Not a project

[pablito]

So I need to get my posts up to 10 so I can send a pm...

This is not a project, but after I bought myself a rotary polisher ages ago, I set to work on my cars...

Well, since the zed has managed to accumulate a load of swirls in her 20 yr old paint work and having stocked up on a few detailing bits and a new rotary I though that it was time to practice on the old scoob before i let myself loose on the zed.

So... the car before i started:





First i had to wash her, so with the trusty 2 bucket method, I went over the car..... The colour of the water was sooo black that i instantly washed her again. It was at this point that i started to clay the car since I hadn't done so since i bought it...... Well i cannot believe the crap that came off... I ended up using enough clay for 3 cars as I didn't use any traffic film remover first.. Lesson learned!




Well i used so much detail spray and clay that i had to wash her again.... so that's 3 washes now.

Time was not on my side as I didn't start till lunch time... so I decided to tape up the car ready for a good polish tomorrow, but I couldn't help myself and I had to have a go with the polisher, so I used some Meguiars Ultimate compound and got to work.


Door panel before i started.



After a few passes with the compound and a quick going over with ultra-fine finishing polish and these are the first results:





By this time it had qot pretty dark and Polly had come home so I finished taping up and packed away my stuff ready for a days polishing and waxing tomorrow. 





To be continued.........

Right then, part 2:


So I had washed her loads, done the wheels, and masked her ready for a good polishing.


So I got out my new rotary and went to work. First i used Meguiars compound to get rid of as many of the swirls as possible. 





As you can see there were a fair few to deal with:




After the Meguiars compound, I then moved on to a finer polish. It was by this point in time that i had truly learned the most important lesson of the day.... USE DECENT PADS!!! The ones that came free with the polisher were shite and kept falling apart making a hell of a mess with tiny bits of foam flying everywhere.


As you can see, most of the swirls have been removed... not perfect by any stretch of the imagination... but definitely much better... I then used my old favorite: Super resin Polish (awaits flaming) and gave it a couple of coats of polish and buffed her up nicely with a clean dry micofiber, and i was left with this:





Finally a thin layer of Dodo Supernatural Hybrid which i applied with a couple of foam applicators, left it to cure for 10 mins then a good buffing with a fresh microfiber... Repeat and this is the result:





By this point i was getting quite bored.. so a quick rub of all the trim with the wax, buffed off and the some autoglymm rubber and trim treatment to finish the black bits off.


Final results:







So in conclusion a few observations which may help others:


1: I cannot stress this one enough.... DON'T have a cheeky reefer before hand thinking that it will help..... you will just get far too obsessive, and take twice as long as you normally would.
2: DO invest in a decent set of pads... it will save you loads of heartache and save a load of time dusting off tiny bits of foam.
3: Do invest in a stool or similar so as to give your poor back a rest.
4: Take off your belt... and rings if you wear them.
5: Invest in decent microfiber towels and drying towels.
6: Apply thin layers of whatever you are applying... you can always add another layer later, better to apply lots of thin layers rather than trying to cake on a thick layer.
7: Don't bother asking the missus for her input... they just don't understand!!!


So I hope you enjoyed the write up... I will be doing the Zed soon.

Well, following my attempt at giving the Scoob some love, It was time to see what I could do with the Zed.

So.. same as before, a few "before" photos:








So pretty much same as last time, A good wash with the old 2 bucked method and a microfiber mitt. A quick clay to remove whatever was on there (not much to be fair, just got rid of whatever polish or wax that was on there from last time really.)

Time to get out the rotary. I used Meguiars ultimate compound first, then played around with a few different finer cutting polishes and finishing polishes.

Here is a nice 50/50 shot.... a work in progress so to speak:



Once again, I got thoroughly bored about half way through, so kinda rushed towards the end and I was trying to watch the rugby on the laptop which I had balanced precariously on top of a tool box in the garage.

I finished off the rest of the car quickly and finished off with a layer of lazy SRP, followed by some carnaubra wax polish. I then went over the car with some Poorboys Nattys Paste Wax.. which smelled of bubblegum! She got 2 coats of this and that was that... I was well and truly done...........

Here are a few "after" shots... not too bad, but i do need to get some more aggressive compound and a few new pads to get rid of those slightly deeper marks.

Anyway...

[Grant]

Very shiny. Nice cars


Out of curiosity. Why not go for a DA mop?

[Poodle]

Congratulations for having the right "Z".

This almost makes me give a shit about what my cars look like, bit late for that though...

[Kezzieboy]

Somebody want to machine polish mine...?

[Dum-Dum]

Wish i could be bothered to do mine but i want to sort the mechanicals first.

[rocker8742]

Which pads do you use mate and which grade?

How'd you find the ultimate compound and srp for machine polishing?

[kingy]

Now thats what I call clean. Nice work.

[Jake]

Good job man! Looking flash!

[Jonny81191]

There's some days when I wish i had a car that looked good polished, mine looks the same after a quick clean as it does after a full detail and wax.

But then I remember at least it's easy to keep it looking good!

[pablito]

Hey guys. thanks for commenting.

I prefer a rotary to a DA polisher as i believe that you get a better finish with a single action.

I use 3M pads and use 3 grades:

http://www.elitecarcare.co.uk/3m-perfect...p?cPath=67

I found the meguiers Ultimate compound to be pretty good too, but i think that the 3M stuff is better and easier to use.. ie green bottle for green pad, blue for blue etc..

SRP is NOT good with a macine polisher and it is a real lazy mans polish.. it has cleaners and fillers in it so whatever you go over you remove and replace with the last layer of SRP....

HOWEVER... for a 1 stop shop type polish at a really reasonable price.. i think it is great...

The reality is that most people will not want to spend 2 days cleaning a car... so a decent wash (2 bucket method of course.. preferably with grit catchers).. use some traffic film remover, a quick clay and buff it up with some half decent wax/polish and you will be just fine....

For those of you who really want to delve into the dark arts.. then check out this website...

http://www.detailingworld.co.uk/forum/index.php

WEBSITE WARNING>>> This website can cause your wallet to empty rather quicky in the pursuit of perfection!!!!

[Stephen]

Both look awesome! Wish i had some spare money to give it a go!