Respray cure times?

[Thaumaturge]

Whats the verdict here? I attempted rebuilding a few days after respraying a frame (3x primer, 3x base, 3x clear acrylic) and marked it up as soon as i made contact with metal. Seems to be slowly hardening as i could easily leave fingernail indents at the time and less so now but as it as i'll prob give it a few weeks at least before reassembling. Is this typical?

 

[mattr]

yes.

depending on paint, application, humidity, thickness, number of layers, temperature and so on, it could take anything from a few days to a couple of weeks to air harden.

We have some prototypes at work at the moment that have to be put into a full, padded, body sock to protect the painted panels while the car is being built, as due to a couple of the features (that won't be there for production!!) the body shell can't go through any sort of heating process to cure the paint. So a standard car takes 12-18 hours to harden sufficiently for the production line (another ~100 to reach full hardness IIRC) and the protos have to be shipped in an enclosed truck to protect the still slightly soft paint (about 3 weeks to go off completely). It is about 25 coats in total though, instead of 8-10.

 

[Thaumaturge]

Wow.. that's interesting and good to know. Wish i hadn't tried putting it back together so soon but you live you learn and even with the chips it looks 1000% better than before. Think i'll leave it for 3-4 weeks to be sure.. especially as i have to really hammer the bolt in for the bottom linkage.