hurry yourself while performing it. This process can be used to repair minor paint mistakes. The process is to start out with a normal grade polishing cloth (use a wooden block or similar to provide a flat polishing surface) and switch to a higher grade polishing cloth as you polish your way up.
Please refer the picture below to see how the polishing process works. I recommend that you do this wet to minimize scarring. Finally, be sure not to use any polishing compound/wax if you are going to apply decal or clear coat later.
I'm not good at explaining so......
The Modeling Guide: Painting Techniques
Doesn't have to be a NMF just to get a good painting surface. I do it before painting every time with a piece of felt.[/QUOTE
That makes sense. I thought you may have thought that I was putting metalizer on the model in which case I would probably polish it. I do have some 3,000 grit sand pads though that will probably work pretty good for what you have explained. And thank you for explaining, sometimes I'm a little dense.
ABW, All I spray is acrylics and I have never primed. Though in a sense I quess painting a second time makes the first a primer. I also use a nail file block with four different grits: filing, shaping, smoothing and polishing to take care of any imperfections.
as to pulling acrylics off of a surface I've found that while acrylics dry quickly they take a day or more to "cure" so if you're in a hurry the uncured paint can be pulled off
Thank you Mike. I have found in the automotive paint process if you pull the tape before the paint dries you are less likely to pull it off. Unless of course your tape pulls the paint that it is on top of in which case we did not pre-prep the surface properly before we laid that coat of paint on. If the acrylics won't stick to the sanded plastic surface then it will need to be primed for adhesion purposes.