I think we need a thread to see how many people are seeing orange peel on their Zs. Common problem or not?

 

Maybe, but the degree varies greatly among the cars I have seen. Although it's no consolation, I saw a rather bad case on a black BMW X5.

 

I have heard a lot of people mention the water based acrylic issue. I believe that this is part of the issue. But, I do believe there are some issues with Nissan's paint process.

For example, the rear bumper on my car around the license plate area has orange peel that can be felt. Also, part of the bumper is not as shiny as others. That is totally unacceptable. Oh, did I mention I have clay bared and Zaino'd the car. I have not found a part of the car that doesn't exhibit orange peel. Plus, the bumpers and all plastic pieces don't match the metal pieces.

According to my local dealership, Nissan is sending a Paint Inspector to look at my car. I hope that Nissan is as quick to try to resolve this issue as they have been with other issues.

 

My fender was repainted by the dealer because their was a 2 inch paint defect under the clear coat. It looked like something had touched between coats. Keep in mind that when you are first in line for a car you get to enjoy the exclusivity of having the hotest ride in town, but the price of that is you are going to have to deal with a few service issues until they can work out the bugs.

 

What is orange peel?

 

I think it is the same peel that Gold Member keeps....

 

I was under the impression that " orange peel" was caused by insufficed drying time between coats. The paint layer being covered needs to still outgas the solvents to bond the solids to the underlying layers. Spraying the next layer over a still wet coat would trap the solvents or @ least delay there escape to atmosphere. Also the overlying layer wouldn't have a firm foundation of which to bond to. Kind of like building a house on back fill and wondering why the foundation is cracking 2 years later.

I believe the underlying cause is the charge to push cars off the assembly line as quick as possible. It's alot easier for a manager to cut the drying time between coats by 5 minutes as opposed to speeding up the automation or human workers to save 5 minutes of time per car.

 

I bought an informative book on automotive painting in an attempt to find out more about the problem and a possible remedy. These are the possible causes it lists:

1. Under reduction.
2. Improper thinning solvent.
3. Lack of proper flow.
4. Surface drying to fast.
5. Improper air pressure.

 

lets kill this topic!

 

I respectfully disagree. Those of us who have a worse than average case of orange peel might benefit from knowing how pervasive an issue it is, and what if anything Nissan may do to correct the bad cases.

 

I'm no expert on painting, but can't minor orange peel be solved fairly easily by spraying a couple of coats of clear over the problem area, then wet sanding/polishing to get that mirror finish? Of course, it would be safer to do this on the bumper panels (easily masked off), rather the main body panels.


This is if the dealer won't fix it.

 

One procedure I saw said to start with 2500 grit paper (wet sanding), followed by a fine cut polish, and then a finishing polish. This assumes that the clear coat is thick enough to begin with. Your approach sounds safer but more involved.
I'm getting several expert opinions from top quality paint shops later this week and having my dealer take a look at it also.
In my case, it's worse on certain areas of the car than others, and those are the only areas I care about smoothing out.

 

minimal as you can see here

 

I think that if someone is worried about the orange peel, they can do a search and find the tons of previous banter regarding this issue and come the same conclusion that the orange peel is what you get nowadays with some cars

People will disagree that their honda civic doesnt have orange peel, and I will argue that the worst OP in the universe is the $36k ford t-bird in black. And Ill add mecedes benz to that list of peely cars. Oh, but the daewoo lanos doesnt have orange peel...what can I say....price of vehicle holds a weak correlation to orange peel.

You can always sell your car and wait for a car that comes out better...but it has been mentioned that wet sanding the finish is BAD news...

 

I also have no idea what "orange peel" is. Does it have something to do with paint or are we talking Chinese food. So, howz about a definition before we terminate this thread. Then put a bullet between its beedy eyes.

 

It refers to a pitted appearance of the paint that resembles the texture of an orange peel. This thread is most likely still of interest to at least the 17 responders to the poll who are unhappy with the degree of peel on their cars (and perhaps others who didn't respond). Those who don't have the problem or don't car about it need not read this thread.

 

This is a magazine photo that was online. Look at the paint around the handle for an example of what orange peel looks like. Notice the silver handle is smooth, and the Silverstone paint around it looks bumpy.

 

That is a good pic to show what orange peel is. I bet all of the Z cars have a little orange peel. It is hard to avoid it in new cars these days. Yeah some companies may vary in quality. I saw one of the new Saturn SUV's in the sun the other days and the orange peel was unbelievable. it was disgusting that someone would buy a car that looked like that.

 

the people that said they have perfect paint with no orange peel in the poll they have no idea what their even looking for, cause all production cars have it except maybe exotics..ferrari, lambo, high dollar exotics..