Car Paint & Repainting

A car's paint and finish is its protection from rust on its steel body. Definitely, those who have owned older cars with faded paint have noticed that the top portions, the roof, front and rear hoods are first to show bad discoloration. In a couple years more, miniature crack will be more evident all over. While, if you look at the sides of the car, the car paint finish is not as bad. The main reason is the roof and deck lids are exposed longer to the elements like sun, rain, dust, snow and what-have-you. Dirt rest and even stick on these painted parts of the car. Bird poop, mud, sand, asphalt, bubble gum and other hard to remove stuff are difficult to get rid of especially when they have been "cooked" by exposure to the sun.

It is a tedious job to remove or get rid of those grime and dirt without using solvents. But then again, solvents are also a culprit in damaging a car's paint! Another cause of fast deterioration of paint on the roof and deck lids of a car is, if it is more often parked for lengths of time under the sun. The car paint gets brittle if it is frequently heated then suddenly cooled. The paint loses its flexibility and elasticity causing it to break in small cracks, at first. The more it is subjected to heating and fast cooling will make the cracks bigger and deeper. When this happens, it becomes a more difficult repainting job should it be done. Hard and sun-cooked paint finishes are more difficult to scrape off with a commercial paint remover. At times, use of blowtorch will be necessary to make the stubborn paint peel off from the metal. Again, the blowtorch could be harmful to the car's steel body. The heat could cause some deformation, especially those made of light gauge metal.

Getting to the point now, how could paint finish be better when you would want to have your car repainted? Usually, cars, brand new or repainted will have somewhere between 6 to 8 coats of paint. Additional 2 to 3 coats of clear coat could be applied for more protection and sheen. This would be evenly applied all throughout the car's exterior. Most of the time, the interior and unexposed parts of the body would have lesser coating. So, when having your car repainted, specify to the car painter or shop to add 2 to 3 more coats of paint color on the roof and deck lids. Expert painters will have no problem doing that and it will not be noticeable from the finish of the rest of the car. Thicker paint will be able to dissipate more heat before it reaches the metal sheet. This would also make the paint finish less susceptible to becoming brittle. Finally, you have invested in a good repainting job on your car so it will not be too much trouble to find parking spaces for your car with better shade and a covered car port. This would also help very much is preserving paint finish for newer or brand new cars.