imported_themightytimmah
New member
This was a 2006 Corvette that I detailed for Autogeek's Detail Fest. It came to me in pretty decent shape, but I still managed to put 14 hours into the paint alone.
Upon first inspection in the shade, the car had excellent wetness, but had room for improvement in depth and gloss. I washed with NXT (mixed double strength in a foam gun), clayed with Griot's Clay, and taped off all trim and decals prior to inspection:
Inspection under halogens revealed significant and deep marring that looked dealer-installed. The car had sat on the lot for some time before Gerry (the owner) purchased it, and his previous polishing with a Cyclo had been unable to fully remove the deep swirling.
I attempted to remove the swirling with the least aggressive approach (Menzerna Super Intensive Polish on a green Edge wool light cut pad). This left a lot of "tracers" and deeper marring remaining.
I stepped up a yellow edge wool pad, in order to fully cut out the defects. This was sufficient in removing 98+% of marring, with 4000 grit wetsanding necessary on some of the deeper patches.
This was a gouge on the rocker panels that required wetsanding to correct:
After 1-2 passes per area with yellow wool, I stepped up to SIP/Ultrafina mixed on a green wool light cutting pad. I preferred this pad to orange foam, and it helped knock down the deepest marring further, while preparing the surface for finishing with a foam pad. It still left some nasty holograms on the finicky GM paint though. The car was rewashed with NXT/APC mix, and it was raining :sosad.
Ultrafina SE was used on a blue UF pad to remove hologramming and produce a LSP-ready finish.
At this time, the car was wiped down with IPA and inspected under halogens. It was pretty much flawless, but, I didn't want to let it go without a full sun inspection. After 12 hours, it was time to call it a day and come back later in the week.
On the 2nd day, the wheels were removed and hand polished before being waxed with WheelWax and dressed with Black Magic. The sun revealed occasional light holograms or remaining scratches. The scratches were chased with 4000 grit paper and SIP on an orange LC @1500rpms, followed with UF SE. All of the hologrammed areas were buffed again with Ultrafina at low rpms.
This job reinforced my belief that halogens don't show everything, and a good full sun inspection or a dual action step is necessary prior to delivery.
Although I was satisfied with the swirl removal, I figured that a good glaze would bring out more depth and wetness from the finish. I went with an old favorite - Meg's #7. This paint was so finicky that a careless heavy stroke from a good MF would reintroduce marring - and with the challenging removal of M07, I found myself going over a couple spots again with Ultrafina
.
Once M07 was applied and removed, Gerry applied and removed a coat of Souveran, before garaging the car.
On the day of the show, Gerry met me at 7am in Boca to drive the car up. The wells were protected with blue 3M tape.
We hit some pretty bad patches of road tar, as well as a dusty construction environment in West Palm. A good wash was definitely in order when we arrived at Detail Fest. I was pretty impressed by the samples that they offered us - DP soap in the foamgun produced some pretty good suds, and the Metro Vac and Blow was invaluable for drying out the cracks and crevices.
The car was QD'ed, and a second coat of Souveran was applied for that "just waxed" look.
After the slowest drive ever (2mph!) from the wash bay to the show area, we found our spot:
The car was a fan favorite, for sure!
Upon first inspection in the shade, the car had excellent wetness, but had room for improvement in depth and gloss. I washed with NXT (mixed double strength in a foam gun), clayed with Griot's Clay, and taped off all trim and decals prior to inspection:
Inspection under halogens revealed significant and deep marring that looked dealer-installed. The car had sat on the lot for some time before Gerry (the owner) purchased it, and his previous polishing with a Cyclo had been unable to fully remove the deep swirling.
I attempted to remove the swirling with the least aggressive approach (Menzerna Super Intensive Polish on a green Edge wool light cut pad). This left a lot of "tracers" and deeper marring remaining.
I stepped up a yellow edge wool pad, in order to fully cut out the defects. This was sufficient in removing 98+% of marring, with 4000 grit wetsanding necessary on some of the deeper patches.
This was a gouge on the rocker panels that required wetsanding to correct:
After 1-2 passes per area with yellow wool, I stepped up to SIP/Ultrafina mixed on a green wool light cutting pad. I preferred this pad to orange foam, and it helped knock down the deepest marring further, while preparing the surface for finishing with a foam pad. It still left some nasty holograms on the finicky GM paint though. The car was rewashed with NXT/APC mix, and it was raining :sosad.
Ultrafina SE was used on a blue UF pad to remove hologramming and produce a LSP-ready finish.
At this time, the car was wiped down with IPA and inspected under halogens. It was pretty much flawless, but, I didn't want to let it go without a full sun inspection. After 12 hours, it was time to call it a day and come back later in the week.
On the 2nd day, the wheels were removed and hand polished before being waxed with WheelWax and dressed with Black Magic. The sun revealed occasional light holograms or remaining scratches. The scratches were chased with 4000 grit paper and SIP on an orange LC @1500rpms, followed with UF SE. All of the hologrammed areas were buffed again with Ultrafina at low rpms.
This job reinforced my belief that halogens don't show everything, and a good full sun inspection or a dual action step is necessary prior to delivery.
Although I was satisfied with the swirl removal, I figured that a good glaze would bring out more depth and wetness from the finish. I went with an old favorite - Meg's #7. This paint was so finicky that a careless heavy stroke from a good MF would reintroduce marring - and with the challenging removal of M07, I found myself going over a couple spots again with Ultrafina
.Once M07 was applied and removed, Gerry applied and removed a coat of Souveran, before garaging the car.
On the day of the show, Gerry met me at 7am in Boca to drive the car up. The wells were protected with blue 3M tape.
We hit some pretty bad patches of road tar, as well as a dusty construction environment in West Palm. A good wash was definitely in order when we arrived at Detail Fest. I was pretty impressed by the samples that they offered us - DP soap in the foamgun produced some pretty good suds, and the Metro Vac and Blow was invaluable for drying out the cracks and crevices.
The car was QD'ed, and a second coat of Souveran was applied for that "just waxed" look.
After the slowest drive ever (2mph!) from the wash bay to the show area, we found our spot:
The car was a fan favorite, for sure!
