How do I sand a car to get ready for paint? What do I need? What techniques should I use? What's the best equipment? Thanks.

 

well are you painting it yourself or having a shop do this?
if a shop is doing the paint job normally they would sand it down for the base coat they lay down

my buddy is painting my car later this year but the front of my car is red and green in rear.
so I took 200 grit to take off the clear coat and to scuff it up enough to get primer to paint it
http://img242.imageshack.us/img242/8531/imag0107xt9.jpg- my mazda

I would reccomend going to walmart and getting 2 things
look for their painters platic sheets. 100x10 feet. plenty of plastic for 3 dollars
then masking tape.

 

Thanks for your help.

 

also if you are doing this you can get a disc sander. a 6 inch one will do fine. get multiple types of paper if you wish
also when sanding you should go through the clear coat. you will notice the dust go from a white to the color of your car. then you know you went through the clear coat.

 

the right way to do it is to go ahead and strip the car down to metal and go up from there. i do body work and i know that when paint gets too thick, it is more vulnerable to chip. when you strip the paint completely off, you need to lay and thin layer of bondo over the parts and sand it to shape. then you prime and sand off the first couple of layers of primer by hand in a cross-hatch pattern. then you lay one coat of primer and let it tack up but not cure. then layers of base until the color is even (i do about 4 thin layers) then wet sand with about a 1200 grit paper, and add your clear. the final layers are what set one paint job off from another. after the clear has cured (about 2 days) you need to wet sand with about a 1500 grit paper until all of the gloss is gone and buff it out. be careful with the buffer.