Paint prep advice needed

i picked up a cheap bike but having washed it and got close i realise a few panels have been resprayed by a complete amateur leading to an orange peel, no a snake scale effect. Will a good smoothing take this down enough to prime and coat or will it need a severe sanding back to base. Panels are plastic not metal.

 

providing that the paint has actually been clearcoated a wet sand and buff should get rid of the orange peel

 

as above if its been clearcoated , run 2000-3000 grit wet and dry. make sure you keep the panel wet when rubbing it flat. wash off then have a look again , you may need to do a couple of sanding sessions, just dont go balls to wall and really hammer down on that paper just glide it over, once it looks sweet buff the sucker or just leave it and give it a nice coat of body wax/polish.

if its not been clearcoated , sand it flat give it a prime - 15min to flash off then right after the flash off lay down the colour, after colour has been layed , leave 15 -20 mins but no longer than 30 mins then clearcoat it, once its cured off buff to a shine

 

No clearcoat just a rubbish paint job, thanks for the tips. Is it the same for metallics? Sounds like i dont leave any layering to fully cure before next coat?

 

Grab some sanding pads/blocks from machine mart, using your hands can leave ripples in the body on plastics and fibre glass

 

no its like an automotive spray job , you can leave the colour coat to fully harden , but then your gonna have to panel wipe it and make sure all dust is removed.

after colour is layed down leave it atleast 15-20 mins but NO MORE than 30 mins then whack a topcoat on, as long as its warm enough to evap that stinky fume away you shouldnt have many problems with the top clearcoat. the clearcoat will take like upto 7days to fully cure bang tidy hard but 24/48hrs you can fit panels and not worry much , Just DO NOT buff polish them for atleast a week or two so that clearcoat hardens up to a full cure .

 

Thanks, ill work on some colour schemes and sort it out.

 

Leave 14 days before buffing for it to cure properly depending on maker of clearcoat it could stay soft for quite some time but after 14 days wet sand it and buff it up and itll look nice just remember left to right motions when wetsanding and dont stick around in one area for too long
loads of instructional videos on youtube for it but its not that hard