Any paint specialists that can advise?

I am planning to repair som (many) stone chips on the hood of my XJR-S. As the photos show, some have been attended to before with a poor result and the clear coat is coming off in spots. There are also more (minor) chips further up.

My question is:
1. How should I go about repairing these?
2. Would it be better to just respray the hood?

I would repair the stone chips myself & if a respray I would get it done by a professional workshop.

 

Difficult choice.
If it's only the hood, and if its paint is still good (as it seems to be), you may go for a good quality new paint.
Surfaces should however be carefully prepared with a good sanding of all the existing defects.
You have the risk however that the new paint will not perfectly match the existing one on the aisles.
Or you make local repairs as you are also thinking of and you wait for making a new paint on the whole car only when it starts tarnishing. This is what I would do.
Because the existing paint looks not bad overall...

 

The paint looks good overall. Stone chips are like wrinkles they are signs of being used

I'd just touch them up. Here in Australia a good paint shop will match the colour in a touchup paint.

 

Thanks for the input guys. I have just done a paint correction and machine polishing and the whole car came up pretty good. It´s just that the stone chips are even more irritating when they stand out against the otherwise good paint.

 

Mark, I manage a body shop so I will share a few things I am seeing from your photos. You actually have two different things going on with the front edge of the hood. You have rock type chips but you also have clear coat delam or peeling.

The good news is the color you have is a solid darker green so this makes for a good touch up candidate. The bad news is when you have clear coat delam the only way to correct this is to respray the panel(s) that have this condition. Polishing etc. might make these areas look better for a bit but when the clear is peeling off you now have exposed paint under the clear and that will dull out rather quickly after you polish.

I just repainted my red XJS' hood for rock chips etc. along the leading edge like yours and it was no big deal. Had enough room on the edges that we were able to blend the color out to the edges of the hood and then cleared the complete panel so color match was not an issue. Sometimes just the new clear will make the resprayed panel look a little darker but compared to looking at the hood being chipped up and clear peeling there is no comparison.

Hope this insight helps. Basically you will know when it is time to do something because you will be tired of looking at it as I was.

 

is there anyone in your area that does ' smart repairs ' they will come to your home and . touch them in ' for you , mobile service

BB

 

Yes. I have sent an E mail and asked for offers on both Smart Repair and a full respray of the hood. I have at least come to the conclusion that professional help in this instance is the way to go and I can then use touch up paint to address minor stone chips as they occur.

 

Do the touch ups and if your not happy with results then paint the hood. There is nothing to lose by trying.

 

Hi NorJag,


I agree with LuvmyXJS you have 2 things going on and I will leave the lacquer peel to the experts.


A trick I have learned with stone chips is that they are difficult to touch in with a small paintbrush as too much paint normally gets applied in one go. Try using a cocktail stick to drip the paint into the hollow of the stone chip once you have treated any rust.


Looks a nice car so good luck,


LeeP

 

Your car looks really nice overall. I still want to have a green Jag! There was a very good article in Skinned Knuckles years ago. The point was to build up the depression in the paint over successive paint applications. The paint was color matched by a paint shop to code. He used a tooth pick to let the slightly thinned paint run into the chip. The paint available in those little touch up bottles is usually too thick to flow properly. He then covered the repair with a cardboard box, I guess to keep dust and bugs out. After the paint level in the chip was slightly higher than the surrounding surface he used the small sandpaper discs, made with a hole punch and glued to a pencil eraser. He sanded just enough to bring the repair flush, then used compound and polish. With a clear coat paint which is the norm now you would have to respray clear over the repair and try to blend it into the rest of the panel. You might want a pro to try this as an air brush would work best. Nothing lost to trying.

Or you could add "lipstick".

 

Mark, in order to take care of the clear coat peeling issue you will need to take the car into a body shop and have them blend in the color and respray the entire hood with clear coat.

It is very important to clear the entire hood at one time because there is no place to break the clear coat and if you try and burn the clear coat in you will see it over time on that big of a panel.

Do it right the first time-please do not let someone spot that area in as it will fail and you will not be happy. That whole front section of the hood needs to be sanded down and then built back up with catalyzed primer. If this is not done correctly you will see edge rings and low spots.

The hood is large enough that in order to get a clean spray job with the correct temp. range it needs to be sprayed in a spray booth. If you have any more questions about this let me know but with that large of a panel and with the dark color do it right the first time and then just touch up the rock chips as they happen.

 

My two bits:


1. Touch up and blending is/was an art. Pitted paint and glass in desert areas s common. Many were fixed by careful matching and blending.
But, clear coat onset made that more complex but doable.


2. My 79 Chrysler Cordoba suffered from peeled clear coat. Compound and polish and a lot of wax "fixed". Shine returned.


3. My 88 Tbird suffered the same malady. The technique described above was an utter failure.


4. The local Miracle Auto Paint place brags of it's process to restore blistered clear coat.


5. Bra's of vinyl were once popular to protect the leading edge of car
noses...


6. I've used "colored" polish with a fir degree of success. Small pits only, Not on chunks as seen here... building up is the only hope, one way or another.




Sure is a nice car, though!!


Carl

 

I'd be curious to know what the cost should be to have the hood resprayed. I'm in the same boat..same color...same issues.

 

The cost to respray a hood on a XJS will vary depending on where you are having it done for example labor rates in your area-materials needed for your job and of course how bad the shop wants to do the work.

Some shops on older cars can get a little nutty on pricing because they may not want to deal with it if they are backed up with newer insurance type work.

I will give a quick breakdown of what I would consider a rather average cost to repaint a hood for the XJS which will be based on a labor rate of $50.00 per hour and a material rate of $ 30.00 per hour:

Sand down leading edge of hood and prime and block for repaint should run around 3.0 hours $ 150.00
Materials for prime and sand $ 70.00
Labor to respray hood and clear 5.0 hours $250.00
Materials to respray/clear hood $150.00
Haz. waste fee -cover car $ 30.00
__________
TOTAL $650.00

Hope this helps give some idea of what the cost will be to repair the chips on leading edge and respray hood on a XJS.

 

I have received a quote for a respray of the whole hood. It´s quite expensive so I am considering doing it myself and if the result is not satisfactory then I´ll get it resprayed.

I am talking the car to a Jaguar club meeting next week and will get some advice from more experienced owners and hatch out a plan of action.

I can post some photos and comments on this thread when I get started.

 

Lots of great info on home shop repaints on YouTube. Can be done to a very high level if you take the time to educate yourself on how best to do this yourself.

Good luck on the project.

 

After some wet sanding with 4 different grades of sand paper, then scratch remover and finally Autoglym resin polish... the result was better than before but it will still need a professionals touch.

After filling the stone chips in with touch up paint, I went on to wet sanding to try and level the surface out. If I were to do this job again I would go with more coats before wet sanding. The stone chips are not as visible and the edges have been taken off the delaminating clear coat and that seems to have helped too.

A respray of the hood will have to wait as I have other more important issues to attend to.

Thanks again for all the comments and advice.

 

Great work. Looks as good as it gets. A car that is driven,
definitely not a "hanger queen".


No further effort needed.


Around here, shop time is in the $125.00 area!!! DIY I feasible.


Decades ago, my talented son acquired a salvage title Datsun 240Z.
Nice, but with front end damage, including the "bonnet. Frame fixed by welding in a better tube. Tin hammered and dollyed out old tech.
Paint store matched it's orange perfectly. Painted with an HF gun.
Rubbed out and it was slick car. Easily sold at a profit to a more than pleased senior buyer. I admit to temptation!!!


Carl
Carl