5-Series BMW Brought Back to Life!! (Another Wetsand Job)

[RickRack]

This 5-Series BMW was brought to me for the same treatment as the 2 other G35’s I posted up previously. This car has close to 100K miles on the odometer and received a complete repaint by the same bodyshop that painted the other two cars. It was my job to bring the paint back to absolute perfection after it had been wetsanded by them. The goal was to make the paint look better than it did when it rolled out of the factory and ensure that there was no orange peel present whatsoever.

Unfortunately, I had to detail this one all by myself because Ryan was working on a Ford GT performing a concours-level detail. This was the only car I booked for the week because I knew it was going to take quite a while working without the help of Ryan. The other two wetsand jobs took about 40 hours each to correct, so I was expecting about the same for this car.

I had a bit of trouble on the other cars because the clearcoat had hardened extremely fast. This particular brand of paint must be refinished immediately after it is painted or else the paint is significantly harder to work with. My goal was to do as much of the heavy compounding as possible the first couple of days so that I would not have to do any extra work for no reason.



The car was pretty dirty, both inside & out and looked awful when it arrived at the shop.



This is what it looked like before…

[RickRack]

[RickRack]

First, I gave the body a quick wash to remove all of the dust from the body shop and got right to work buffing.


I started compounding with 3M Extra-Cut Compound using a yellow Edge wool pad. Each panel took about 2 hours each to fully remove the wetsanding scratches. Some of the panels had been wetsanded by hand and were very difficult to correct. The only way I was getting satisfactory results was by dry-buffing the surface multiple times using mostly the pad and a tiny spritz of distilled water as lube. The compound was barely cutting through the clearcoat and seemed to just “hydroplane” across the surface with very little effect. I normally would have never attempted this on softer paint, but I had no other choice on this rock-hard clear.



Here are a few during pictures right after the Extra Cut / yellow wool pad step….

[RickRack]

After the wool pad / Extra Cut step was complete, I proceeded to buff the complete exterior again with 3M Extra Cut Compound using a yellow Meguiar’s Solo foam pad, which removed about 90% of the compounding haze. I went over each panel, applying the product twice to ensure that I left the best possible finish before a medium and fine-cut polish was used. The first set of polishing with Extra Cut was to remove the compounding haze and the second set was strictly to burnish the paint to the highest gloss possible, using very little product until the compound broke down into a very fine powder. I believe that compounding is the most important step when correcting paint, which is why I spent most of my time doing so.

After all of the compounding was complete, it was time to remove all of the buffer trails and take the gloss to another level. I chose to use Menzerna Super Intensive Polish as a medium polish with a yellow Meguiar’s Solo foam pad. I used the same technique as I did with the Extra Cut / yellow Solo pad, working the polish until it broke down to a very fine powder.

I decided to give the car a much needed wash before the final polishing step was performed to remove all of the excess compound, dust, wool, etc. that was in every crack & crevice and ensure a perfectly clean surface.


I chose to use a different finishing polish, instead of 3M Ultrafina as I had on the two previous wetsand jobs. My choice was Menzerna 85rd using a blue Lake Country CCS pad. The level of gloss achieved by this step was absolutely jaw-dropping! The metallic flake really seemed to pop after this step and left the paint glowing.

I wiped down the complete exterior with 91% alcohol after all of the polishing was complete and did a quick wipedown of Zaino Z6 before the pictures were taken. No LSP was used as requested by the body shop, because the paint needs to cure before doing so.

All in all, I spent a total of about 40 hours over a period of seven days to perform this detail and correction work. It was definitely a ton of work for one person, but seeing the end result made it all worth it in the end. My entire body was aching tremendously upon completion and I hope that this will be the last one of these type jobs for a while.

Again, no LSP was used and the pictures are straight out of the camera with no altering whatsoever.



Halogen / garage pics

[RickRack]

Outside pics…

[RickRack]

[RickRack]

[RickRack]

[bwalker25]

Another wonderful job! always a joy to read these posts you make. Great job!

[Dirty-Sanchez]

All of that in just 40 hours! OMG, I bet you are sore.

That's nothing short of a "professional" (and inspirational) detail.

I can't think of the right words for it... very impressive.

[zoomzoom mazda5]

I was stunned to see the before and after work you have done to the BMW, 1000% better looking than any body shop can do. My hat is off to you Rick! outstanding workmanship!............is that the Ford GT that Ryan is working on in the back ground? Hope it is!......................Angelo

[dsms]

I wish we all could detail in an orange peel free world Once again you raised that gloss barrier, although I done think there are any barriers when you polish. But anyways killer work and you have my respect for a true dedication to the craft.