'68 Coronet R/T wrote:My guess is the 12" long sanding block is too long and flexes in the middle. All the scratches seem to be going in one direction which means they weren't removed when using the next finer grit.
I use a small piece of oak about 5" long and 1 1/4" wide and 3/4" thick for the initial wet sanding to remove orange people and any urethane wave.
The process is to work a 12" x 12" area at a time. I keep a spray bottle of water with a drop or two of dish soap in it to keep the surface wet. I also keep a microfiber towel to wipe the surface from time to time to check my progress.
Next I use a soft block (like this: https://www.amazon.com/Motor-Guard-SB-1 ... B003WUYG1E) with 1500 grit and work the panel in the same manner as described above. Repeat with 2000.
If you only have a few places with those scratches showing, try wet sanding them again with 1500 and see if the scratches go away. Then hit the area with 2000 and follow up with your buffer and Meguairs M-100 compound. I start the buffer working at low rpms to spread the compound and then jump it up to 2000 or so for buffing.
The scratches are actually going different directions and are all over. I have a soft block like that link you sent, I used it today and didnt use the 12" block like I did yesterday.
Today I started with 1000 grit on the soft pad then 1500 then 2000 then 2500. I used the wool pad with M100 then the black 3m foam pad with 3M machine polish and when wiping off the final residue with a clean microfiber towel it revealed the scratches.
I then started all over . This time carefully using 800 grit to get out the deeper scratches then 1000 the 1500 then 2000 then I used my 5" DA with a 3000 grit disk and water proceeded by the wool pad, polishing pad. I found it looked way better and i had very few scratches after using the DA. BUT now I had tiny swirl marks cut in different areas.
I then took a small piece of 2000 grit paper and water and sanded by hand with no block in the areas with the someone deep swirl marks followed by 2500 grit by hand and it removed the swirl marks, then I hit it with the wool pad M100, and polish again only to find no swirl marks but now long scratches all over going random directions.
I'm starting to really get worried that if I keep sanding and cutting with compound that I might burn through. I should also mention for my first time cutting and buffing doing it on white paint seems to make it really hard to see verses like a dark color. Do you recommend a product to put over the scratches and or do they even make such a thing that actually fills the many scratch grooves or is it all about sanding more clear down to level out the scratches?