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SDTM Cary Hardy: Clear Coating: The Final Coat

Straight Down the Middle·video·22m 43s·analyzed·Dec 20, 2019
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.017

TL;DR

Final clear coating, wet sanding, and polishing process for pinball playfield restoration.

Summary

Cary Hardy from Straight Down the Middle demonstrates the final clear coating application and finishing process for a pinball playfield. The video covers applying the final clear coat layer, wet sanding progression from 800 to 3000 grit, curing verification via the fingernail test, cutting and polishing with Novus 2 and show car glaze, and detailed post-work cleanup of switch slots and component reinstallation.

Key Claims

  • Issues in previous clear coat application were caused by combination of 95-degree outside temperature, aged clear coat, and fast hardener

    high confidence · Cary Hardy explaining variables from previous video's problems

  • Hardy switched from DuPont Chroma Clear to Advantage brand based on superior results on the Hook machine

    high confidence · Cary Hardy discussing material changes between videos

  • Playfield must cure for at least three weeks before cutting and polishing, verified via fingernail test

    high confidence · Cary Hardy explaining curing timeline and verification method

  • The clear coat mixture used for spraying contains approximately 98-99% water and a drop of dishwashing detergent

    high confidence · Cary Hardy describing spray mixture composition

  • Wet sanding should progress from 800 grit through 3000 grit, stopping at 3000 to avoid hindering curing process

    high confidence · Cary Hardy explaining sanding progression and reasoning

  • Using Novus 2 as lubrication between cutting wheel and playfield prevents burning the clear coat

    high confidence · Cary Hardy demonstrating cutting wheel technique

  • The cutting and polishing wheel should not spend too much time in one spot to avoid heating or burning the clear coat

    high confidence · Cary Hardy demonstrating proper wheel movement technique

Notable Quotes

  • “I usually use DuPont's Chroma Clear, but that's usually on my machines. But with the results I get with Hook, chances are I might actually switch over to Advantage. Because it looks great and it's solid.”

    Cary Hardy@ 3:34 — Indicates material preference shift based on recent project results; could influence other restorers' material choices

  • “The most important part of this whole process guys is patience.”

    Cary Hardy @ ~12:30 — Core philosophy statement about clear coating restoration; emphasizes waiting for proper curing

  • “If I do not have any kind of lubrication between this wheel and the plate field, there's a very high chance that I could actually burn the clear if I'm not careful.”

    Cary Hardy@ 12:28 — Critical safety/technique warning about cutting wheel operation

  • “I'm constantly moving this pad back and forth across the playfield because I do not want to heat this clear coat or burn it or damage it.”

    Cary Hardy@ 13:42 — Demonstrates proper technique emphasis on consistent motion to prevent heat damage

  • “Look how shiny this damn thing is guys.”

    Cary Hardy@ 17:26 — Demonstrates satisfaction with final polishing result; shows transformation quality

Entities

Cary HardypersonStraight Down the MiddleorganizationDuPont Chroma ClearproductAdvantageproductHookgameNovus 2productBarnyardgame

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Educational content demonstrating detailed pinball restoration techniques for broader enthusiast audience

    high · Structured two-part series on clear coating with detailed explanations of materials, techniques, timing, and verification methods designed for viewer learning

  • ?

    product_concern: Previous clear coat application issues traced to multiple variables (heat, aged material, fast hardener); demonstrates complexity of clear coating process and potential failure points

    high · Hardy explains that 95-degree temperature, aged clear coat, and fast hardener combination caused the problem in previous video

  • ?

    technology_signal: Material preference shift from DuPont Chroma Clear to Advantage brand based on superior results on Hook restoration

    high · Hardy states he typically used DuPont but is now considering switching to Advantage: 'with the results I get with Hook, chances are I might actually switch over to Advantage. Because it looks great and it's solid.'

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.068

0:00
Thank you very much. taking everything off the top side of your playfield leaving nothing sticking up. Now it's time to get this thing cleaned up by using naphtha. Well, I need a nuclear reaction to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electricity I need. So we're going to be putting on our equipment and start mixing the clear. It's like I'm seeing the clear shoot and it's going on to the playfield but it's not really doing what it should. It's not looking like it's leveling out. It seemed like it's more like coagulating together and this is not what the typical fashion would look like. I use all the clear that I have to in order to get this plate filled completely coated and covered. So I end up going back and forth making a couple of more batches just to make sure I make enough to cover this plate fill. The mixture I'm using that I'm spraying on the plate fill is I want to say like 98 99 percent water and like a drop of like like dishwashing detergent liquid soap I'll fill for the low areas and just drop a couple of drops in there and that clear should be cured oh man that looks a lot better
2:23
What's up guys and welcome back to another episode on Straight Down The Middle. My name is Kerry Hardy and I talk and do everything pinball. So if that sounds interesting to you then hit that subscribe button down below. We are finishing up this clear coating series in this video. It's only going to be a two part series. The first video consisted of basically all your pre-work as well as laying down your first coat and this video is going to consist of laying down your final coat with the postwork. I got a number of questions about the previous video with my clear coating issue and there are many variables that were involved in that but basically it was a conundrum of the fact that it was 95 degrees outside. The clear coat was aged so chances are it was out of date and I used a fast hardener so with the combination of all those that has got to be the issue because in this video I'm still going to be using the same clear coating gun. But I am switching over to a new clear coat. I'm not going to be using the same clear coat this time around because the place that sold it closed down. I have since then switched to Advantage. I usually use DuPont's Chroma Clear, but that's usually on my machines. But with the results I get with Hook, chances are I might actually switch over to Advantage. Because it looks great and it's rock solid. So where we left off on our last video is that we just got finished sanding down a whole bunch of clear coat due to the amount that I had to throw onto it. The play field has been cleaned and we're ready for our final coat.
4:02
Alright, so what I'm doing is putting down a mist coat over the entire play field. This gives me a baseline to go on just to see how well it's spraying. Looks good, so I'm going to put down my next layer.
4:28
So far so good. After a couple of minutes, I'm going to put down a heavier coat. Now, something I want you to keep an eye on is how much more reflective the clay fill starts becoming with the more clear that goes down. Now obviously this has been cut for time purposes, but there has been a few minutes that has past before I started spraying another thick coat down like this.
5:29
Now I'm gonna let the playfield sit there for about five or ten minutes so that way it could settle down and then we gonna take a look to see if there are any issues that need to be addressed like bubbles or anything like that But this time around there were no issues I didn't have to get the eyedropper or anything of that nature. But typically your first lay down of clear, or to be your next coat, after you get finished spraying it, will look good. But that's why we have to wait 24 hours to see if there's anything else that's going to need to be done. Out of the frying pan and into the fire. The play field is out of the clear coating booth and we are ready to begin our wet sanding process.
6:36
I'm gonna start out with an 800 grit. This is a little bit higher up than the usual 500 that I was using on the first coat because typically this should look flat.
6:51
So I'm gonna give this a really good once-over, sped up obviously for time purposes. And what I want to see whenever I get this all wiped off is there are no low spots. The only shiny areas should be around where there are holes in the play field. I shouldn't see any low areas where the ball will be rolling.
7:19
But is that what we get? And that is exactly what we got. So it's a very good sign knowing that it's flat. Now it's time to get this thing ready for a nice sanding and work our way up and get this thing all nice and shiny again. So we're going to bring it up to a 1000 grit. Do a good sanding on that. And then we're going to bring it up to 1200. Now you're going to see through the process that each time I go up on the grit, the play field is going to start to look a little more shiny. on our way up to 1500 now. Moved over to the sanding block because this is the size of sandpaper that I have.
8:43
On to 2000. Now the 2000 grit it's going to be a lot easier to sand with. You're going to feel like the sandpaper is really not doing much but trust me it is
8:55
because now you're even going to notice that the play fill is starting to get a nice sheen on it starting to see the lights on the playfield from above
9:08
on the 2500 this is where we really start seeing a difference Let's look over this play field to see what we got so far. This is after 2500.
9:43
Looking pretty good. It's not as shiny as we want it to be, obviously, but just kind of giving you an idea of what the sheen looks like at this point in time.
10:04
Now we're moving up to 3000. Now this is a different kind of material. This is not your typical sandpaper. This is actually a pad. So this is going to be really smooth going across your playfield. but you're going to see that the 3000 makes a pretty big difference when it comes to the sheen that this play field gives off and there it is this is after a 3000 grit sanding and this is where we are going to hold up on doing any further i don't want to go any further than 3000 right now But why, Kerry? Why not go ahead and cut and polish this thing out right now and be done with it? That's because if I was to do the polish and cutting compound on this plate build at this point in time before the plate build is completely cured, then I'm actually hindering the curing process that is still taking place. So what you want to do is not do the cutting and polishing until you are for sure that your plate build is cured and ready to take it. So a way to go about doing it is the fingernail test Now there probably a better name for that but I going to use the term fingernail test because what you do is typically put your fingernail into the apron portion of your playfield and press down pretty darn hard If you have an imprint of where your nail was at, your playfield is not ready. So that's why I think every 24 hours until you no longer have an indention or just be patient and wait longer than that. For instance, I wait about three weeks at least I want to say until I did the cut and polish on hook. So just monitor it accordingly. Let that sucker sit. Be patient. That's the most important part of this whole process guys is patience. But back to the video on after it's cured. We are nearing the finish line. it's time to get this thing cut. So I'm using my cutting wheel and I'm applying Novus II to the wheel and I'm not going to turn my machine on yet. I'm going to spread this evenly across the plate field to make sure that every portion of the plate field has got some Novus II on it.
12:28
If I do not have any kind of lubrication between this wheel and the plate field, there's a very high chance that I could actually burn the clear if I'm not careful.
12:49
And once I believe I've got a good layer of Novus II across the playfield and my cutting compound is completely soaked into the pad, I will begin a medium to low spin speed and work my way across the playfield. Now you're going to immediately see this baby start to shine. One of the most important things that you need to remember when doing this is to not spend too much time in one spot. You're never going to see me in this wheel stick around in one spot for too long. I'm constantly moving this pad back and forth across the playfield because I do not want to heat this clear coat or burn it or damage it. So I'm moving it consistently like so. Now something you're going to even see me check is to make sure that I'm not heating the food. I'm going to use the back of my hand and just fill a couple of spots just to make sure that I'm not heating this plate filled up everything's all good so I'm gonna do it again more Novus 2 in the pad spread it across the plate filled and go to town again
14:39
now once again I'm not pressing down on the pad either guys the weight of the machine and the spin is doing the work
14:51
Getting a lot closer to that look that you've been wanting to see for a while now. Now we're ready to move on to the polish.
15:36
Now, this is where I'm going to use a show car glaze. Now, there are many options that you can go about using, but this is a mirror glaze, and it has worked well for me in the past. I use this on all my machines and it gives me a nice post effect. So that's what I'm going to use. Same ordeal with the compound on my cutting wheel is that I'm going to make sure that I'm spreading this evenly across the entire play field and that I have plenty of it on the pad of my polisher.
16:07
Now this wheel is obviously not going to be spinning as fast as the other machine, which is good. So I really don't have to worry too much about this cooking my plate filler or anything.
16:44
Now once I go over the playfield a couple of times with this I going to let it sit Shouldn take too long maybe five minutes Before the play field looks a little milky And then I'll bust out my actual polishing wheel.
17:10
And do the very final step. Look how shiny this damn thing is guys. And there you go. Now I'm just going to go over the play field with a microfiber cloth, kind of wiping up any kind of residual that may be left behind from the polish.
18:12
And we're done. That is essentially the clear coating process with polish. I know I had my doubters out there And who didn't believe I could do it Who doubted me Who amongst us does not belong Someone here does not belong Stranger amongst the loyal I will weed you out All that's left to do now Is all the post work and clean up which is pretty tedious so let's start the post work cleanup now this is going to be a little work intensive and patience is definitely required here as well because you're going to need to make sure that you go through every nook and cranny that stuff is cleaned out all your areas that have been taped over have now got gunked up clear coat and your water soap mix that you use to sand. So I'm using a small sanding drill bit right here. There's many different types of bits that you can use. This just happens to be the exact width of a switch slot. So I'm using that. Now I haven't cleaned anything up. I'm just kind of showing you here that once you get it all sanded, then you can start putting things back where they belong. I would just do each section at a time. That way you know for sure that you've cleaned and sanded or drilled out or routered out any areas of clear in a specific zone. So here I am getting the pop bumper area. I'll pull off that one pop bumper, get it all eaten away with the drill bit, use some isopropyl alcohol, wipe all that extra stuff away, slide it into place. This has got a lot of clear in it, so I'll usually use a drill bit like this. This is going to require a little more precision, so you're going to see me definitely being careful with that, even though my arm blocks it. Trust me, I'm definitely being careful with that thing because that will eat wood that drill bit it will eat stuff up
20:24
and there we have it once you've gone over every switch slot then you've got to deal with this mess right here what a mess then you can start reassembling your playfield. I usually go first with anything that is not actually mounted into the top side first. So flippers, targets, drop targets, pop bumpers, slingshots mechanisms, stuff like that. I usually get those all in place and then build this game up. You have the little areas like this that you want to have a steady hand on.
21:19
Just to get that clear out of those little crevices like that. Then I will take the sanding bit and go through every one of my GI bulbs to make sure that there is no clear that's gonna keep my bulbs from getting good contact. The last thing you want is to get this machine back together and some of your GI isn't working because SubClear is blocking the connection. So go through every single GI bulb, make sure that all the connections are clear.
21:47
And that's going to wrap up this clear coating series, guys. Please, if you like what you've seen and maybe even learned something, be sure to give me that thumbs up. And if you haven't already, do not forget to hit that subscribe button down below. that way you can be notified on whenever we upload something for your viewing pleasure until next time peace out
22:28
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