New Paint - when to wax and buff?

[DogParkGuy]

Ten days ago my car was the victim of a hit-and-run driver. Result was driver-side rear door was smashed to the tune of $748. Work being done this week. How long to wait (if at all) to polish, wax or buff out?

[Mikeyc]

Since different body shops use different painting techniques and baking ovens the best thing to do is to ask your body shop technician. Depending on how they did the work he will likely give you a wait period for waxing/sealing of 30-90 days.

Polishing you can do right away, but polishing soft paint can be tricky IMO. It's best to wait until you are ready to wax before polishing. In the mean time you should protect your paint with a pure polish like #7.

[bluemoon]

What Mikeyc said, ask the technician who did the painting. I had to have a bunch of hail damage fixed a few months back. I had a very interesting chat with the body shop owner about wait times before waxing. He expalined that differant paints will require differant wait times. Some will take as long as 6 months before they will fully cure (under certain conditions) and be safe to wax, and some paints have chemicals in them that will greatly reduce cure times and the paint will be as hard as it will ever get within a couple of days and the paint can be waxed by the time you pick up the car. And several differant wait times in between all depending on what was used and any baking that was or was not done. The only person who truely knows the right answer is the person who applied the paint.

[the other pc]

Call me a cynic but I do not recommend taking the word of painters anymore when it comes to wait time for waxing. I’ve just heard too many horror stories of bad advice being dished out by painters.

The sand, cut and buff are part of the painting process so polishing and using paint-safe products like #34 are normally OK within a few hours, minutes if it’s baked. But waiting for long term curing and waxing are things that happen after it’s “out the door” so painters’ grasp of the concepts are highly variable to say the least.

When you ask the painter about wait time ask for the coating manufacturer’s recommended wait time for waxing. They’re the ones who understand the process. If he recommends a shorter time don’t believe him.


PC.

[Superior Shine]

Great advice here but.....................


Almost a year ago I unknowingly topped a rear bumper with #20 less than 24 hours after it was painted.

It had been waxed every month since and looks fine.


I am (was) an automotive refinisher and preached the 30-90 day rule all the time.

[Superior Shine]

[Mike Phillips]

Someone remind me to get back to this one...

I have to head out the door for Meguiar's for our Open Garage right now but I do have some comments that I want to post to this thread.


I was going to move it out of Hot Topics but for now it can stay.

[DogParkGuy]

Thanks to everyone for their responses. First I will ask Toyota since they arranged for the repair and stand behind the body shop. What I want to avoid is a car where there is a significant difference in appearance between the original paint and a body shop repair. Should have taken before and after pictures!