Sunday Detail v. Blah Neon

gav'spurplez

New member
My brother bought his wife a new 06 300 Touring, so her neon is out the door.

But, since it is an 01 and has never seen a coat of wax, he figured better get it cleaned up before trying to sell it.

Before pictures of the engine and interior, but none of the exterior. It is a white car and it was overcast, so no good befores came out.

Anyways,



Exterior:

Wash - Meg's GC Shampoo

Clay - Meg's clay

Polish - SSR2.5 / IP ( about 80-20, just so that i had enough to do the whole car ) Orange Sonus Pad via PC

Wax - Meg's Liquid # 26 via pc on a gray pad

Engine - degreased with simple green, and dressed with CD2

Tires / wheel wells dressed with Meg's Hotshine



Interior:

Vacuum,

LGCM with Bissell solution,

Dressed door panels / dash with meg's trim and dash foam.

Windows with Stoner's !



HPIM0484.jpg




HPIM0485.jpg




HPIM0491.jpg




HPIM0489.jpg




HPIM0499.jpg


Wax
 
you may be able to tell that the bumpers seem more "off" white or even yellowish compared to the rest ofthe car. well, i could not do anything with them, the clear was GONE !!!

so do they need to be wetsanded or what ?? clay / polish / cleaner wax - nothing worked,

my brother is not all that concerned since it is a dinky neon and he just wants it to look good enough to get a couple grand for it.



so, for future reference, what do you guys suggest ??
 
Looks good and hopefully he gets some extra money because it is so darn clean. Have the bumpers ever been repainted?
 
they bought the car used from carmax with about 12K miles on it, now it has like 92K



the bumpers must have been painted or had some type of work done to them, because they are pretty bad :nixweiss
 
gav'spurplez said:
you may be able to tell that the bumpers seem more "off" white or even yellowish compared to the rest ofthe car. well, i could not do anything with them, the clear was GONE !!!

so do they need to be wetsanded or what ?? clay / polish / cleaner wax - nothing worked,

my brother is not all that concerned since it is a dinky neon and he just wants it to look good enough to get a couple grand for it.



so, for future reference, what do you guys suggest ??



Klassy AIO + Klassy SG might be able to make it shine a bit.
 
Blah is right! What a boring car, I'm sure she will love the 300 much better.





The detail looks great! You certainly added some dollars to the retail.
 
the dealer wanted to give my bro 800 bucks and he was like,



......." write up the paper work without the trade............"



then the salesman was like, "............ well how much do you want for it............?"



my brother was like, just write up the paperwork without it !!



a friend of mine has a younger brother, took the car for him to see and the father wrote a check !!



said the car looked like new :waxing: :woot2:
 
Looks great!



Should be able to be sold for several hundred more than it would have as prospective buyers look it over and think "wow, this car has really been taken care of!"



Great job on the carpets and the engine - isn't it amazing what some good products in the right hands can do to turn an ugly duckling into a thing of beauty.
 
gav'spurplez said:
so, for future reference, what do you guys suggest ??



Looks like it wasn't necessary since your brother got a great price for the Neon, but perhaps a nice finishing touch would be to pull the wheels off, pop off the wheel covers and re-spray the black to cover up the rust, maybe with some high-temp BBQ paint or engine enamel. Only if you have time for it, of course.



Still, that was a great turnaround. I hope the 300 sees better care from your sister-in-law than the Neon did. :chuckle:
 
92MX83 said:
Looks like it wasn't necessary since your brother got a great price for the Neon, but perhaps a nice finishing touch would be to pull the wheels off, pop off the wheel covers and re-spray the black to cover up the rust, maybe with some high-temp BBQ paint or engine enamel. Only if you have time for it, of course.



Still, that was a great turnaround. I hope the 300 sees better care from your sister-in-law than the Neon did. :chuckle:





i seriously doubt it,

she was asking me about putting it through an auto wash, where the guys dry it afterwards, i told her that their "towels" were probably not going to be the best material and might not even be that clean !!!

her responce was " i'm almost 40 and can;t hand wash my car every week" :argue



so before getting into an argument, i simply said, make sure i see it twice a year for proper polishing and waxing.

....side note, i already had to polish out a 15 inch long clear coat scratch / scuff looking thing from the hood. dealers and their carelessness :doh
 
I would expect there to be nothing you can do with the bumpers. My understanding is that they're painted on plastic, usually with added flex agents, so the paint on the metal doesn't stay the same shade as the bumpers after some UV exposure.

I've seen quite a few older cars with this type of discrepancy. Single stage red seems to really show up noticeably.

(side note-was the rest of the car cleared? I've heard most white paint is SS and fairly hard. :nixweiss )
 
Very nice turnaround, especially the engine! Were you able to remove the rust around the bolts where the seats mount to the floor?



As far as the bumpers go, the paint they use on them is different because the bumpers and plastic and the paint needs a flex additive so it is less prone to cracking. Different paint + different material painted often means different color than the rest of the car and you really can't do anything about it.
 
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