Ok, This weekend I did some bodywork/paint repair on my 4Runner. The paint color matched perfectly the old paint, my problem is that after removing the masking I ended up with a visble line between the old paint/clearcoat and the new one. How do I blend in or erase this line? Paint matched perfect is just that line that I need to fade in. Any advise will be greatly appreciated.

P.S I will post pictures tomorrow

Thanks!!

 

Not sure how bad it is. But buffing it may help. Or if it doesnt then hit it with a claybar and call it good.

 

I do have some claybar I'll give that a try. Ck tomorrow I will post pics

 

hard to say without seeing it but i would say wet sand with 1500-2000 lightly and try to buff it out with rubbing compound. but again thats just without seeing it...

 

Did you paint and clear up to the tape or is it just overspray up to your tape line? If you hard lined it with tape and painted and cleared right up to it, it's probably not going to come out very well. Whenever shops have to blend into existing paint, they'll gradually fade the old paint into the new paint (blend), then clear the newly painted area and a little beyond, and then use a blending solvent that melts the new and old clear coats together so there isn't a harsh line between the new and old paint/clear. Usually the blended area is small since even the blending solvent leaves a slightly noticeable texture that can be wet sanded and buffed out but still won't look 100%, hence, do it in a small area. I used to work for a small touch up shop and we used to paint and blend bumpers for local dealerships. The repair was OK enough for the dealers to sell the cars, but if you knew to look for it you could definitely see a haze from blending the new and old clears together. When I actually went to school for auto body, we always took the bumpers off, repaired and painted the affected area, scuffed the whole thing, and cleared the entire bumper. MUCH better results doing it that way, but it also involved a lot of work. If you can paint the whole part (ie. door, hood, fender, bumper) without blending the clear, that's the way to go. If you have to blend, make sure you blend in a small area that won't be noticed easily. If you're trying to remove a little overspray where you taped off, I would say try the clay bar and buff it, if it's a hard line it's going to be difficult (if not impossible) to get the two layers flat to each other. That's my advice.