I am looking to get some ideas about what can be done with AkzoNobel waterborne. I am an old school painter having shot thousands of gallons of paint, but next to nothing with the paints of today here in California.

I am curious as to what can be done because I am seeing stuff at the shop that frankly is nuts that I wouldn't think of letting happen when I was painting. Things like poor blends mostly, but also color match.

Just curious to chat with someone using this stuff outside where I work. I answers I get there I don't think are accurate.

Brian

Go to Refinish Network, a site that mainly consists of professionals and shop owners. Some shoot waterborne daily in high production shops..

Thanks Scott.

Brian

Hi Brian,I am a production painter who has been using Sikkens Autowave for the last 6 and a half years.I would be happy to answer any questions you have or try to offer some help.You can PM if you wish or I would even be willing to talk to you on the phone to keep it on the down low if you prefer.

Jayson, I thank you so much for your response and saved it, forgetting to get back to you. Anyway, I forgot because I talked to someone here in town and got basically what I was after. You see I have painted a lot of solvent based, I was nuts on color matching, and blending to create an indetectable job, that was my goal every time. I would back tape a body line on a fender that was two inches from the hood and then apply color, remove the back tape and scuff the edge and then blend in that two inch and make an indetectable repair with a perfect match to the hood.

This is an extreme and seldom needed process of course because you just simply blend the adjacent panel in most cases.

I was mostly looking for just how easy is it to blend this stuff? I am disgusted by the lack of blending skills I am seeing and want to scream to tell you the truth. They will blend across an entire door bringing the blend all the way to the end so that door doesn't match the one behind it! They are under the impression that you have to blend the blend out for much further than you really need to.

I am under the impression that matching the colors would be tough because of how strong the toners are, am I right about this? I know color "matching" seems to have turned into a picking the right alternate from the deck more than really tinting a color to match, but can you fill me in a little on that?

Brian

iv been spraying waterbourn paint since 1992 all the way up to the present day.As for blending colors ,do you have in your infentry color blend.Most manafactures have a color blend for waterbourn.im using standox ,mostly on blending i use old sckool tactics,drop the presure a little bit ,bring the gun back estra inch ,and drop the last coat on over the edge of the blend.Im affraid to say its practice and using your old sckool skills.you will find so many people will say different ways ,you will have to find youe own way whats best for you.As for color matching there are so many varients now.We have service shades that are done at the factory .Some colors i have had to tint ,then loged the grams of color in my book.When things go wrong on a waterbase panel ,some times its quicker to just wash it all of ,good luck.

No worries Brian,we all get busy and forget stuff,seems the older I get the harder it is to remember.In my opinion it is much easier to blend but you have a different technique compared to solvent(I sprayed solvent for 20 years then changed to WB 7 years ago).Some systems do indeed have stron toners but autowave is not that way.You can tint it to get the color blendable(not butt match perfect) but again it is different that solvent.With WB it is a different color until it dries,so you need to do a spray out as you tint.You have to adjust,wait for it to dry,adjust etc,it can be very time consuming vs picking a solvent toner eyeballing it to get it close then spray it on/or do a sprayout.

It is much easier to pick a variant that is close to what you need and blend.I am very happy with sikkens colormatch,I work at a large independant and not very often we have trouble matching.Now if you do have a tough color you can tint and do sprayouts just like solvent,it just takes longer,but since you are writing sheets and dealing with insurance companies you know you can get paid for it.The other thing you can do is use the color camera.I know,I hated them when they first came out,they didn't work worth a darn,maybe 1 out of 10 colors.I tell you now the software has improved and there are a few ways to use the camera to get a very accurate match.You can type in the manufacturer and the code and our camera will pick the closest variant and tint it for you.Once you do a sprayout of the camera shot if it is not good enough you can take a picture of the sprayout and it will adjust it further to make it almost perfect.

In short you don't need more blend room,tinting and color match can be very acurate,more so than solvent IMO.There are excellent courses available by akzo's training center(I'm sure there is one on Cali) Autowave application/certification,tinting,advanced application dealing with tri stages(camera works great on these too)

My blend technique with WB is similar to starting a lawnmower(picture your spraygun in the hand pulling the cord) but keep your trigger pulled.The reason I find WB easier to blend is that it stays wetter longer allowing the metallics to be layed out.If you flick your wrist and feather the trigger the blend ends up grainy and dry.HTH and I will answer any other questions you have.......

I went to the color camera school and it just didn't seem to be that great to me. But that was the plan for me to shoot the colors during the damage analysis so when it got to the paint dept they would have the color.

You have had good luck with it then?

Brian

How long ago?Things have improved along with the software.They have also come out with a certain way to polish your sample that improves accuracy to over 90%.I hated the camera and never used it,I started using it a year ago after I worked with a tech guy at our shop and it made a huge difference.Im not the best at explaining things,it would be much easier to show you how we use it and the results that we get with it.We have had pretty good luck with it.

I just went a few months ago.

Brian