What is this paint condition?

I

imported_pdsterns

New member
While cleaning up my daughter's black Jetta I noticed quite a bit of this conditon. Can some one tell me what it is?



18599tn_100_1383.jpg
 
Looks good from 5 feet but when you get closer you see all these paint defects. So is this just the clear starting to craze? If you get in close to this it is little lines that look like crystals all over the place.
 
That's not the beginning of clear coat failure.



That's full on clear coat failure.



I don't know that that can be polished out. It might be possible, but I think it goes down to the primer, hence the light color. I could be wrong though.



There's no cure. It's like a disease. The worst thing that'll happen is you'll have to wetsand and repaint. Not the end of the world, but not the most convenient thing to do.
 
pdsterns- My first thought was "hey, that's a nice clear macro picture" :xyxthumbs



Yeah, my take is "clearcoat failure" as well, plus it looks a bit like acid rain etching. By polishing it you can probably improve the look a good bit, and protecting it will retard further deterioration to some extent.



That might be a good candidate for a "decontamination system" such as AutoInt's ABC or the one from FinishKare. In this case I'd probably go with the FK one, though I haven't tried it myself (yet).
 
Accumulator said:




That might be a good candidate for a "decontamination system" such as AutoInt's ABC or the one from FinishKare. In this case I'd probably go with the FK one, though I haven't tried it myself (yet).
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My Jeep and Lexus are both showing very early stages of clear coat failure. The spot on my Jeep is isolated to one spot about the size of the tip of my finger, and it looks like a minor version of the big spot in his picture. The 2 spots on my Lexus (one on the hood, one on the trunk) are about the size of a pinhead.



What do these systems do to/for the paint? Will it make the spots less noticeable.
 
MongooseGA said:
What do these systems do to/for the paint? Will it make the spots less noticeable.
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The idea is that the first step of the systems, the "alkaline" step, will truly neutralize the acidic stuff that's gotten into the pores of the paint. Supposedly this is the only way you can stop the acids from eating the paint. Being able to slow down the deterioration would be a good thing at the very least, and sometimes it's surprising how well "ruined" paint can hold up with good care.



I'd definitely do it on your Lexus. It would be the perfect "clean slate" approach and with the spots you mentioned I'd *really* recommend it. Wouldn't it be cool to be able to stop the deterioration and know that you saved the car's finish?



Again, even though I've only used the ABC, I'd say to go with the FK stuff. All the posts saying how much better it is (than ABC) have me pretty well convinced that it's the right stuff for some jobs.
 
The clear is fractured.



A-B-C,and other decontaminating systems, are irrelevant.



IMO, that paint is gone... refinish the entire panel.



Jim
 
As I said before the car does not look bad from 5 feet away so I'm not ready to refinish yet, it lives in a New Brunswick and does not get much care. But it is not just the hood, stuff like this can be found over most of the car. See all the little lines around the out a ways from the big bomb? It looks like the surface of the moon with rolling metorites.
 
Jimmy Buffit said:
The clear is fractured.



A-B-C,and other decontaminating systems, are irrelevant.



IMO, that paint is gone... refinish the entire panel.



Jim
Click to expand...



My supposition here is that the â€ËœA-B-C â€Ëœ system is a stop cap position to neutralize the rust, thereby avoiding on-going corrosion to the metal underneath until the surface can be repainted

JonM
 
SphyNxXx said:
Is there anything you can do to prevent clear coat failure?
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Keep it waxed/sealed/protected and clear can last virtually forever unless something unusually awful happens to it. But once it starts to fail the clock is ticking and *eventually* you just have to repaint. Small spots like what MongooseGA is talking about can often be kept in check though, much like large stonechips.



Heh heh, FWIW, *I* would have that panel reshot too. But as TOGWT said, the decontamination is a stop gap measure that sure won't hurt anything and might delay the inevitable.
 
Looks like baked-on tree sap...

My GF's car has pine sap all over it. It has the same crystaline look as CC failure, except it doesn't exactly "flake off" with a little effort. It takes tons of work to get that stuff off.
 
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