Dealer hammered X5, 335i, CTS, Corolla

Scottwax · 06-14-09, 09:18

2008 BMW 335i. Regular Saturday morning customer's car who hasn't been so regular due to the nearly constant weekend rain/storms we've been having since late March. I believe this was only the 3rd time I've cleaned any of their cars since the end of March because of the rain. It had been since late winter since I'd waxed any of their cars, so I went ahead and polished this one with my Meguiars G110 using a yellow Meguiars polishing pad and #205, and sealed the paint with Optimum Opti-Seal.

============

2008 Cadillac CTS. I polished and waxed this one when it was new about a year ago. This time, there were some bird bomb etchings and swirls on the hood the owner wanted taken care of. He'd tried to remove the bird bomb etching by hand and left some finger tip marring around the etchings. I used Meguiars #105 and an orange Soft Edge cutting pad via G110 which removed most of the etching and all of the marring. I followed with #205 and a yellow Meguiars polishing pad for the rest of the car and sealed with Opti-Seal.

SCoach · 06-14-09, 09:35

Well, I wanted to send you a PM, but I guess I'll just ask here...

I'm curious what you do for wheel cleaning? Both in terms of chemicals and brushes. Your wheels always look great, and I am looking to do some upgrading, so I'd love to hear your process.

Thanks,

-P

Scottwax · 06-14-09, 09:35

This is my son's 2007 Corolla that I detailed for him when I was up in Kentucky this past week. He knows how to detail cars but doesn't really like doing it. ONR and Opti-Seal is enough detailing for him. Interior needed quite a bit of cleaning, he is a merchandiser for Pepsi and helps run a youth group at his church so he pretty much lives in his car. I did make him take all his stuff out of the car.

Due to the rain during the week, my last day there, Thursday was really the only day we had to get it done. By the time he finished work, it was 2 PM and he had an MRI for his knee scheduled at 3 PM and his friend who was going to drive him there had loaned his car out. My son didn't get back until 4:15 PM so that left me 4 1/2 hours of daylight to get it done. At least he left the mats for me. I had to use the carpet brush attachment on my G110 along with BioKleen's Traffic Lane Cleaner to take care of the floor mats. Even made a video of it.

YouTube - Carpet cleaning

BioKleen TLC for the carpets and seats, Woolite/water to clean the vinyl. Optimum Protectant Plus to dress and Clearkote's Quikshine on the wood trim. Yeah, I know the dead pedal isn't perfect in the picture but I was runninig out of daylight so I had to get the pictures quick.

Exterior was the same as the two cars above, #205/yellow and Opti-Seal.

Scottwax · 06-14-09, 09:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by SCoach

Well, I wanted to send you a PM, but I guess I'll just ask here...

I'm curious what you do for wheel cleaning? Both in terms of chemicals and brushes. Your wheels always look great, and I am looking to do some upgrading, so I'd love to hear your process.

Thanks,

-P

99 times out of 100, Optimum No Rinse and a variety of brushes is all I need. Very rarely do I have to use Optimum Power Clean. I have some videos posted on youtube showing both methods.

74 thing · 06-14-09, 09:47

Hey Scott, do you ever use VM or RMG anymore? I know you still use CMW (great product that I have been using for years as well), but I was wondering about the rest of the Clearkote products. They have a great product line.

I notice that you also use Meguiars and Optimum which are great product lines as well.

Honestly the quality of the work you do is so high that I bet it really does not matter what product line you chose, your final work would still come out fantastic.

Scottwax · 06-14-09, 09:54

2009 BMW X5. The owner noticed some odd looking areas on the driver's side of the hood of his wife's X5 and called me out to detail it and either remove the defects or advise him on what the problem was and what it would take to correct it.

When I got there, I could see several areas of what appeared to be etching from something that spilled or dripped on the paint. It was very obvious the dealer had noticed it too, because they took their usual step. Rotary, wool pad and a very low skill level to attack the problem.

Here are some examples of the etching, there were 3-4 areas of it on the driver's side of the hood.

Now, using the same tool (rotary) someone else used, along with a very aggressive compound, Meguiars #105 and a yellow Meguiars polishing pad @ 1000-1400 rpms, 3-4 polishing sessions on some areas, the finish looked like this after compounding:

I further refined the finish using Meguiars #205 via rotary, again using a yellow Meg's polishing pad, 1000-1400 rpms.

The etching was noticably reduced but not completely removed. I considered wetsanding but was afraid if that didn't completely remove the etching it would be hard for the owner to get the dealership to repaint the hood if I did wetsand it.

I finished off the hood using 3M's Ultrafine Machine Polish (aka Ultrafina) using a blue Ultrafina pad at 1000-1800-1000 rpms.

I then let the sun bake the hood and front fender (anything that might come back will after 2 hours in 95 degree temperatures in the full sun!) while I washed, polished (G110/#205 since the rest was pretty much swirl free) and sealed (Opti-Seal) the rest of the car before going over the hood and fender with OS as well. Why didn't I completely wash the car to begin with? 2 reasons. I had good sun to see what I was kind of progress I was making and because #105, 205 and UF do tend to dust a bit and I'd have had to rewash the X5 anyway. Using ONR makes it easy to wash a section or two as needed to do heavy compounding and then washing the rest of the vehicle and removing compounding dust at the same time.

Anthony Orosco · 06-14-09, 11:18

Very nice work Scott

Anthony

Scottwax · 06-15-09, 06:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by 74 thing

Hey Scott, do you ever use VM or RMG anymore? I know you still use CMW (great product that I have been using for years as well), but I was wondering about the rest of the Clearkote products. They have a great product line.

I notice that you also use Meguiars and Optimum which are great product lines as well.

Honestly the quality of the work you do is so high that I bet it really does not matter what product line you chose, your final work would still come out fantastic.

I still use VM and RMG, mostly combined into Pink Moose on black and red vehicles with paint in excellent condition (since the combo will only remove minor defects).

Harvey Birdman · 06-15-09, 07:54

Thanks, Scott-- even with the damage, your work is impeccable and the paint looks phenomenal.

dmw2692004 · 06-15-09, 08:01

great work!

bufferbarry · 06-15-09, 08:07

scott great video man! wow that beamer was hammered. all the cars look super.

SoCalB6 · 06-22-09, 11:15

Looks great, Scott! If I may ask, how in the world do you get away with polishing hot cars in the sun? I always have to wait at least an hour before I can even wash the car!