Mirror paint woes

[AllTorque]

Was gently hosing down the Griff yesterday before a shampoo, and noticed this white stuff on one of the wing mirrors. As I hosed it, the white stuff seemed to grow so I looked a little closer - was amazed to find that my cosmos blue paint was peeling off the bloomin mirror. I could not friggin' well believe it! I now have a postage-stamp sized white patch of bare plastic on the mirror that looks absolutely awful, and nearly made me cry!

Does anyone have any tips on restoring it? If I order some touch up paint, can I paint straight onto the plastic, or does it need some form of primer? Anything has got to be better than this!

Really hope someone can help me, cos a re-spray is not something I have budgeted for....

[Big Al.]

They all do that sir! mines the same always touching up odd spot (oo err) that shows through.

You sure that ain't crabs Matt
(fingers crossed for ya mate, suggest you put up a post instead of us keep hijacking all the others).

[thegamekeeper]

Mark the white stuff is the primer but unfortunately TVR dont paint the mirrors properly. You do need a special primer to paint onto plastic but it is readily available, most paint shops use it because all modern cars have colour coded plastic bumpers. The backs of the mirrors come off quite easily, there are 2 black plastic levers inside the mirror which you should be able to see if you adjust the glass to extremes and shine a small torch inside.You can order aerosols of matching paint from TVR by quoting the paint code which should be in the handbook/service book

[simpo one]

Why do you need to remove the backs? Just take off the rubber rings and mask the rest, surely?

[thegamekeeper]

Much easier to rub them down off the car and it only takes 30 seconds, less time than masking up on car etc and acheives a much better finish. Also if yo dont want to do it yourself it is so much easier to take the mirror backs to a paint shop than leaving them the car and getting it back full of dust

[AllTorque]

Thanks for this advice guys. So would you recommend using an aerosol over a very fine brush/thinned down paint? With an aerosol, would I need to remove all the old paint, or just spray over the peeled area?

[victormeldrew]

Spraying over the peeled area would look HORRIBLE! Point is the rest will peel as well unless the plastic is primer properly. You will need to bring it back to bare plastic (NitroMors will help!) then prime it with a plastic etching primer as mentioned above.

Preparation is everything if you want a good finish!

[thegamekeeper]

Be VERY careful with Nitromors or you could find the mirrors have vanished into a pile of mush. On an area so small just rub it down carefully with 1000 grade wet and dry. As Victor says preparation is everything

[davidd]

Think thats bad..when I had the car I made teh stupid mistake of using a pressure washer on it. It took all the paint off the mirrors!

Thankfully the dealer resprayed it for me.

The mirrors are always going to get a hammering, I would get a pot of touch up paint, use that carefully then when the front needs doing get the mirrors done at the same time.

D.