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What's a good amount of time between painting the clearcoat and starting the wet sand/polish/wax steps? I'm currently at day 4, and the orange peel has settled almost completely out of the surface, and getting antsy to start the final step, since I just picked up my Tamiya modeling wax. I was going to wait until day 7 (I hear a week for several folks), but the paint doesn't smell & the fingerprints are not being embedded in the clearcoat itself. I'm using Micromark 6000 (although I may skip this one since the orange peel is damn-near gone already; Tamiya is some great paint with great colors, IMO), 8000, 12000 grit wet sands then Micro-Surface brand Micro-Gloss followed by the Tamiya modeling wax (which is non-abrasive, BTW). I asked my local model shop about waxes, and they said they weren't sure how good/bad Tamiya wax is since they just got it, but The Treatment is excellent. Novus is good, but it *is* abrasive. Also, I asked about using enamel primer (Model Masters) instead of Tamiya clearcoat, since you're not supposed to put lacquer over enamel, but he said that it's generally only a rule for hot lacquers, as in automobile paint, and that Model Masters primer is OK under Tamiya paint. I can't recommend Tamiya products enough, but their primer is currently hard to come by, as they are having importation difficulties due to the contents of their products (I bought 14 cans, enough for all of my projects, ahead of time and am glad I did).
BTW: Doing some research, some folks say to apply the clearcoat either as if it was just another layer of regular paint (i.e. wait 10-15 minutes) or else wait a full 30 days. The thinking on that is that any time in between risks cracking as the clearcoat & paint dry at different rates (although I've gone Tamiya all the way and saw nothing close to cracking after waiting 3 days between...I think cracking has a better chance of occurring if you use different paint manufacturers)
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