long term effects of using a rotary

[jason rawls]

Has anyone ever done a study on the long term effects of using a rotary on any particular vehicle? Does it shorten the life span of the paint being that it removes clearcoat and therefore uv protection?

I`m just curious to what the answers are so I can know what I`m talking about when someone asks me questions like this.

Also, do any of you professionals use a paint gauge to measure thickness before using a rotary? And if so, doesn`t a gauge measure the thickness of all the coats of paint and not necessarily the clear coat? How would you know how thick the clear coat actually is?

[ron`s]

Jason
The long term effects can very. How many times you polish how aggresive you are with the polish and so on. If the car is taken care of right you should only need to polish one time a year with frequent waxing in between. A normal polish will remove less than 1mil of paint or clear probably .5mil. If I remember right most cars have about 3mils. of clear.
I can tell you my elbow is feeling the long term affects of the rotary.
A paint gauge will measure total thickness. At least an affordable one
Good Luck

Ron

Rons Dents& Details

[Intel486]

Any abrasive polish does shorten the life of the paint even when used with an orbital. For regular care just polishing with a rotary won`t remove that much paint and would be fine.

Yes, a paint thickness guage measures all the layers ontop of the metal. There are average thicknesses of each layer and you`ll have to guess the total thickness of clear. The important thing is you aren`t suppose to remove more than .3mils of clearcoat as most of the UV inhibitors are concentrated in this area. You`ll be able to watch that w/ a paint thickness guage.

[Boss_429]

As Intel said, "excessive" polishing with fairly abrasive products can remove paint quite quickly, especially if the buffer is in the hands of someone who is not experienced with a rotary, pad selection, and the products they are using.

A paint guage can help, but it would be difficult, and time consuming to measure the thickness all over the vehicle as you are buffing. Keep in mind that some parts of the vehicle have varing thicknesses of paint to begin with.

It is sometimes difficult to tell if you compromised the clear coat.............. meaning that you`ve remove the upper portion of the clear that contains most of the UV protection. However, it`s pretty easy to see if you`ve gone through the clear, as the base coat will look different than the clear over base. You might also see the clear starting to flake/crack near the area.