"Do I need a new paint job?" - BMW 335i Resurrected and Coated

[zmcgovern45]

The owner of this vehicle contacted me with the hope that I could help bring some life back to this relatively low mileage 335i that he had just purchased. He was concerned that the paint may be in such bad shape that he would need to have it repainted. Upon my initial inspection, it was very clear that this paint needed a tremendous amount of work to restore it, however I was up for the challenge and even did a test spot for the owner to see if my paint correction process would meet his expectations. After seeing the test spot, we set a date for the appointment.... This vehicle went through my normal cleaning and decontamination process, and was then followed with an intensive 3 step paint correction process to remove the majority of surface defects and greatly improve gloss and clarity. After the paint was restored, a ceramic paint coating was applied to help provide years of durable protection, easy maintenance, and incredible shine! This was a long project, but the results were fantastic!


Process
Exterior
Tires: Tuf Shine Tire Cleaner & Tire Brush
Wheels: Sonax Full Effect Wheel Cleaner & Various Brushes
Pre-Wash: CG Citrus Wash via Foam Lance then pressure rinse
Wash: ONR
Bug Removal: Meguiar's D103 and Stoner Tarminator
Paint Decontamination: Medium Grade Speedy Prep Towel with Nanoskin Glide as Lubrication
Tape trim and other areas of concern
Paint Thickness Readings Taken
Compound/Cutting (twice): M101 with CarPro Flash Pads & Meguiar's MF Cutting Pads via Rupes LHR21ES and Rupes LHR75e
Wash & Oil/Residue Removal: Pre-Soak panel with 50% IPA, then wash with ONR
Polishing: M205 with Lake Country White Polishing Pad
Coating Prep/Polishing Oil Removal: CarPro Eraser
Ceramic Paint Coating: CQuartz UK
Exhaust Tips: CG Metal Polish + Protection via #0000 Steel Wool
Glass: CarPro Eraser
Tire Dressing: Optimum Opti-Bond


Interior
All cracks and crevices blown out
Thorough Vacuum
All vinyl and plastic wiped down with 303 Aerospace Protectant
All weather floor mats rinsed and scrubbed with Meguiar's D103
Leather (driver's seat): Steam cleaned, scrubbed with D103, steam cleaned
Glass: CarPro Eraser




Before


When the vehicle arrived, the defects were easily visible in the sunlight. Notice the holograms, swirls, and scratches on every inch of paint.

During


As always, I started with cleaning the wheels and tires. In typical BMW fashion, these had plenty of brake dust built up on them. Sonax Full Effect wheel cleaner makes quick work of this mess by reacting with the brake dust and loosening it from the surface.

A lot of filth coming from the inner barrels of the wheels

Wheels and tires cleaned up. While they certainly look better, all of the wheels truly need to be refinished as they were simply neglected for too long and are beyond repair.

The vehicle was pressure rinsed, foamed, rinsed again, and then thoroughly washed.

After the wash process, I began with the decontamination. Notice the amount of bonded particles that were removed on just a small part of the hood. It is critical to ensure all bonded contaminates are removed prior to polishing.

I began my testing on the hood. After much correction, the difference was incredible. No high powered lights needed to see this transformation!

50/50 on the hood

50/50 shot on the door after compounding

Fender before correction

Fender after compounding

Top of rear quarter panel before correction

Top of rear quarter panel after compounding

Rear bumper before correction

Rear bumper after compounding

Trunk before correction

Trunk after 1st compounding pass (notice the remaining defects)

Trunk after 2nd compounding pass. Even better correction.

 

[zmcgovern45]

50/50 on rear quarter with halogens.

50/50 on rear quarter with LEDs. You can easily see the holograms on this panel with these LED lights. This is damage from a previous detailer who was incapable of using a machine properly (which is obvious by the overall condition of the vehicle

50/50 on driver's door

Driver's door before correction. Notice the complete lack of reflection

Driver's door after correction. Clarity drastically improved!

50/50 on driver's door

Matt finishing up with the side skirts with the 3" machine. He spent 7-8 hours working hard with the 3" machine on this project... that is A LOT of work!

Rear bumper before correction

Rear bumper after compounding

Fender before correction

Fender after compounding

This 50/50 shows the improvement made with our final finishing polish. The left side has been polished and is an incredibly deep blue and the right side shows the haze left from the heavy cutting process.

After correction and coating, this paint looked fantastic!

The next day I started with the interior. While the car was only scheduled for the basic interior cleaning, I cleaned up the leather on the driver's seat to show the owner how he can improve his leather on his own if he wishes.

Exhaust tip before polishing. I am confident that these have never been polished due to the incredibly thick buildup on the inside of the tip.

Making progress

Exhaust tips all cleaned up

After


This truly looks like a different vehicle. The paint is now full of life. Reflections are crisp and vibrant.

Unfortunately it was a cloudy/rainy day, but you can still see how great this paint looks. I am very pleased with our results! About 24 man hours went into this turn around, and it was well worth it!

As always, thanks for reading!

 

[mojo122]

Wish I lived close to Zach! Outstanding work.

 

[Angus]

Great Job! It's amazing how badly people treat their cars...

 

[Pats300zx]

Fantastic work Zach :bow:bow:bow

 

[RTexasF]

Recovery doesn't even begin to describe it!! A job to be proud of without question. Resurrection is more accurate.

 

[trashmanssd]

What did they do wash it with sandpaper, I mean it will get the bugs off quick but so will a flame thrower. Wow great job!

 

[Ronkh]

Great job.

 

[wendell jarvis]

Stellar work as always Zach......just recently did a 2 step on a 330ci....Graphite Grey...Beautiful color...I'll do a write up and post......great save and awesome skills.....Cha Ching $$$$ ....lol

 

[austin26372]

Fantastic turnaround. Night and day!

 

[The Gloss Boss]

That was one trashed BMW! Great work! I ordered some flash pads and it looks like I made a good choice in doing so.

 

[kbmag1]

Wow, very impressive. What was the owner response? Had to be excited.

 

[zmcgovern45]

Thanks guys!

 

[Klock]

Tremendous turnaround!

 

[JSFM35X]

Great job, I always wonder how much gets taken off the clear when I see a swirlzilla turned into a show car. Any chance you put a gauge on it before and after?

I am not saying you did anything wrong, I am just curious.

 

[zmcgovern45]

Great job, I always wonder how much gets taken off the clear when I see a swirlzilla turned into a show car. Any chance you put a gauge on it before and after?



I am not saying you did anything wrong, I am just curious.

It is nearly impossible to measure this as precisely as needed to make accurate statements about how much material is used.

Since we are measuring in microns... Which is an incredibly small unit of measurement, you would have to place your gauge in the 100% exact same spot to trust your before/after readings. Paint thickness is not consistently uniform, therefore missing your measurement spot by even a millimeter or two may give you an entirely different reading. Also, the rather inexpensive gauges that are used may not be accurate enough to be trusted for repeatable measurements when you are hoping to accurately test for the removal of a few microns of material. A proper test would require a good setup and even better instrumentation.

I suppose you could tape off a 2'x2' section, take 50 readings and average them. Then repeat after correction.... However this is an estimate at best.

Mike Phillips did a rather precise test that included measurements while sanding and correcting paint... You can hunt for it on autogeek somewhere, but iirc his process removed around 10-15 microns with a fine grit wet sanding and full correction. Keep in mind this is also dependent on variables like paint hardness, machine used, product used, technique, etc.


All I hope to do with my PTG is to asses the current thickness of the paint to determine if I have a safe amount of material to work with... In this case, I had more than enough to do a very heavy correction (relatively speaking, of course), so I was not concerned at all with this process.