Expert: Gary - 7/23/2008

Question
I do some custom work on cars for a few nfl guys. I recently am just finishing up on a car and when working on the window regulators i slammed the door and.... long story short i made two nice pings in door.
Anyway my issue is I have taken a pinging hammer and flattened the dings, filled them, blocked them (bout the size of a half dollar total) and now i am ready to "try" to blend.
Paint is a silver mettalic, base coat/clear. When i start painting with my airbrush it is always too dark around the edges . The center of repair is good. What am I doing wrong??

Answer
Hi Brian,

What is happening is the metallics in the silver is laying differently around the edges because of the blend. What you can do to fix it is spray a coat of blending clear over the repair beyond where you will be painting. This will allow all the metallics to lay the same way because they are being sprayed on the same fresh blending clear. Once you're finished you will just need to clear-coat the panel.

Most major paint manufacturers make a blending clear. PPG's has two products that would work great for you. DBC500 blending clear or DX840 Blendease.