How to get spray paint off my car?

[timninja]

I'm restoring a alpine white fender that was painted completely black,here's my .2,get lacquer thinner, and a rag,use just a little thinner on the rag and it'll come off clean,but make sure as soon as the paint is remove stop wiping with the thinnered rag you'll go into your clear

[oldmann]

Gasoline and rag?

WHILE SMOKIN A DOOB! Won't need to worry about paint.

[MattAvino]

use gasoline i crap you not gasoline is perfect

Damages paint more rapidly than other stuff and is harder to clean off. Also leaves residue.

[EDirtyZ]

use gasoline i crap you not gasoline is perfect

[Exodus_2pt0]

take a soft cotton tshirt and dab it with acetone (dont saturate it) and wipe spray paint. Should come off immediately. Then wash the car and dont let acetone sit on the paint of your car.

This.

I spray painted all kinds of strange things on my GLI after an accident. Then I got bored and decided to clean the paint off and repair the car. Acetone did the trick like a charm and did not damage any paint.

After the acetone though it doesn't hurt to buff and wax.

[bddog]

When I worked at Gardena Body Shop, we would use xylene to get over spray off of everything, including seats.Wash with soapy water right away.

[F34R]

Brillo pad

[nokincy]

take a soft cotton tshirt and dab it with acetone (dont saturate it) and wipe spray paint. Should come off immediately. Then wash the car and dont let acetone sit on the paint of your car.

This. Or use mineral spirits, you won't hurt your cars finish and it's the easiest way to get the over spray off.

[Ryann]

Xylene.

[Tamataz]

Gasoline and rag?

[MattAvino]

take a soft cotton tshirt and dab it with acetone (dont saturate it) and wipe spray paint. Should come off immediately. Then wash the car and dont let acetone sit on the paint of your car.

[Mr. Tasty]

Clay barring will generally mar the paints finish, even if you are careful. Might as well fully correct your paint now.

[Andy348]

Use brother as clay bar?

Very tempting.


I will try a medium clay bar and if it doesn't work I shall try other methods mentioned here. I'd like to avoid getting abrasive polishers and pads and such but if it can't be helped, so be it.

Thanks & I'll keep this updated.

[London]

Clay bar will work fine. Might have to put a little oomph into it but it'll work well. (same EXACT situation happened to me) didn't scratch my paint up at all. Just took off the spray paint.

I would absolutely not suggest off. I used it on my spoiler once to get some random sap off (granted this was like goo-off from the 70's so it was probably supercharged) but it ate through a chunk of the clear coat on the paint. Can't see it but rub your fingers across it and you can tell immediately.

[Vivek]

I bet you will need something more aggressive than just a clay bar. I had a similar thing happen with my race car, but the paint was less than 2 weeks old I ended up having to use a cleaner wax and a mild rubbing compount ( I so wasn't happy) The clay bar wasn't enough.

The clay bar is a good idea to use anyway. It will pull anything that might scratch your paint off when you polish and wax it. On dark colored cars its a good idea to use it on a regular basis anyway since it will remove the stuff that causes swirl marks.

Give the clay bar a shot, but my guess is that it won't pull the overspray off. Do the whole area, and that way if the stuff doesn't come off with it, the area will be clean when you go after it with a more abrasive compound such as a medium or heavy cut cleaning wax. If you do end up needing an aggressive compound, you will need to follow that with successively more mild compounds so you can remove the scratches, without leaving the area looking dull or showing swirl marks.


Will

Some of this is sort of misinformation. Swirl marks are caused by shitty/dirty towels, not embedded dirt (that a clay bar would remove). Also, most cleaner waxes are a very mild chemical polish, and then a wax. They also generally have a lot of fillers to make the surface appear to be in better condition than it is. I highly doubt a cleaner wax helped much in overspray removal (it was probably mainly the rubbing compound).

If all else fails, OP, some graffiti remover should likely be okay. Try it on the bottom of your car somewhere (maybe under the rear seat?), but in all likelihood it won't damage your paint. Car paint, especially original, is much, much stronger than spray paint, and can hold up to chemical solvents much better. I know someone will call me out on this statement, and I really don't want to look up where I got this info, but oh well.

Edit: also note that there are many different grades of clay bars. You'll likely need a medium to heavy grade, depending on how bad it is.