gcjin2007

i hear that the RL is wetsanded from factory, and this is the fisrt car that i know of that has his "feature." im wondering if most cars have this nowadys and if the paint really has the mirror finish? also if cars do not have this nowadays why isnt the RL gettin any or no recgonition at all for this "wetsanded" feature?

P.S. for all u guys who do not know about this, it is very complicated, but simply whenever a car is sprayed w/ paint it is NEVER a perfectly smooth finish but merely looks like a "peel of an orange" when u look at it very closely. but when a car is wetsanded, the paint becomes perfectly smooth and just like a mirror finish from w/e angle u look at it from, this is mostly a feature that is used on show cars(thats y showcars look so shiny, not just from the wax but from the car being wetsanded.)

justinjsw

Thats what I heard also.

CGTSX2004

iTrader: (1)

Wow...so the RL should really sparkle with proper washing and waxing...

dseag2

It is definitely noticeable. I waxed mine last weekend with Meguier's Gold Class and the car is so shiny it's almost embarassing. The Celestial Silver is a very bright silver anyway, so she definitely stands out! I can only imagine what a newly waxed black RL looks like.

codyt01

I did the full Zaino process on my RL about a month ago. I think we ended up with about 4 coats of Z2 and 5 coats of Z5. Once that was done, the shine on the RL totally blew away the shine on my 2004 MDX which had the same process applied to it, for the second time about a week earlier. Those two cars are only a year apart and Zaino was applied to the MDX one week after bringing it home. It's is Satin Silver Metallic, the RL is Meteor Silver Metallic.

gcjin2007

wow, someone wit a black RL PLEAAASSSEEE wax it and take some pics, then have someone eat off of it

legendguy

I have noticed that the RLs have an amazing amount of metallic flake in the paint compared to my other cars (also Honda products). I have Lakeshore silver, and after waxing and puting in the sun it glimmers. My only concern is how hard it may be to try to paint match when the inevitable occurs.

justinjsw

I found it...the RL do indeed get wet-sanded.

"New, High Luster Paint Process"

...Wet-sanding the primer coat by hand before the color coat is applied gives the new RL a deep high luster finish reminiscent of the fine finish on an expensive grand piano...End of quote

Source...Acura 2005 Facts book

Shotgun

They have a video on the Japanese Legend site that shows about seven or eight assembly line workers furiously wet sanding the Legends (RLs). Time permitting I'll try to relocate the site and post the specific URL.

JL9000

Honda Japan

SiGGy

Wetsanding would get rid of the orange peel in the paint. It wouldn't not make the car any more shiney. As the shine comes from the clear coat, not the paint. It would make the reflection in the paint appear more true, and not have orange peel (distorted reflection)

Wetsanding is usually done between paint coats to get rid of the irregularitys that happen from the sprayers. Cars that aren't wet sanded (99.9% of cars) have orange peel. Basically unless you own an $300k+ exotic, or have a expensive custom paint job. You have orange peel in the paint.


edit:

i just read they only wet sand the primer coat. Not suprising as it would be very labor itensive to wetsand between all layers of paint.

so it'll still have orange peel....

codyt01

Siggy,

I must disagree with you and my car is proof. I compare the finish on my 2005 RL to my 2004 MDX and you can visible see the difference in the more clear reflection. I can visible see the orange peel in my Satin Silver MDX, where there is none visible in the Meteor Silver 2005 RL.

SiGGy

umm, thats what I said. The reflection is clearer... ?!? that's all wetsanding does, it gets rid of orange peel. It does not make the car shine better.

Silver is also one of the hardest colors to see orange peel in.

so WTF are you disagreeing with? you just REPEATED what I said, and used your cars as an example..... and you agreed with that I said. not disagreed...

lol, your killing me here. Elaborate on what you disagree with please.

soopa

oh man. chill sig. chill.

clearer -- shinier -- whatever.

the paint APPEARS more brilliant when the primer is wetsanded. we can all agree on that. why? who cares really.


90% of "orange peel" effects you see are from the primer, not the paint itself. this is partly why they do just the primer for sure.

this is why whenever i get parts from a body shop i make sure they thoroughly sand the primer.


back on topic. its AWESOME that Acura does this. good to finally see them putting some effort into their paint.

phile

I've been meaning to point this out, but when the Legend first came, I think Acura was bragging about X amount of layers of paint it had vs. the competition. In fact, some of the old Legends I see driving around have paint finishes that still shine.

SiGGy

no

It's from the paint too. Any good aftermarket/custom paintjob gets wet sanded after each coat.

Orange peel comes from the sprayer and the way the paint adheres to the metal. Granted wet sanding the primer will help adhere the paint to a smoother surface. The paint will still have orange peel unless it's too is wetsanded. As no sprayer evenly coats the surface...

I have personally hand painted 6 cars, I'm well aware of what wet sanding does... not to mention grew up haning out at a body shop owned by a friends family.



That's a HUGE mistake, then the paint spray (orange peel) on those panels will not match the other ones. Matching the original spray from the factory is hard enough, like matching a faded red car. Having them make the panel painted better than the others would really show itself. Unless it was the plastic bumper... or side skirts.

I don't care. I was correcting him on his statments made. And others on their misconceptions.



enjoy

codyt01

Siggy,


My sincerest apologies for seemingly misreading your post, and assuming this was still a free country and one could disagree with someone and a friendly discussion would ensue...

My question to you now is, who wrote this part of your post then:

i just read they only wet sand the primer coat. Not suprising as it would be very labor itensive to wetsand between all layers of paint.

so it'll still have orange peel....

My disagreeing comment was was on the RL having Orange Peel since it was only the primer coats they sanded. The RL does not have ANY Orangle Peel at all. So if that part of you post was from somewhere else, I'm sorry for miss reading that it was your statement. That is what I'm disagreeing with!

Buy damn, I guess you can't disagree with anyone here or you get slammed!

As for the shiny statement, I feel a car without Orange Peel is shiner due to the truer reflections. But you have the right to disagree with that if you feel it's doesn't shine more but rather only reflects light in a truer way.

Either way, it looks much better than one that isn't wetsanded and I think that is the point we both were attempting to get across.

soopa

SiGGy

Oh agree, it looks a lot better. Absoloutely no argument there. The RL does still have orange peel though; I have test driven one and looked it over /w a fine tooth comb. I considered buying one until i saw it in person, didn't do anything for me. To get rid of it completely you *have* to colorsand the paint (way too labor intensive for a mainstream production car) It just has a lot orange peel than other cars do. (you can see even the dodge viper below has very little orange peel. It too is has the primer sanded)

Most people don't have an eye for details like that. I got into a conversation like this many moons ago and created a webpage (url below) because people argued up and down their car didn't have orange peel. I'll add the new RL in next time I go to the dealer for maintenance on my CLS.

http://24.221.30.40/~cls/orange_peel/

I didn't personally insult anyone. Nor do I mind arguing. Soopa enjoys poking at me. However he really doesn't know where alot of my opinions come from I've done a lot more work than just the puter business.

It's all in good fun to me. I enjoy debates. If I personally upset anyone I'm sorry and applogize. My only remarks would be don't lose sleep over a internet forum. There's plenty enough in life to worry about already.

acurafox

I have noticed the difference in my own driveway, when I park my Celestial Silver RL next to my Starlight Silver Odyssey (virtually the same shade and tint of silver), and the Odyssey's paint looks almost as good as it did new. I may try to take a picture and see if the comparison is noticeable in a photo.

2veloce

It already has for me. My rear bumper paint was damaged by a another driver. No damage other than the paint and the bright trim piece. So far I am pleased with the repaint on the bumper.

stokdgs

And we always sanded the primer with a guide coat on it, to help find any high/low spots and fix them before painting. The amount of paint sprayed and the amount of thinner and type of thinner - slow or fast drying, and lastly, the skill of the painter, determined how smooth the coats of paint flowed on, and if done correctly, the finished product would be very smooth with little or no orange peel, taking into consideration the condition of the rest of the vehicle's paint, so it would match it. If we really wanted to make car look great, we would wetcolor sand with 1500-2000 grit 3m paper, the final topcoat, then buff it with finer and finer compounds and the results would be like what you see on very smooth paint with say, Zaino applied on it.. I too have a new '05 RL in Opulent Blue Pearl, and the paint looks pretty darn smooth - smoother than my wife's '04 MDX in Sage Brush Pearl. However, after using Zaino ZPC Fusion cleaner on the MDX followed with 6 coats of Z-2 Pro with the ZFX , her MDX paint is very very clear, and the metallic colors below all really pop out at you in the sun.. We took it to the Acura Dealer and compared it to any of their new MDX's and it blew them all away. I am planning to do the same thing to the new RL and will post pics when done. Good luck with your project. DanF

scottj

Yeah, I grew up in a body shop and spent many hours smoothing the last coat of brown primer dust coated over the earlier gray primer so you could see what was going on. Orange peel happens when the paint can't flow/settle smoothly before it starts to harden.

The effect of orange peel or other surface irregularities is cumulative so the fact that the RL primer is hand-sanded means that the paint layers have a better starting point and, presto, we get smoother paint. No mystery there.

Dan, of course your MDX looks great. You've smoothed out any irregularities with Zaino! That's a lot of surface to cover on an MDX.

stokdgs

The MDX has more surface area than anything else I have ever owned! I used a PorterCable 7626 and white for the Z-PC fusion and black foampads for the Z2. It still took hours, and while it used more product that by hand with the Zaino foam pad, I used the 6" pad from the buffer to do the wheels a few times, and now I have lots less brake dust to deal with. Agree with you 100%. I got to shoot a few cars before I left the business and its all in how you get the products to flow, without causing runs. The wetter, the smoother finish which equals alot less finish work to get it out the door. The greedy boss would try to run 20+ vehicles on us a week, so me and the painter were always busy, and we got to also clean out the cars after and wash/wax them up. Remember those days?? Take care, DanF