Making brand new trim for our cars!

seems to have worked well with the matte. Once it sets ill do a quick sand apply some satin clear

Jeremy R. said:

Which Matte did you use? Is the satin clear from the same manufacture?
I had some poor results with clear this past summer. Ruined one of my pieces ( not trim ) Fortunately it was an undercar piece that was cleared for extra stone/corrosion protection.
Leaving the trim in trim paint may be the way to go to make touch ups on the car easier. Remember the bit about the new paint melting into the previous layer after a wet sand? That MAY be do-able with the trim on the car if there's no clear coat to interfere. Just a thought.

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The paint I used on this piece is Spray Max matte trim paint, sticks well and doesn't do any of the funny stuff that other trim paints were doing. The satin clear (which I haven't used yet) is from the same manufacture and its a 2 part paint so it should be better than what I was using previously. I was thinking about having the customer paint it a while back but I saw that everyone else was doing that and decided not to. I wanted to keep it rubber with no paint because it would be better against fading and paint chips, and it would save time for customer as they would not have to paint it. Also saves me time because once its molded I would be able to run multiple sets a day. One of the biggest benefits about having a rubber piece over painted is that if someone was to door ding your car you wouldn't have to repaint the piece again. Instead you would quickly just wet sand and polish it by hand and it would be back to normal. I was able to hit my rubber ones with a hammer real hard and it barely left a dent. Ill take some videos tomorrow of me destroying some old prototypes for your viewing pleasure and also to show that I'm not lying haha. I also tried out your 2 thin layers after a wet sand it worked like a charm so thank you! I'm hoping that this new clear will work better with the silicone and not cause as many issues. I couldn't find the brand you recommended sadly locally but I did grab 2 cans online that should be coming soon so ill keep you updated on how that turns out. Thanks again for the help it was a gamer changer for me


also the Longevity of the clear does not matter at all because once I mold the piece it gets destroyed, just needs to last long enough to be molded

Came up with a plan to have all the pieces perfect, had to Frankenstein a bunch together but its better than what I had before

Jeremy R. said:

OK, took me a minute to realize that. So what you are going for is the smoothest surface finish to get the smoothest insides on the moulds.

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For a mirror like finish I found that using a fine polishing compound with a buffing wheel works wonders. If not a 2500 wet sand and a quick polish should be all it needs. This is how shiny I had them before I decided to go with satin finish

GedMc said:

Hi Fritz, hope all is ok, any update on how the moulds are coming on.
cheers.

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Nothing too crazy but I have started painting them. Along with fixing little flaws