Dr. Colorchip - what am I doing wrong?

[scandata]

What am I doing wrong? This scratch is on my trunk.
I followed the instructions to the letter. After four applications there's barely an improvement.
Below are the before and after pics. Any advice would be great

[OmniCamaro]

Yeah I had the same problem. My take on it is that it just doesn't work. Waste of money.


Camaro addict!

[Joe M 2012 2SS]

Dr Colorchip is designed for small chips. It works very well on them.

That's a nasty scratch Mike. Is it through the clear coat? Did you compound first to remove some of it?

It's hard to tell from the pic how deep it is, but it may wetsand out if not too deep.

I haven't used Dr Colrchip on a scratch, but a couple medium sized chips. What I did was to first use IPA to clean the area, then using the brush that came with the kit, put paint directly in it, instead of using the dab, smear method.

Wait 15-20 minutes, as it dries it will settle into the area. It takes it a little while longer to dry when you use more then the dab/smear method. Apply more paint if needed, and wait 15-20 minutes again. Once the paint is above the surface after drying, this is what you want.

Wrap the white cloth around some type of card. I had a old flexible laminated card that worked well. Using one of the 2 sides that's smaller, apply seal act to the cloth on this edge, then very lighty use the card/cloth to level the surface. It's easy to use too much pressure, and pull the paint out, so if you do, just start over.

Since it's in 3 parts, you may want to do just one part first until you get it right.

Raise the trunk lid so the paint wont run out of it when your applying paint.

Don't apply any wax or sealant over this area for at least 3 days.

[terry_b]

Sorry to go off topic... How does Dr. colorchip hold up? My front end has been blasted and is full of rock chips, is this a good - if temporary - fix?

[Joe M 2012 2SS]

Originally Posted by terry_b

Sorry to go off topic... How does Dr. colorchip hold up? My front end has been blasted and is full of rock chips, is this a good - if temporary - fix?

Here is how to use it on chips, it's great for small chips. It won't come off after curing unless you use compound over it

Go to 7:02 of this video.

[scandata]

Originally Posted by Joe M 2012 2SS

Dr Colorchip is designed for small chips. It works very well on them.

That's a nasty scratch Mike. Is it through the clear coat? Did you compound first to remove some of it?

It's hard to tell from the pic how deep it is, but it may wetsand out if not too deep.

I haven't used Dr Colrchip on a scratch, but a couple medium sized chips. What I did was to first use IPA to clean the area, then using the brush that came with the kit, put paint directly in it, instead of using the dab, smear method.

Wait 15-20 minutes, as it dries it will settle into the area. It takes it a little while longer to dry when you use more then the dab/smear method. Apply more paint if needed, and wait 15-20 minutes again. Once the paint is above the surface after drying, this is what you want.

Wrap the white cloth around some type of card. I had a old flexible laminated card that worked well. Using one of the 2 sides that's smaller, apply seal act to the cloth on this edge, then very lighty use the card/cloth to level the surface. It's easy to use too much pressure, and pull the paint out, so if you do, just start over.

Since it's in 3 parts, you may want to do just one part first until you get it right.

Raise the trunk lid so the paint wont run out of it when your applying paint.

Don't apply any wax or sealant over this area for at least 3 days.

Thanks Joe, I'll give your method a try. The scratch is all the way to the primer, so if this doesn't look well enough I'll just get it painted. It's only the vertical part of the trunk, so it shouldn't cost too much.

The steps you listed vary quite a bit from the instructions on the box, so it's definitely worth a shot. It says to put the paint NEXT to the scratch and smear it across. Putting it directly into the scratch makes more sense. The instructions also say to let it dry 2 - 5 minutes (but no more than an hour). Maybe it just didn't dry well enough the fist time (first four times, really!) that I did it.

I'll follow up with results.

[Joe M 2012 2SS]

Originally Posted by scandata

Thanks Joe, I'll give your method a try. The scratch is all the way to the primer, so if this doesn't look well enough I'll just get it painted. It's only the vertical part of the trunk, so it shouldn't cost too much.

The steps you listed vary quite a bit from the instructions on the box, so it's definitely worth a shot. It says to put the paint NEXT to the scratch and smear it across. Putting it directly into the scratch makes more sense. The instructions also say to let it dry 2 - 5 minutes (but no more than an hour). Maybe it just didn't dry well enough the fist time (first four times, really!) that I did it.

I'll follow up with results.

The directions are for small chips, which is what Dr Colorchip is designed for. Before I got my rock guards for my front tires, I got several chips on the doors and "gill" areas.

The couple medium sized chips I had just didn't do well with the dab/smear, so I tried a different process. I put the paint in the chip with the brush to fill, waited double the time, it still pulled out.

Did some research on chip repair and incorporated the use of the card shown in the video. The sweet spot for me was 15-20 minutes of dry time based on the amount of paint I used. Yours could be shorter or longer, depending on how much paint is needed to fill.

The filling is the easy part once you get the dry time right.

Leveling is where you need a very light touch and patience. It took me around 20 minutes to level, using the cloth wrapped around the card, just barely even going over the area, then checking it after each pass with my swirl finder light.

I had 1 corner of 1 chip that had a tiny bit of area below the surface, so I added a little more paint, and continued until I couldn't see it anymore. Is it 100% perfect? No I'd say 95%. No one would ever notice it unless I showed it to them with the light.

You know how OCD I am. If I could see it from 1 foot away, without the use of light, it wasn't good enough!

I still have a chip that someone had repaired before I bought the car, on the hood, that they just slapped the paint on and left the blob, it really pisses me off, I used some 3000 grit glued to the end of a pencil eraser, followed with compound, but it still didn't level to my satisfaction, it's so cured Langka Blob eliminator won't do anything for it. It is what it is.

[scandata]

OK, I followed Joe's instructions and it looks much better. I had to keep repeating the process about 20 times (allowing less dry time with each pass), seeing a slight improvement each time. In the second pic you can see that there's also a pair of tiny scratches to the right just above the bowtie. Those will need some buffing to level off the edges of the scratch before they'll look better, but that will have to wait for another day.

For anyone else using this product for scratches (rather than for chips), I'd suggest throwing away the instructions that come with it and following Joe's method. It seemed to work a lot better.



(AS SEEN FROM A TYPICAL VIEWER'S DISTANCE)

[Joe M 2012 2SS]

Nice job Mike!

Be sure not to go over this area with compound, it will pull the paint out!

Dr colorchip recommends waiting at least 3 days before waxing or sealing over it, since you used more paint then the normal process, give it a week.

[xc_SS/RS]

Yeah I got it to work decently on a few chips on my car. One was through to the metal and it could stand some more to touch it up but it looks way better. The key I think is to make sure you have something extremely flat to use to smooth the paint over the chip. But don't apply much pressure with the piece because then it will pull paint out of the chip. Plus it seems like the paint shrinks kind of when it dries.

Looks great though! Good job on fixing it

[scandata]

Originally Posted by Joe M 2012 2SS

Nice job Mike!

Be sure not to go over this area with compound, it will pull the paint out!

Dr colorchip recommends waiting at least 3 days before waxing or sealing over it, since you used more paint then the normal process, give it a week.

Will do. Does mean never polish that area? How long before I can wash it?

[Joe M 2012 2SS]

It actually rained the day after I did mine, I called Dr Colorchip to see if this was an issue, they said no, and that I could wash next day if I wanted. Dr colorchip dries fast, but cures slow.

Finishing polish is fine over it. I had a very small chip I had used it on near to "the blob" on the hood that I had forgotten about, when I used Megs D300 it pulled most of the paint out, had to re apply. This was several months after I had used the Dr Colorchip. Have used Carpro Reflect over the whole car and no issues with it pulling paint out.

[AllBlackSS]

On Dr Color Chips official website they have the instructions and it says to brush the paint in the chip then smear it with your hand wearing a glove. It says to wait 1 minute then begin using the blending solution. I have found that it is much easier to get the excess paint off after waiting 1 minute then it is waiting 10+ minuets.

https://www.drcolorchip.com/demo/how-it-works.php