You can always try the Clear Plasti-Dip for a bra. Can't hurt and it's tough and not too expensive.
Keep us posted if you try it.

 

Snoopy and hyperv6

Yeah orange peel is when the guy shooting the paint gets a little too close to the metal he is painting but not close enough to cause blistering.
Blistering ruins the paint job. Blistering is when air gets trapped under the paint and the only way to repair it is to completely strip or sand the paint down to the metal. Hard repair.

We had a little tool that measured the thickness of the paint. Checking orange peel the tool would be all over the place because the paint is thick and thin. I have forgotten it's name but it worked with magnets and only on ferrous metal. We sprayed lacquer back then.

When I worked at the Buick starting 1965 we still sprayed by hand, no robots. Buick, if you can believe this, (in Flint, anyway) didn't have robot sprayers until the 1979 model year. (actually the bodies were built and painted at a different location (Fisher) and trucked to Buick. Fisher Body had robot sprayers so the body was robot sprayed and front was hand sprayed.

Painting applications are much different today than when I was there.


Boydie Back in the Saddle.................

 

OH I am well aware of some of the poor paint systems GMY had in the 70's. It is amazing some of the paint lasted as well as it did back then. LOL!

It was not till the Corvette was in KY that 95% of them did not have to have body work or paint work before delivery.

 

If my memory serves correctly, 1979 was the first year GM, and others were mandated to use water based paint. I ordered a 79 Cadallic, and the paint on it was, shall we say interesting. Had that car for at least 12 years, and as I recall the paint did hold up fairly well.

 

Not sure when they started using water base. I left in 1980 and went on skilled trades.

Dupont was right across the street from the paint shop then and we did a lot of experimental painting, electrostatic spraying, water base, etc. I was thinking they went to water base at Buick when they started to build the front wheel drive models. But 1979 sounds right. There is a chance different divisions started water base at different times.

Boydie Back in the Saddle.......................

 

I think the water based was mostly in the 80's and up. GM started to have some primer issues with some color back then. Silver and Maroons were at risk as the primer would fail. Other held up well.