Not sure if I correctly break down the polish, help!

R

Rickymx

New member
Hi,



i bought some 3m products: Fast cut plus (50417) extra fine (80349) and ultrafina (50383) but i'm having some problems:



-working on a 2007 black vw touareg using a foam cutting pad and the fcp i was not able to take out some scratches (not really deep) so i'd like to know if you use it with a wool pad?



-i don't understand when is time to stop polishing, but i saw a strange thing with the ultrafina: i start spread it and work it at about 1.000rpm and in a couple of passes it gets invisibile (it seems that there is nothing on the paint) but if i speed up to about 1.500rpm and continue polishing then it came out and gets clear!

is this normal? does it means that (also with the other 3m products) i have to go on polishing also when it seems that there is nothing on the paint? :nixweiss



thank you!
 
There are a couple videos on the autogeeks site that would probably help. also, if you search the forum there is a product abrasives chart. What polisher are you using? Depending on what polisher you use is what RPM you should set it at to spread, polish, etc.
 
i'm using a normal rotary, apart from this i'd like to know if these are the normal stages for a polish to breakdown. i hope you understand what i mean ;)
 
thank you, there are a lot of informations in that link!

But it does not tell me how i can decide that i've worked the polish enough, i think that i tend to work it less than it should be
 
First off you might be playing with hard paint and second the scratches are deeper than you think or should be wet sanded first.



Not sure if I've ever used the fast cut, unless they changed name or number, but 3M compounds usually do what they say, sometimes not the prettiest finish but get the job done.



The compounds should not be used like the Ultrafina. They will dry out much faster and can cause deep swirls if buffed dry.



Fast cut, spread the product, work with some pressure for a couple passes and a couple more with light pressure. Fine cut the same. Do a IPA wipe and check your progress.



If you are happy and swirls are minimal the use the UF. Directions on the bottle, 1000-1800-1000. IPA x3 and check in the sun. Then do whole vehicle if happy.



UF should sling a little, this will give you the proper amount. Once you find that point, you can use a little less so it doesn't.
 
Thank you very much, i'm watching all the videos

just one thing: "sling" means splatter? Sorry but my english isn't very good.
 
Rickymx said:
Thank you very much, i'm watching all the videos

just one thing: "sling" means splatter? Sorry but my english isn't very good.
Click to expand...



English is good to me...yeah, sling means splatter. :buffing:
 
Hope you don't mind me posting my question on to the end of this.



I have just spent a frustrating weekend trying to polish my car and want to find out what I was doing wrong. To set the scene:



2 year old car that was washed and clayed. Started of with PC, SFX-2 and Meguiar's #82. Paint is in good condition apart from mainly light swirl marks. The odd deeper scratch but more of that later. Car was in the shade, although the day itself was warm.



Now I have read about a dozen polishing guides and watched about the same number of videos so felt reasonably sure I could get the desired results. Well no. The first problem I had was that the polish seemed to disappear within a few passes. I did spritz the pad with QD but working on the area never produced the 'oily' sort of overlapping semi-circles I see on all the videos. I did follow the recommended steps of applying a cross of polish to the pad, spreading it manually, a few passes at speed two and then several slow passes at 5, applying moderate pressure. Towards the end the polish was dusting quite a lot but never seemed to go through that translucent stage. Checking the work didn't really show a great deal of improvement, nothing like what the videos show.



To cut a long story short, I tried combinations of faster speed & more pressure, longer working & less working, more polish & less polish. You name it, I tried it.



At the end of it all my car does look better, but not as good as I was expecting, Also it took way longer than it should have.



The best way I can describe the experience is that the polish never seemed to really have enough lubricant to produce the even, thin spread on the videos that can be worked over several times. The Meguiar's stuff seemed very thick when compared with a bottle of Sonus that I have. Admittedly I have had it for quite a while but the bottles have been sealed during that time. Can polish 'go-off' or breakdown on its own so it stops being workable?



I also tried #83 with SFX-1 on the rear spoiler as there were a number of scratches that I wanted to work on. Not deep, as they didn't catch on my finger nail and hadn't broken the coat/paint, but visible enough. I used the smaller 4" pad for this and while the polish did seem to behave a bit more like the videos I never got the marks out, even after 2-3 attempts. Once again the videos seem to show this as being a relatively quick process with.



I can provide more detail if necessary. I would really appreciate any comments or advice at to what I may have been doing wrong as I have other cars to do but given how long it took don't know if I can spare the time.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top