Paint job

Anyone else here have a Honda CR-V (mine is a 2000) with the paint, or it appears the clear coat peeling off. Mine is red and the roof looks a milky white now. It is also starting to happen on the hood with a few spots. The weird thing is when it rains, it returns to the red color. Can anyone explain that trick of nature?

Wax your car regularly and the roof will appear its normal red color at all times.

The milky appearance is caused by the irregular surface of the worn paint areas. The original clear coat, and subsequent wax layer, smooths out the microscopic irregularities that cause light to be reflected in random paths. A temporary layer of rainwater has the same smoothing effect.

Trying to apply wax over damaged clear-coat may not have the desired effect…Even rocks don’t last forever…Did you think automotive paint would? But if you keep it waxed and in a garage it will last as long as you are likely to own the car even if that turns out to be 20-30 years…

A body shop can easily restore the paint to look new. I did some good work on an 87 Mazda truck that was “good enough to wax”. It made a big difference. I just got a new rear bumper for my GMC and it was worth the money to get rid of the rusted out old one.

As for why water makes it look better - it temporarily smooths over the irregularities. Try it with a rock - it’s surprising how good some rocks looks when wet (granite, for example).

So is the white the primer showing underneath?

You should see the roof on my 2000 Minivan, it is down to bare metal on the rear half.

The white is the clear coat delaminating from the color coat underneath. There is no way to correct this except refinish the color coat and clear coat. It is a paint failure. I’ve tried just clearing over some that wasn’t too bad but doesn’t come out very well and with the cost of materials, don’t waste the clear. It needs to be repainted.

Can I go to Earl Scheib’s grandson where he’ll “paint my car for $99.95”? In other words, can I just do a cheap paint job — maybe black over the red? and will it last?

Cheap paint job’s an option, just do NOT change color, doesn’t work out in most all cases. You might drop by several local body shops, get some bids.

If you are considering “Earl The Pearl” you might as well do it yourself with a case of quality (NAPA) spray cans…

Remember…With ANY paint job, it’s the prep-work that is 85% of the job. Shooting the paint is the EASY part…

The car is 12 years old and NOT considered a “Classic”…so why would you want to put an expensive paint job on it. There’s cheap and then there’s CHEAP…Maaco is about as cheap as I’d go…And DON’T change the color…It’s a lot harder to do and will cost more.