Yesterday Tnfalconer sent me a PM. I thought there was a lot of good info in his question and my reply so I asked him if I could post his PM here.
If any experienced body people read this and see an error PLEASE feel free to speak up. Now is the time to correct things
Resbum
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Tnfalconer
I worked with a friend at a body shop for a little while and applied many Raptor bedliners. Is the application of primer on a smooth surface not counterproductive to applying Raptor? The surface is supposed to have tooth so that the bedliner has something to bite to. Do you plan to rough the primer after doing such a nice job on it? Raptor won't stick for very long to a smooth shiny surface. I actually did some testing with this while there, inadvertantly. We cut the paint to metal with a nylon abrasive cup, the rougher the better. It will stay forever.
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Thanks for sharing the first-hand working experience with Raptor. It goes exactly with everything I've learned about the stuff. From what I've learned, if you apply the Raptor wet-on-wet to the primer, after it's flashed, it will chemically bind to the primer well. However, you can't apply the Tiger seal to the primer until it's completely off-gassed. And, I don't completely trust just chemically binding. So, I am going to have to rough up the primer before applying the Raptor. That's actually what I spent the major part of yesterday doing and was going to be a part of my next post to the build thread.
Here are the materials I'm using and the sequence I'm going to follow to apply everything.
Materials:
2 gallons U-Tech E380/381 (grey/black) epoxy primer
4 tubes U-POL Tiger Seal (seam sealer)
2 quarts OMNI MBC paint WITH binder
2 quarts OMNI MBC paint WITHOUT binder to tint the Raptor
2 gallons U-POL Raptor Bedliner
Sequence:
1- E380 primer was designed to go over media blasted surfaces. Any surface that wasn't blasted I stripped to bare metal and left a 120 grit texture.
2- Let the primer cure, then thoroughly scuff with 180 grit. There will be no shiny areas left. I also give it a light skuff with 80 grit.
3- Apply Tiger seal to all seams.
Note- This next step was recommended to help, 1) Get the color coverage without using so much of the Raptor (save some $$$) 2) Help give the Raptor something to chemically bind to, as well as, mechanically bind to.
4- Using the OMNI MBC paint WITH binder, shoot a light coat of paint onto the roughed up primer. It will mechanically bind to the primer.
5- After the OMNI MBC WITH binder flashes, but while it’s still wet, shoot the tinted (OMNI WITHOUT binder) Raptor top coat. The initial light coat of paint will still leave some of the rough primer surface exposed for the Raptor to mechanically bind to. The Raptor will also chemically bind to the still wet initial light coat of paint.
I’m new enough to bodywork/paint to not know if this theory is true, but in thinking it out, it does make sense that this will help everything mechanically and chemically bind together.
Again, if any experienced body people read this and see an error PLEASE feel free to speak up. Now is the time to correct things
Resbum