Driven Auto Detail
New member
Hey peeps, thought I'd post one of my recent jobs. The vehicle belongs to the Brownsburg Police Department and it serves as the prisoner transport van. Being 11 years old and never garaged, it was very oxidized and beat up. The Chief of Police asked me if I could do anything for it and I told him I'd do what I could. To my surprise, it was actually a single stage paint. Needless to say, I went home wearing a lot of red paint on my shirt and pants. Plus, all my towels were red. Ok, on to the job...
Brought in from the rain:
With this van being in such bad condition, I needed a heavy hitter. It was washed via foam cannon containing a few ounces of Chem. Guys CW&G and scrubbed a soft wheel brush. After washing I allowed it to air dry as to not ruin my good drying towels:
After washing, it was time to mark off a test spot to see what I was up against:
I decided on a Meg's YELLOW polishing pad, Optimum Compound, and my new Makita rotary. I had never used the rotary before, so I thought this would be a good vehicle to test on:
After tackling the hood, I moved on to the side of the van. I had to leave smaller areas for hand polishing at the end:
By now, my YELLOW Meg's polishing pad had turned into what looked like a BURGUNDY Meg's cutting pad:
More "work in progress" pics:
After about 7 hours of work, and a quick coat of DG AquaWax to give a little bit of protection and enhance the look, here is the end result:
I will say that the paint was far from perfect, however, knowing what the vehicle is used for, the goal of this job was just to make it look BETTER.
Comments, questions welcomed! Thanks for viewing!
Brought in from the rain:
With this van being in such bad condition, I needed a heavy hitter. It was washed via foam cannon containing a few ounces of Chem. Guys CW&G and scrubbed a soft wheel brush. After washing I allowed it to air dry as to not ruin my good drying towels:
After washing, it was time to mark off a test spot to see what I was up against:
I decided on a Meg's YELLOW polishing pad, Optimum Compound, and my new Makita rotary. I had never used the rotary before, so I thought this would be a good vehicle to test on:
After tackling the hood, I moved on to the side of the van. I had to leave smaller areas for hand polishing at the end:
By now, my YELLOW Meg's polishing pad had turned into what looked like a BURGUNDY Meg's cutting pad:
More "work in progress" pics:
After about 7 hours of work, and a quick coat of DG AquaWax to give a little bit of protection and enhance the look, here is the end result:
I will say that the paint was far from perfect, however, knowing what the vehicle is used for, the goal of this job was just to make it look BETTER.
Comments, questions welcomed! Thanks for viewing!
Seriously though, that came out great, I'm sure the prisoners will feel a lot better being transported in something that's not all oxidized like that! :rofl
