Due to my trials and trivails I'm pretty sure my hood is the victim of a bad paint repair job. So now I am trying to figure out which route to go in repainting the entire car. I have seen base coat/clear coat and I have seen integrated urethane finishes that have the clear mixed in.

Does anyone know what Mercedes did in '88. I have seen a reference that they did not use a clear coat in '88. Can anyone shed any light on this? Plus any opinions on which paint to go with keeping cost as a consideration but not being a dealkiller. Thanks!Car is garaged but does see S.FL sun and rain.

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88 300E (plus used to have 72 350SL, 83 240D)
Dad's got a 99 ML320 & 93 300SE...we're a Mercedes family !

From the 1987 brochure I found in one of our drawers, non-metallic is:

1. sheet metal
2. Zinc phosphate
3. cathodic electrodip primer
4. primer/filler
5. color matched primer
6. top coat

metallic is:

1. sheet metal
2. zinc phosphate
3. cathodic electrodip primer
4. primer/filler
5. color matched primer
6. metallic coat
7. clear coat

There is a note that this diagram doesn't apply for the 300TD of that year, though it doesn't say what paint process that model used. I imagine that the above would probably apply to 1988 as well, but I'm not sure about it.

anthony

Thanks, I have non metallic navy blue and your post confirms my suspicions that it was not clear coated. The paint polishes up really good but it's not long at all before it hazes up again,regardless of how many wax coats I apply. It didn't act like it was clear coated (or the clear was shot). I figure the paint is on its last legs...plus the previous owner burned the edges in a few places so it's getting close to time to paint.