Wing Mirror Cap Resprayed

Mechanically, the car is ticking over just nicely, so my focus has turned to cosmetics.

As is with life, the minority was spoiling it for the majority, i.e. a few minor bodywork blemishes were unjustly letting the car down.


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To get my eye in as it were, I thought I'd start small and respray the wing mirror cap - it'd obviously taken a knock at some point and was looking rather second hand.

The first problem was getting the mirror cap off. As access to the clips is completely obstructed by the mirror glass, that would need to be removed first. For a full write up on removing the mirror glass and caps, check out my How-to guide.






Due to the depth of the scuffs, the mirror cap needed to be stripped back to plastic. Using some 400 grit wet and dry I got to work.




Once I was happy with the surface, I rinsed the part in cold water and let it dry naturally in the sun.


Prior to painting I used some panel wipe to clean off any contaminants on the surface, any dust, dirt, grease on the surface could affect how the paint adheres.

I got a 1 litre bottle from APL chemicals, the stuff works great, I've used it on loads of jobs now, not just before painting. APL have an Amazon store so you can grab a bottle here*.


It's important not to touch the part post panel wiping, any oils from your skin could affect the adhesion of the paint. Using some string, I hung the cap by the fixing tabs from my washing line. Not the most suitable spraying environment but you need to work with what you've got.

A lot of people ask me how to spray paint car parts, so I'll do a quick overview of the methods I use.

Firstly, I applied three coats of Halfords grey plastic primer, the first a mere dusting, the second a thin coat and the third a full coat with 15mins between coats. I let the primer fully cure over night and moved onto the colour coat.

Luckily Halfords stock BMW Sapphire Black in rattle cans, so I didn't have to have any mixed up. I used the same process as with the primer.

Last but not least, the clear coat, again using Halfords rattle cans and the same three coat process. Don't be worried to dust the paint on, it'll look poor to start with, but with each layer you'll build up the gloss.

The final finish was better than I expected to get out of a rattle can, however, there is some orange peel. Once the paint has fully hardened, I'll be able to get the machine polisher on it and correct it back to a mirror finish.