Scion Love

Jakerooni · 06-09-09, 08:22

haven't had the pleasure of detailing a scion before. and well frankly I laughed a little when it drove up my driveway.. LOL Looked like a little roller skate to me. A good repeat client of mine buys and sells cars all the time. And he just picked this one up off of Autotrader. Pretty sure it used to be a rental car or something of the sort. It only had 8000 miles on it but looked more like 80,000 with the condition it was in. I mean nothing bad but far worse than I expected a car with only 8000 miles to actually have. It had some pretty good paint defects. RIDS everywhere. and the front seemed to have a bit of road rash going on.

For the record... Scion paint isn't the easiest paint to deal with for future reference.

I had to do some trial and error here. I tried the 105/205 with the D/A (G110) with little luck. So I grabbed the Makita....Oh the joys....

First up a good bath and clay treatment to see what I was really dealing with

Some hawaiian shine auto bath was in order here.. Nice and sudsy

Now it was hit and miss with the sun this fine day. I tried getting the defects as best I could. You can see some of them. More RIDS than swirls.. I have to assume it was half a$$ed detailed before they shipped it to him.

So the problem area really was the hood. Rock chips and RIDS galore.. as stated I tried the whole D/A thing with little results... Grabbed the makita with Foam first... Nadda... Switched over to wool.. UGH!!! ARGH!!! HOLY *&%$#!!!!!

So what was left?

Yep I said screw it I'm wet sanding the dang thing. No more disc do I had to do it by hand with my sanding block and Meg's Unigrit 2500.

After the nice dullness set in I could easily see where even the smallest chip was that needed filled in with the touch up. Of course the fill wait till dry sand fill again and repeat until desired results came into play. (actually had the car for 3 days so it all worked out in my favor)

Then it was time to polish it back up to a nice finish. 105 really did the job here. Started with wool and took it to Foam keeping with 105. It really does finish down quite nicely.

Checking for clarity

A nice deep wet finish already and I haven't even switched over to 205 yet.. This was turning out good now.

Once I got the hood in shape I went through the rest of the car with 105 and got it leveled out nicely.

Keeping with the makita and a finishing foam buff it pad I switched over to the 205 to get the finish I wanted.

Jakerooni · 06-09-09, 08:30

Oh the dripping wettness that was showing off.

Figured it was time to get it outside and take some nice reflection shots. as well as inspect the interior to make sure I did't miss anything there either.

Reflections and such....

Friggin cool little car. I can see myself having lots of fun driving one of these around. I was actaully amazed at the amount of room you have on the inside seeing as how small of a car this is. The owner was very pleased with the outcome. I wouldn't call it perfect by any means but a huge improvement over how it came it.

Thanks for looking guys.

Gianni D · 06-09-09, 08:33

great recovery ... hope you are doing well in Michigan!!

Jakerooni · 06-09-09, 09:14

Thanks Gianni. When did you move out to PA? GM move you out there or something?

David Fermani · 06-10-09, 06:00

Sweet work. You can never beat the look of a sanded finish. I have that same Dewalt DA.

Jakerooni · 06-10-09, 12:48

LOl yea it's my waxer these days. If I must use a D/A I grab the G110 for any sort of correction. But the Dewalt is a great machine as well. It would be better if you could change out the BP's on it. and yea a nicely leveld surface just shines on and on and on...

ohiostate · 06-10-09, 01:29

Very nice!!!

Gianni D · 06-10-09, 06:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jakerooni

Thanks Gianni. When did you move out to PA? GM move you out there or something?

I resigned from GM in January and moved here to PA to work for the Otis Elevator Company.

So far so good around here. The plant I was working at (Pontiac Stamping) is scheduled to be idled later this year, so I was lucky enough to be the last person that resigned before they started laying off people.

The aurora needs some of your tlc, but I just bought the wife a new car so it might not get a correction anytime soon.

If you don't mind ... send me a box of Koegel's Viennas this way. I haven't had one of those hot dogs in a while ... lol

bufferbarry · 06-10-09, 06:05

Jake from what i have seen so far that was probaly your nicest work yet! very top notch. great job man! what camera do you have? ill bet that thing looked great in person.

Jakerooni · 06-10-09, 09:20

I think I'm just getting better at taking pics there barry. I have a Sony alpha 300 DSLR. Picked it up right after christmas and love it. My first shot at a DSLR camera. got a killer deal on it at circut city right before they closed the doors for good.

And it looked great in person. I think the other factor for this is I had 3 days to do it. Usually it's a one day thing. So I had time to check and re-check and then re-check again.

bufferbarry · 06-11-09, 02:28

yeah thats cool i was curious i just recently got a nikon d40 and ill tell ya what you can tell a dslr difference in pictures! anyway great work!

Jakerooni · 06-11-09, 02:35

I know a lot of people with the D40. for the price it's probably one of the best bang for the buck camera's out there right now. Can't wait to see how much better your pics are going to be.