hey everyone ive just painted a tailgate for a friends ute

its got a bit of ornange peel and id like to know what grit sandpaper i should start with and finish

and how long do i have to wait till i can start sanding it. just painted the tailgate 1hr ago

and what compound and polish i should use

was looking at 3M products

thanks Allan

This is my personal preference - pros may go about it differently.

I wait until overnight before sanding any clear or primer. This gives it time to finish setting up and makes it less likely to tear/rip if you sand too aggressively. Light nib sanding and prepping, I wait a few hours before redo - but complete sanding I wait overnight.

What grit you start with depends on how bad the peel is. If you have horrible orange peel, it might take P600 - P800 to get a good cut on it. If you have average peel, most guys start out with P1200 - P2000. I prefer to wet sand and check my work often. It makes the paper last longer and seems to cut faster.

ok great and when colour sanding is it the same as blocking,using a cross pattern

and ive got the tailgate ready for sanding. now this may sound silly because im very new to the panting scene. ive put around the edges of the panel masking tape to cover the edges and stop burning through, is this wrong or is there a better method

thanks again Allan

How many coats of clear do you have on that tailgate?
If only one or two you must be extremely careful not to sand through and should use a finer grit to start.
When I color sand each grit goes at a 45 degree angle to the previous grit so I can see when all of the scratches have been removed.
Yes, you want to use a block.

its a solid colour so the paint shop told me not to worry about clear coat

ive started with 1500 and i can see where ive knoced down the peel and the area's i need to work more