This was a detail for the mother of one of my other clients - she had a black 2003 Highlander with the worst set of RIDS that I've seen so far. It had scratches on one side from the that she presumably parks a little too close to (they've got some mean thorns, lol I ran into them while I was working) and all sorts of scars on the other side - paint transfer, door dings, marks from metal trash cans, what might be key marks, etc. Before she found me she was looking at a repaint - almost $4000.00 from the dealer. She was floored when I fixed it for less than 10% of that.
Before:
The worst of the marring was hidden by a thin coating of dirt:
After wash and
clay, the true nature of the problem came out:
Trim was faded, dealer sticker was baked on, removed with Prepsol and a Plastic razor blade, but wet sanding was required to get the fading out.
Most of the car looked like this.
Sides were 1500 grit sanded, I informed her that this was a one-time shot and if the marring was induced again a repaint would be necessary
Compounded with HTEC/wool cut pad/1500rpm:
Followed with OP/orange/1500rpm, M80/white/PC 6, topped with CG 50:50
Taillights compounded and polished, trim got CG gel.
It's still not 100% marring free (sorry no sun pics), but all of the light swirls came out and only deep marring remained. The wells and tires got Black Magic foam after APC cleaning.
I think I did it in early April or so.
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