Chip Repair techniques?

[lloyd3]

My old Dodge truck benefited from a spate of cleanup work here recently.  

Instead of replacing a number of worn vehicles with newer models, we opted to spend a little money to spruce up the vehicles we already had and try to get a few more years out of each.  This decision was buttriced by having a new driver in the family (!) who will likely have his struggles in Denver's newer (and meaner) traffic.  I had great success with chip repair on the wife's 2004 Volvo, so-much-so that I though I'd try my new-found skills out on my 2001 Off-roadster 1500.  Almost 20-years and 120k miles of wear and tear had freckled the hood and front fenders (and the rest of the body) with plenty of chips.  First, I lightly sanded each chip to eliminate the high spots and rough edges and cleaned the crater with lacquer thinner. I then applied the paint-chip kit paint to fill the bottom of the pit and then (after the paint had dried), I filled the rest with the clear-coat dabber. I waited the prescribed 48-hours and then wet sanded the site to lower the excess clear-coat material to match the surface of the paint.  Most of the time this worked pretty well. It is, however, easy to sand through the original clear-coat, and sometimes the whole repaired plug comes out when sanding. No big deal, you just start over.  Because of the amount of pits I was dealing with, this process took several hours (and days) to complete. The truck does look much better (there were some pretty egregious scratches and dings to deal with). But...what I have found, is that I can't always get everything to blend back in to the original paint.  Sometimes the repaired site looks blotchy, even after several attempts with compound and wax.

Any suggestions for getting a more-even appearance?

[GMP440]

   The only way to get the paint chip repair to blend is to use an air brush, like the ones used to paint scale models.  It gives a more even finish that makes the repair less noticeable than
when the touch up is done with a small brush to fill in the chip. 
  Another thing you can do is take a small painted piece to a paintshop and they can color match the sample by using a spectrometer camera and mix  up a batch that will be very close. 

[lloyd3]

Well...ok.  Some of the repairs I've done have gone so-well even I can't find them after a bit. Generally the problem arises when you get several chips in close proximity and end up working on them as a group. This is when I get the problem of matching. You end up sanding a bigger area and then it seem lighter or "blotchy". I have gone back and really focused on these areas with more compound and greater pressure on the buffing and it's helps quite a bit about half of the time. I find that letting the compound and then the cleaner wax fully dry first seems to be the ticket.  Not always, but usually.