Sorry I know this has been beat to death but I am thinking about trying to niteshade my taillights on my 04 f150. I am thinking i'm going to tape off the back up light. I was just curious for those who tape off the taillight do you peel the tape off then spray clear or do you spray clear, let it dry then take the tape off? Also do I just sand then paint? I'd like to try to avoid wet sanding if possible. Thanks

 

Wet sanding is so easy and will take you 5 mins there is really no reason to avoid it

Mask off the reverse lights and spray the nightshade, remove tape, then hit the whole lights with clear. wet sand with 2000 then buff it with polish to really make use of the clear coat you just layed on. But it won't make much of a difference whether you remove the tape before or after the clear coat spray to answer your original question.

 

Yeah you want clear over the tails after removing the tape. If you put clear on first and then pulled the tape off you would screw up the clear coat.

 

ok perfect, after I made this post I did a bunch of searching on the net. Just to make sure I got this right i'll wet sand with 800, spray the night shade(I plan on 2 or 3 coats).Then clear(3 or 4 coats) then wet sand with 2000 grit then buff and wax? Also do I add soap to the water I use for wetsanding?

 

Yes put a few drops of dish-washing liquid soap in the water for lubricity. I'd highly recommend taking your time on these and doing them right the first time. I also lightly wet-sanded between each step with 2000 grit to prevent orange peel.

 

ok, i'm deffinantly going to take my time. So should I do one coat of ns then wet sant with 2000 then do the other coat, then wet sand with 2000 then clear?

 

you can pile on the coats and do a more aggressive wetsand at the end... and then repeat for the clear.

 

I dont want them to dark, i'm thinkin 3 coats at the most

 

3 coats will definitely get them almost black, and the wetsand/buff will most likely remove 1.5 coats at the least.

 

You can do it either way. I've done both and have found it easier to take my time rather than throw it all on at once. Wet-sanding between each individual coat prevents any build-up of orange peel or surface roughness. It doesn't take as much sanding to get each individual coat smooth as opposed to doing it all at the end. If you do one coat and don't smooth it out it will just build up more and more each coat, so like bambo mentioned you would end up removing half of what you put on there just to sand it smooth at the end.

3 coats will not necessarily be black unless you lay it on thick. Keep it light and take your time.

 

ok cool, how long to I wait before I sand after spraying?( how long to I let each coat dry??) I really appreciate the help guys

 

It doesn't take too long, probably about 10 minutes after each coat and you should be good to sand. I think that's about what I did. You don't want to sand until it's dry to the touch (no fingerprint smudges or tackiness).




edit:

Here's an idea of what you can do when you take your time. It does have a learning curve..took me two tries on these lights but I had rushed it the first time. First two are in direct sunlight....third is what they normally look like.

 

OK awsome, my paint is supposed to be in thirsday so i'm going to attempt it then. Thanks for the replys!

 

By the way your truck looks killlller

 

Here's how they turned out. Not perfect but not to bad for my first attemp. That smuch is just dust. Thanks for the help guys