Aren't we all?
I'm a long time shine junky. I'm glad I found the rest of you. I heard about Autopia from the detailing forum at vwvortex. I've been lurking on and off for six months or so. I just got a gem of a car for cheap that really just needs a good cleanup. So, for the last few days I have been here hardcore, gleaning every last bit of information I can from the joint.
A little about my automotive past. My first car was a 1984 Dodge Turismo. I called it the paintless wonder. It was a striking calico consisting of faded blue SS paint, primer and surface rust. Total nutcase, but dead reliable. I paid $150 for it from my stepdad and proceeded to beat the ever-livin' crap out of it.
Next, I found a 1987 VW Scirocco 16V. I fell in love. It was absolutely beautiful. The black paint was, umm, slightly oxidized. However, a friend of mine was a whiz with a rotary and we cleaned her up well. Like any poorly maintained european car, it nickeled and dimed me to death. (I was only in high school at the time.)
Then I got a Toyota Paseo in a stunning metallic black. Lovely specimen for the first two weeks of ownership. The dealer that I bought it from cross-threaded one of the spark plugs. I was on my way to work one fine day, and then I hear POP and a car that was now running on three cylinders. Left a nasty dent in the hood too. So after he fixed that, I decided to change the oil. I let the car cool down for about 15 minutes before starting to drain. Then as we all do, I pulled up on ramps, and popped the drainplug out. I went in the house to grab some stuff and came out a few minutes later expecting the oil to be drained. Nope. That's kind of odd, I remember thinking. Boy, that looks pretty thick. Oh well, must be old. After I got done, I fired her up and discovered some rod knock.
After getting the motor re-freshened, I was a little gunshy of the little fella, so I traded it on a 99 Eclipse 10th Anniversary package in beautiful Minden Silver Pearl. I truly discovered my love for detailing with that car. However, it did me wrong a few times, so I'll leave it at that.
Fast forward to now. I am in the US Air Force, stationed in the UK. It really sucks to get paid in USD and have to shop in Pounds Sterling. So that leaves me with whatever the BX has. Ug. Let's not discuss that, or I may have a gran mal seizure.
I just picked up this little prize for 325 pounds.
It's a 93 Vauxhall Cavalier 2.0 GSi. (Or something like that.) It's got 165K on it, but it purrs like a kitten, has a year's worth of MOT, shifts smoothly, and the oil is the proper consistency.
It's also going to come in handy here. It needs some serious TLC. See hood.
So far, I polished the hood and roof with some cheap KIT scratch remover and applied some gold class to it. By hand. I'm still sore. It's not that bad now. It does still need some more work.
I'm going to grab one of those 4 amp Firestorms from the BX and then order the Poorboys kit with pads from autogeeks.
Sorry for the super long winded first post. If you've made it this far, thanks. I look forward to sharing tips and ideas while trying to help as many "less educated" leaving you pros to field the tougher questions.
Thanks for my new second home.
Tim
I'll just have to wait til they get more in stock. The good news is that I have Thursday off, and consequently, have all day to do the rest of it. When I'm done, I'll post up some pics in the Showoff section for you all.
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