Pro Gauge II Paint Measurements

[Jngrbrdman]

My $50 paint measuring device arrived today. I checked at eight points on each panel on my 2005 Corolla and my 2003 Pilot. Both cars measured consistently about 2 mil. According to the little instruction book that came with the tool it says:

"At 2 mills (50 microns) the primer is about to show through most cars and if it is a clear coated car then the clear coat is almost gone. Even at 3 mils the paint is thin and you would be well advised to be very careful with any polishing."

I don't know about that though.... I may have polished certian areas more than others on the Pilot, for example, but the roof is measuring the same as the doors? I don't think that means I've worn the paint out. The same thing goes for the Corolla. The most abrasive polish I've used is akin to SSR2. I've only polished it twice and those are the only two times it has ever been polished in its life. I'm the second owner and I verified all maintanance records and paint care with the former owner. So how accurate is that 2 mil statement saying that the primer should be showing? From what this tool is saying in the instructions, the paint is half as thick as it is supposed to be on both vehicles.

I think I'm going to take this to a local body shop and get a measurement with a higher end tool just for calibration purposes. If they measure the same then that will make me feel a lot better. I'm not really surprised though. I knew they started cheaping out on paint earlier this decade, so it really isn't a shock. I can't wait to measure the paint on a late model Subaru. I'm not sure this gauge will read that thin. lol

[Stephan]

I think like you said it may need or require some adjusting...the way its reading I would be leary on washing it...might take off that last bit

The fact it says that on the roof of the car, leads me to believe something isn't right....

[black bart]

I was told by a body shop that the average new car has 2mil of clear coat on them

[Jngrbrdman]

That's kind of what I thought. Oh well... I'll figure out what the dealio is. It could be that this one is just out of whack, but it wouldn't be the self proclaimed most popluar paint measuring tool ever if it was that inaccurate. I'm going to test it on some more cars and see what it says.

[Mindflux]

Keep in mind that panels dont exactly get sprayed evenly. One panel can be 2ml and another could have easily been 2.5ml and so on.

This is vastly more apparent with body work, but factory paint isn't exact either.

[aarolar]

Yall realise a mil=.001in right? When you talk about the difference in 2 and 2.5 mils that's .0005in. For reference the average human hair is around .003in or 3mils. So say your paint is 2 mils thick and you remove .5 mils per time that only means you can buff your car 4 times? I thinks the clear is alittle thicker than 2 mils but I may be wrong, its happened before.

[Jngrbrdman]

It may not be much, but races are sometimes won by tenths or hundredths of a second, and that isn't much either. The fact that my brother-in-law's crapy van which has paint peeling off of it has paint that measures thicker than mine concerns me, but it is the performance of the paint that I care about. If my paint is 2 mil thick and will last for as long as I have the car, then dandy. My bro-in-law didn't get so lucky with his van and the paint is twice as thick. I'll post pictures tonight when I get them uploaded. It is pretty sad.

[Jngrbrdman]

Alrighty.. So just to give you some perspective you can see how thin the actual paint is on the shot where it is peeling off. I think we have all seen that before. This vehicle isn't even that old. It started doing that about two years after they got it brand new. I told them to take it in for a warranty claim, but being the morons they are, they just figured they would get it repainted someday. Yeah, like anyone spends money repainting a van like that. Anyway, the pictures of the gauge are right at the point where it pulls off the paint. You can see the difference between when it is measuring paint and when it is just on the primer, or whatever it is showing after the paint flakes off.

[Jngrbrdman]

6 mill is what it is reading on that painted part. My Pilot and Corolla measure 2 mil. This just seems a little unfair... But hey, at least my paint isn't peeling off. lol

[richy]

I'm sure you did, but remember it takes readings differently on the roof vs the sides...that will give you funny readings if you read it on hte wrong side.

[Jngrbrdman]

I made sure I measured it on the right sides. It is kind of hard to screw that one up unless you flat out aren't looking. I was getting 2 mil readings on the roof, hood, trunk, and all over the place on the sides and rear. I'm pretty sure I was getting the accurate measurments. Especially now that I have measured another vehicle that shows something different.

[dr_detail]

Just for fun, read a piece of plate steel with that gauge and see what you get as a reading -- the results might surprise you.

[CalgaryDetail]

i would try to find a higher qulty queage to check if the paint us really that thin, and make sure your progague is working,... however i have done corevettes with 45microns, we did not buff them.. but from the factory they were that thin..... sometime you just get the short end of the stick....

so yeah, i would have your paint mesured somewhere else to make sure

[Jngrbrdman]

I don't know that the quality of the Pro Gauge is really in question here. I'm not about to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars for a gague. This one works, it just isn't digital. I would just like to benchmark it on something where I know the thickness already. That way I know what the margin of error, if any, is for this tool. It read the bare metal perfectly and then read the painted surface differently, so I know it does something. It just surprises me that paint is coming from the factory this thin. The paint doesn't seem that thin... but of course, they are both greyish colors and it would be hard to tell when the paint got really thin anyway. I wonder if they can't get away with that on white cars and that is why the paint is thicker. I think I'm going to spend some time at a dealership testing paint on new cars in different colors just for the education sake.