Wet Shine Detailing: Honda (swirl)City in Nighthawk black

[imported_fishbonezken]

Hey guys, so this is a detail for an ’06 Honda City in nighthawk black. It has been in an accident and resprayed in a few areas and there were some colour mismatches as well as other minor damage in other areas. So the whole car was resprayed and Honda kindly provided free buffer marks service.

The car wasn’t too dirty to begin with.

Process for cleaning the wheels were Meguiar’s Super Degreaser(cut 4:1) on the tires and wheel wells and Meguiar’s Wheel Brightener(cut 4:1) on the wheels. Tar spots on the face of the wheel removed with Perma Glass Tar Remover.

Car’s body is washed with Osren Bubble and Wax shampoo, surface smoothened with Osren Magic Clay Cloth and exterior rubber and plastic trim cleaned with Osren Multi Clean. The paint is then de-waxed with Osren Multi Clean.

Then a test spot was performed on the passenger rear door. First step would be Meguiar’s #105 Ultra-Cut Compound via Lake Country 4-ply twisted wool @ 1500-2100rpms and followed by Meguiar’s #205 Ultra-Finishing Polish via Lake Country Kompressor white pad @ 900-1200rpms. Due to the hardness of the paint, M205 was not enough to completely remove the wool buffer marks from the first step.

So three polishing stages will have to be needed, which were:

1. Meguiar’s #105 Ultra-Cut Compound via Lake Country 4-ply twisted wool @ 1500-2100 rpm

2. Meguiar’s #105 Ultra-Cut Compound via Lake Country Kompressor white pad @ 1200-1500 rpm

3. Menzerna 106FF Final Finish via Lake Country flat black pad @ 600-900 rpm



Some before pictures,

 

[imported_fishbonezken]

After M105/wool and M105/Kompressor white

After M105/wool only,

More ‘before’ shots,

Joe a.k.a. Slk dropped by to lend a helping hand (THANKS bro!)

The rear boot gave us some difficulties, M205 were leaving very light holos(could be my wrong technique) and Meguiar’s SwirlX used with an ROB(Random Orbital Buffer) remove holos but left the finish slightly cloudy. So we settled on Menzerna 106FF on an LC flat black pad.

After the three polishing stages,

My rather wet office,

 

[imported_fishbonezken]

Lake Country Kompressor pad,

LC Kompressor white with M105 left a very decent finish with only very minor swirling.

After M105/wool,

After M105/wool and M105/LC Kompressor white

For the finishing stage, weapon of choice was Menzerna 106FF Final Finish via Lake Country flat black pad @ 600-900 rpm.

Technique was to first work it at 900-1200 rpm until it turns clear (to remove light swirling from M105), spray one light pump of water for relubrication and work at 600 rpm to remove any holograms.

Here are two pictures. One of them is before refining with 106FF, the other is without refining, just after M105/LC Kompressor white. Can you tell the difference?

Neither can I, the first pic is after refining whereas the latter pic is before refining. That’s how fine M105 left the finish with.

After fully refining the paint, polish dust is blasted away with the pressure washer. Firstly by soaking it with a mixture of Osren Bubble and Wax shampoo and Osren Multi Clean, this is to help remove any polishing oils and help dissolve polish buildup in the cracks and crevices. This is rinsed off and soaked again with Osren shampoo only to neutralize any APC that might not be rinsed off.

Here are some pre-LSP (Last Step Product) shots. If there are any holograms from the refining stage, they would show up now.

 

[imported_fishbonezken]

Then all polish residue in panel gaps were cleaned off with a MF cloth and Meguiar’s All Purpose Cleaner (cut 10:1).

The car is dried off with a Cobra Arctic White cloth and the blow function on the vacuum cleaner to blow off water from tight areas.

LSP of choice was first to lay down a base of Enviroshield (this is akin to Opti-Seal, Z-cs, UPGP).

While this was curing, tires and wheel wells dressed with Osren Tire Shine. Autoglym Bumper Care applied to mudguards. Wheel face cleansed and protected with Jeff’s Werkstatt Prime Acrylic and Poorboy’s Wheel Sealant.

Areas where Enviroshield was applied too thick were buffed off and Duragloss #105 Total Performance Polish is applied via MF. I followed application technique from Zainostore’s website, which is to lay down a strip of product diagonally across the pad, spread them with a finger, and apply in straight lines.

After drying for about an hour, it was then buffed off and Duragloss Aquawax was used in some areas to aid removal.

Here are some post-lsp shots. The paint wasn’t perfectly polished as there are quite a number of RDS(Random Deep Scratches) left, I would say about 92% correction. Hope you’ll enjoy the photos and thanks for looking!

*mods, if the last pic is inappropriate, feel free to remove it. Thanks.*

 

[imported_Sludge1]

You really turned that one around. Really nice, detailed write up. I always enjoy your posts. Thanks. :bigups

 

[Tru_Shine]

Hey good job :wavey , you made it look alot better, could I throw out some thoughts though? I am pretty sure the NHBP is really REALLY soft paint, and shouldn't need a 4ply wool pad for correction, The orange LC pad would have got the job done and saved you alot of work, and thats a little overload for the white kompressor pad to have to remove the 4ply wool pad marks, you definantly got the right compounds and polish, but try to correct with the LC orange/m105 then the LC white/M205 and then if you are still not satisfied do the LC black/106ff. Just throwing out some helpful tips, I'm sure you worked your butt off trying to get those stupid swirls and hazzing out! good job once again.:clap:

 

[Street5927]

I Would have to agree with the above post that the wool may have been a little over kill. As stated, maybe 105/205 combo would have save you some time. It appears as though there is still some light hologramming in the pictures. I am not sure if those are actually holograms or just some left over carrier oils that are making the "star" appearance with the lighting.



Overall, nice job, though.

 

[imported_fishbonezken]

@Sludge,

Thanks alot



@Tru_Shine,

Thanks! The whole car has been resprayed and the paint is definitely not as soft as OEM Nighthawk Black. That and the fact the marks left by the body shop were pretty deep, M105/wool couldn't remove everything with one hit. Some required 2-3 hits at 2100 rpms, killed my arms, haha. Also, as stated in the post, M205/Kompressor White was to gentle and couldn't fully remove M105/Wool marks in one pass. Still, I appreciate you input, thanks!



@Street5927,

Thanks alot! I have no idea about the 'star' appearance around light sources as well. There are no 'stars' when looking at the paint in person, must be bad photography on my part or something to do with the camera lens?

 

[vtec92civic]

nice work man . . . . . you have a pretty nice assortment of brushes there and even some products i personally never heard of . . . . . . but it made the car look great.



What was the run time spent on the vehicle? Never the less excellent work!

 

[Envious Eric]

105 @2100 is pretty stout! It must have been audi hard!

 

[dmw2692004]

your photo bucket bandwidth as been exceeded! we cant see most of your pictures!

 

[imported_fishbonezken]

@vtec92civic,

Thanks. I spent about two full days on the vehicle.



@toyotaguy,

Yup!



@dmw2692004,

Sorry about that, please check back tomorrow(22nd), my monthly bandwidth usage would reset at that time. Thanks:heelclick

 

[imported_fishbonezken]

Pics are up again

 

[KC@detailien]

fishy a at display again





how much we misses it