Well my 6 year old SS Cobalt is finally showing some sign of "sun damage" It's not THAT bad but it's really annoying after how much I cared about the paint on this car. Is there any DIY ways out there on how I can fix the problem? It's mainly on the hood, and the top near the sun roof.

Like any products from O'reilly (Kragen) Auto-Zone etc.. Someone told me there was a commercial for a product thats sold at Home-Depot and O'reilly but doesn't remember the name of it.


Anyone know what I can do?

 

Get the car professionally buffed and detailed. It will be well worth your money

 

Buffing does wonders. Then get a fresh coat of wax on that bitch.

I just pulled of a vinyl stripe and I can see how faded my paint is. Not sure what to do now. LOL.

Going to need a buff and probably still have to replace the stripes. :/

 

Best reason not to put stickers on your paint unless you plan on keeping them there forever.

 

will a buff fix this or need re clear?

 

as long as the clear coat is not "peeling" buffing will fix it. Hell I've seen cars with no clear coat at all get buffed to a very nice shine.

 

You can buff the car yourself and save a ton of money. I just just got into it myself and I can tell you it is hard work but it does pay off.

 

no clear even? wont the paint mess up

 

All depends how bad the damage is but yea lots of buffing and waxing does wonders. you have any pics of how bad it is?

 

depends on the type of paint. some are made to not use a clear coat.

 

I've been wanting to buff my car this summer. Is there any dangers like swirl marks or anything like that or is that something of the past?

 

swirl marks are a product of scratching ur clear coat by washing it unproperly, such as drive through washes and stuff. a good polishing job takes out most swirl marks just make sure u research and take ur time to do it right, and do a good coat or two of wax afterward and ur good

 

a bad buff job though can leave severe swirl marks in the paint, far worse than you could ever do by washing. I see our crappy body shop at work do it all the time. Luckily they can almost always be taken out by rebuffing. Swirls like this typically happen with poor experience or lack of proper effort on a rotary buffer. On a random orbital I think it's much harder to do, but I've never tried an orbital so idk. I know rotarys are very easy to screw up if you don't know what you're doing.

 

Tommy, how well would a good claybar/hand polish with compound/wax work on a sunburnt car?

 

It should help out a good bit. Depends how bad your car is. The claybar pulls out stuff embedded in the paint, the polish brings the deep color look back, and then the wax obviously protects. Using a compound probably wouldn't hurt either.

 

It will help depending on how strong of a compound you go with, but considering how difficult it is to keep even pressure by hand, you may end up getting some spots that come out better than others. With a buffer you can achieve a nice even finish. Also some of the best compounds out there can only be used with a buffer. By hand is great to a point, but it really just depends on how bad the car is. Either way it will be a noticeable difference.

 

Okay, sorry I haven't been posting and thank you guys for the help here are some pictures of the damage:

Hood:



Sun roof:



Top:



Man, I didn't realize how bad the top was. I feel almost ashamed of myself to let my baby go out this way. I think I should just get a new paint job no? I don't own a buffer and I know they aren't that cheap but I wouldn't have any idea on what to do. I think it's just better off to pay someone to do it.

btw would "Nu-Finish" products work by any chance? That was the product that they told me about. but I have no clue. I trust you guys because well you all have a cobalt well majority of you do and this is a cobalt forum and you guys take care of your cars and such. Thanks again guys!

 

That clear is etching and even a heavy buff will be hard to completely remove it. I have buffed on cars without a clear before with my porter cable (Wouldn't get hot enough to burn a clear coat) and they turn out nice, but after the first rain the car looks beat up again.

I would advice picking up some good rubbing compound and hitting it with a cutting pad (Looks like cones on the bottom of the pad, usually white/ivory in color). You will have to decide if you are satisfied once it's been buffed, I can tell you from experience based on the amount of bold white color, the clear has etched to the color and it will display a line.

May consider picking up some gloss black vinyl or even some 3M Carbon fiber vinyl for the roof just to have a cheap fix.

 

Sounds good I'll see what I can do!




EDIT: I have noticed though when I do wash my car they vanish. Is this normal?

 

Try some NuFinish on dat bitch

 

Looks like it's been showing signs for awhile


Well to be honest with you, this happened to my 1994 Integra LSVTEC (same spots as you) and it sucked. The only thing I could think of doing after a lot of reseach is to get it reclear coated and repainted. It sucks. The hood I ended up just getting a carbon fiber hood and the sunroof and hatch I had someone repaint it for cheap.

Good luck

 

You got me. sigh.................


I'm thinking about just getting it re-painted. I went ahead and bought some "Meguiar's Ultimate Compound" didn't work. Worked maybe a little bit but not what the dude told me! "Yeah, that will definitely get it out man I use it." smh I guess I'll try some NuFinish but I doubt It'll fix it.