# Microbubble Diagnostic Intake {% hint style="info" %} This is a living document. It is maintained and updated without notice. It's best to refresh pages to ensure delivery of the latest iteration from the CDN Content Delivery Network in your area {% endhint %} #### Before You Ask Why You're Getting Bubbles Posting a photo of the door helps, but it does not provide enough information to diagnose the problem. Before anyone can give you a useful answer on painter groups or forums, we need the following information. Please review these questions and include your answers in your post. ### The Product What are you spraying? Include the brand and product name. What color are you spraying? Dark colors have higher pigment concentration than light colors and behave differently in terms of viscosity, open time, and surface tension. What sheen is the product? This may be a name such as satin or semi-gloss, or a gloss unit number such as 10, 20, 40. Is it a 1K or 2K product? If 2K, what hardener ratio did you use? How many mils was the coating applied? Is this a primer coat, a sealer coat, or a finish coat? If it's a finish coat, is it the first coat of finish or a subsequent coat? How long did you wait between the primer or sealer coat and the first finish coat? How long did you wait between finish coats? *** ### The Substrate What is the substrate—solid wood species, MDF, previously painted surface? Was it primed or sealed before the problem coat? What product was used to prime or seal it? Did you spot prime any areas with a rattle can? If so, which product—BIN, Zinsser CoverStain, vinyl sealer, something else? *** ### Cleaning and Prep Did you clean the surface before spraying? What did you use, and how did you apply it? How long did you wait between cleaning and spraying? *** ### Mixing and Material Handling How did you mix the material before spraying—shaken, drill mixed, or stirred by hand? Did you strain it? If so, was the strainer lifted high out of the bucket or kept close to the material? *** ### Equipment What spray system are you using—HVLP turbine, HVLP compressor-driven, airless, or air-assisted airless? What tip size are you using? What is your fluid pressure at the gun? How old are your pump seals, and have you had any recent air leaks in the system? *** ### Environment What were the temperature and humidity in your spray space? How long did the doors acclimate in the spray environment before you sprayed them? How long did the product acclimate in the spray environment before you sprayed it? Were fans running during or after application? Did you use any force-drying methods such as heaters or heat lamps? *** ### What You Observed Where are the bubbles located—uniformly distributed across the face of the panel or concentrated at edges, joints, filled areas, spot-primed areas, or end grain? Were the bubbles visible the moment the wet film hit the surface, or did they appear or worsen in the minutes after you racked the door? *** The answers to these questions tell us where the bubbles came from and whether the film had a chance to let them escape. Without them, any answer you get is a guess.