'An almost perfect paint finish' achievable by Newbies

T

TheMac

New member
 I will probably only ever detail two or three  cars in my lifetime. After I bought a DAS -6 pro dual action polisher some 5 weeks ago, I started looking for a definitive  guide explaining exactly what to do, and, as far as practical, how to do it. I was unable to find one. As a consequence I thought I would do a post to provide those new to car detailing, like myself,  a simple record of at least what worked for me supported by some photographs of the finished paintwork. Prior to this I have only ever attempted to detail one car - the background of which can be found on Detailing World forum thread entitled 'before I destroy my paintwork'. In light of that first attempt (which was actually pretty successful) my current approach has been significantly amended in terms of product selection.


Having had some difficulty with the durability of my foam polishing pads I finally plumped for micro fibre pads which, from my reading of the forums, are deemed to be significantly more durable and versatile - especially when going to be used on the Audi's fairly hard clear coat. I ended up buying pads manufactured by Meguiars, as they always seem to get a pretty good write up and appear to be roughly the same price as all the others.


For my previous detail I had used a  polish which I later discovered contained oils. These temporarily hid some minor scratches, and I later discovered these oils were both capable of inhibiting the final paint sealer and could also be difficult to remove completely even with an alcohol solution! As a consequence, this time I ended up buying one of the new water based polishes which do not appear to have either of those problems.


I eventually plumped for four 'Xpert' products (including the Titanium 11 sealer) which should cover the full gambit of my detailing - no matter what happens to the car. This new polishing technology apparently contains micro particles which the company claims give a very clear paint finish that has been  winning detailing  competitions for some time in the US. Selecting products from the same manufacturer keeps it simple and has the advantage of me not having to research which manufacturers products  go with which.


All four products chosen are 'one step', but have the additional advantage of being  complementary - in that they can be used together. So, instead of having to do 3 procedures, you can combine the Ultra 1000 (used for medium / heavy correction), with both the high tech1500 (used as a finishing polish), and also the jewelling polish into one procedure. The finished product can then be sealed with Titanium 11, which, having watched the video, seems pretty quick to apply and gives a very deep shine which is deemed to last between a year to eighteen months.


In practice, as I am retired and only detailing one car, I intend to apply each product individually - as I want the finished paintwork to look as clear as possible.


The big attractions to me of the products are the manufacturer's claims that they are virtually incapable of burning my paint.  They are transparent - so I can see exactly what I am removing at the time of machining. They contain no fillers or oils, will not cause swirls, and are capable of giving an award winning finish. It almost sounds too good to be true! Anyway, we should all be able to judge just how good or bad the finished product is after the detail is complete and the photos posted.  


I hope this thread will be of some use to other novices. Detailing seems to have the potential to be such a rewarding exercise it would be satisfying to do it correctly.


TheMac


 


 


 
 
There aren't any definitive guides because every car is different. The only thing that always holds true is the need to start with a test area. The rest is part art, part science. Looking forward to the results.
 
TheMac- Glad to hear you're so happy with your results!


 


Now for the big challenge- keeping it marring-free through the course of numerous washes ;)
 
Thanks for the encouragement. I intend to split the work undertaken into the days that it occurred in the hope that it will be easier for anyone following and, I suspect, a lot less daunting.


Day 1


I clay barred the car for some 3 hours and followed this up by using the Xpert 1000 mixed with the 1500 at a ratio of approximately two pea sized drops to one drop. The  1500 is wetter and provides an element of gloss and I think is sometimes used as a finishing agent. I spread the product at speed one and cross hatched it for 2 minutes at speed 5, 1 minute at speed 4, 3&2 and then spent two minutes doing the same slowly at speed 1. The paint finish is starting to improve.
 
Apologies for leaving this out. The Meguiars micro fibre cutting pads were used for this procedure and the area machined at each stage was approximately 2 foot square or half a car door.
 
By way of background although the products can be used separately as one step or in sequence i.e. 1000, 1500, 3000 etc, or even together, I had read a post on one of the forums that they could be mixed to personal preference. I contacted the poster who is a professional detailer and who was good enough to suggest the mixes that he thought would probably work best with my Audi's clear coat.


 


Additionally I have to say that I appreciate that anyone who would be foolish enough to come on a forum populated by professional detailers and suggest that he was capable of achieving a near perfect paint finish at second attempt and with a £100 machine would be naive in the extreme. Hence the quotes in the title. The thread is really to attract the attention of novices who, if they are like me, just want to use their newly purchased polishers as soon as they get their hands on them without initially having to spend weeks researching articles, videos and conflicting posts all over the net first (which to a large extent I did anyway). The objective of this post is to give the opportunity for us first time novices to achieve what we might consider 'an almost perfect finish' while minimising the chances of us damaging the paintwork in our enthusiasm.


 


Day 2


 


I used the 1500 Ultra polish in the ratio of 3 pea sized drops to 1 drop of Jewelling 3000 polish. The Jewelling polish is even wetter than the 1500 and is used to clarify and shine paint. The same method of machining was used as in day 1. If the products during any of the procedures described appeared to be disappearing and the paintwork was becoming dry at any stage I just added a little more. This step was undertaken with a blue hex logic finishing pad which came with the machine and apparently has a ppi rating (perforations per square inch - I think) of 80 or more.  I understand that the higher the ppi the greater the shine. My experience of finding out ppi ratings of pads even from the people selling them was that it was almost impossible.


 


The above process was repeated with just the 3000 polish on its own. For this procedure I used a black hex logic pad which is slightly softer and presumably has a greater ppi rating than the blue.


The slower I moved the machine the better the results in terms of shine appeared to become. At this stage I  found that the flake in the paint became very prominent and the clarity of the paint increased significantly.
 
TheMac- Ah, that all sounds good!


 


Noting that I'm not familiar with your polisher (or polishes), it does sound to me like you're using sorta low speeds.


 


I work smaller areas than the conventional 2' x 2', but eh, that's just me.


 


Are the Xpert products diminishing-abrasive or not?  Sounds like they have a very long work time (but maybe that low speed factors in there).
 
From the videos that I have watched on the net the products are being promoted as having have very long work times. Unfortunately my knowledge does not extend to whether they are diminishing-abrasive or not or even what that means.  I had a look but can not see any obvious reference on the Xpert web site re this aspect.


Apologies.
 
TheMac- OK, my wild guess is that they do diminish/break down, getting less aggressive as you work them longer.  Nondiminishing abrasives merely dry out, they stay uniformly aggressive the whole time.  The nondiminishing ones are a relatively recent development and have their pros/cons.
 
Day 3


I applied 3 pea sized drops of the Jewelling polish with 1 drop of the Titanium sealer. At this stage the back of my black hex logic pad had separated and after a couple of attempts at repair had to be discarded. As a consequence the blue hex logic was used instead. I followed exactly the same procedure as previously. The gloss on the paintwork was showing distinct signs of further increasing.


 


I had enquired as to how to apply the Titanium 11 (two) which is the last stage of the detail. Matt Gibb in Australia who I understand has a role with R&D for Xpert products posted a video to explain the steps. You can not get much more helpful than that! The video can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldW5Pyfx0xE&list=UUlzs8Pyi20xn2Nw1mCmLmiQ


This was the easiest stage of the detail and made a significant difference to the overall gloss and finished product but do note that no water must get near the Titanium coat on the car for 24 to 48 hours.


 


Finally I applied a very thin coating of the Titanium by hand and left it for a couple of days before wiping off by hand with a micro fibre cloth.
 
The final product


The paint, which seems extremely pure and glossy with an abundance of flake, shows no sign of any marring or hazing from the machining. The clear coat certainly  gives the impression of floating above the paint which to me would be an absolute necessity. The exercise itself was fairly time consuming taking approx 24 hours but I quite enjoyed the challenge. My only reservation in the whole process was that the correction undertaken with my random orbital did not take out some of the minor scratches on the bonnet. These are few in number and in straight lines so were not caused by the machining and I can only spot them if the sun is at a certain angle. I think that the reason for this may be the Audi's very hard clear coat and / or the fact that my polishing machine is just not powerful enough.


It has been suggested elsewhere that the use of a rotary may have been better for the correction stage of the process but that is way beyond both my skill level and finances although apparently the products are almost incapable of burning the paint if that is a significant factor.


I had considered giving the 1000 product to a professional to apply by rotary at some date in the future just in case it would magically transform the paintwork into looking like a sheet of glass. I took the car to a professional detailer (of some 14 years) to-day but his opinion was that the paintwork could not be made much, if any, better!


To achieve a level of detail that would satisfy even a local professional detailer by using a £100 machine and being as inept as myself is probably not a bad recommendation for the choice of products used and approach followed.


Anyway, the final stage to this post is going to be the most difficult as I try to upload a couple of photos of the finished product. Working this laptop is like a black art to me. Also getting a finish that will satisfy a local detailer is unlikely to be the same as producing one that is up to Autopia standards! Nevertheless, it may be okay for us novices. Is it 'a near perfect finish'? I really do not know but it is probably the best paint finish I have seen in real life.


Try to be gentle with your comments.


TheMac
 
Apologies I should have said that I used a Lake Country Gold 100 ppi pad to apply the Titanium as this was one of the few that actually advertise the ppi. The higher the ppi the greater the shine.
 
TheMac- That sure looks good, and most importantly *YOU* are happy with it!


 


A few sorta-random thoughts follow:


 


- I don't by any means think a rotary would've been of any real help.  In the time it takes to master one a non-pro can do a lifetime's worth of details with a RO/DA


-I don't use the highest-PPI/softest finishing pads, even for the final polishing, as I prefer a slightly firmer pad for use with abrasives, even very mild ones, and I have never had any issues attaining literally blinding gloss on Audi clear with those firmer pads


-I wouldn't label myself "inept" if I were you, you did a great job


-IF, and that's a mightly big "if" IMO, you want to take out those remaining scratches it *can* be done, even without a really powerful machine.  Just takes time and perhaps a more aggressive product.  Note that I've removed nasty fingernail scratches from behind Audi doorhandles *BY HAND*.  Sure it took a looooong time, but I did it.  Heh heh, people were polishing harder things than autopaint by hand for centuries before the days of electric polishers ;)


 


Now, focus on that wash technique!  IMO that's the *real* challenge when it comes to detailing.
 
Thanks for the post and advice. I am pleased to learn about your views on the rotary and interested in your comments about the finishing pads. Also I will maybe machine smaller areas in the future and see if that further increases the gloss. Having previously detailed Audi's you must already know what works best. Any advice would be gratefully received. My paintwork has 'orange peel' which I intend to address the next time. This attempt was really just a shot in the dark to see how it would turn out. I will try again in a year or so.
 
TheMac- the orangepeel on my A8 and S8 is simply AWFUL, really made me  :o   :rolleyes:  considering that the cars were painted by their fancy then-new robotic system.  It's almost as bad as the orangepeel of my Chevy truck and the Crown Vic (and consider the diff in cost between my S8 and a Crown Vic).  


 


BUT, I haven't done anything to correct it.  I'm not gonna thin the clear that way despite knowing all about the argument that leveling orangepeel can be safer than some other sanding since you're "only taking it down the the level of the orangepeel's "valleys" anyhow..".   (note that there are other methods of leveling orangepeel, but I've never tried them and don't plan to.)
 
That is good enough for me! While the orange peel, especially on the bonnet, is pretty bad I will now definitely let it be. 


Thanks you have probably saved me an expensive paint job.
 
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