Drt0800

A body and paint question. Repaired a paint lift on drivers side of hood. Primed and painted once (with NAPA rattle can) with a perfect color match. The job looked fantastic EXCEPT..I ended up with a tape line on the hood. Can someone please advise me as to the proper masking so this doesn't happen. I'm going to sand it down again and considering blending into the hood.

ANTI VENOM

I originally posted a bit of my experiences but I lost the whole post. Bottom line for me (novice) tape will leave a line. "feathering" or "fading" is the only way I know to get it done. There is a paint section on this forum and they will likely have the answers. Good luck to you.
P.S. Forum member DUB hangs in the paint section and seems to know his ..... uhmm. Stuff.

maddogwyatt

You can get round it by primering to a tape line, let it dry thoroughly. Then flat the edge with 1200 grade wet'n'dry until the line disappears. Re-mask slightly further up the hood. spray color -assuming it's not metallic. Then sand that line out as before. T-cut, and polish.i've had reasonable results with this method.

Drt0800

Polo Green Metallic
Perhaps the best route would be to allow the slight over spray to avoid the tape line and remove it during color sanding

GKK

The proper way to do the repair is to spray the new color onto the repaired area and gradually blend the paint onto the surrounding areas.

Then the Entire hood will have to be prepped with 1200 grit wet paper and Clear coated.

Another technique is to Back tape around the repaired area using a body line or seam as a break point. You can then blend the paint onto the panel and then gently clear up to the body lines back taped edge. When the tape is removed, the paint edge will be very fine since it was feathered sprayed against the sticky side of the tape and after color sanding and buffing, the edge will be just about invisible.

It's hard to explain without showing...

Drt0800

No, the explanations are great. I understand. I prefer the 2nd method as I prefer not to spray the entire hood. Afraid if I 1200 wet sand the existing clear and then clear over it, the metallic would be ruined. I do plan to color sand the existing clear on the hood and buff it out. The paint is excellent and I expect a very good match

GKK

The metallic will only be ruined if you sand through the clear which will not happen with 1200 grit. You can use 1500 if you're unsure of the clear coats thickness.