Spotting Holograms with Brinkmann & Sun Gun

[imported_Dave KG]

Critical to ensuring you have the best possible finish when rotary polishing is assessing that the finish is hologram free - however, this is not always easy as many will know especially for light holorgrams... So I have compiled a few little tips and videos for how to make the best of your light source when finding holograms...





Brinkman



First off, the classic detailer`s light! On the finish below, shining the light straight at the panel, we see the fine machine hologramming left in the finish from a heavy compounding stage:



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20074.jpg



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20075.jpg



The marks are there, but not obvious... to make the marring more obvious however, sweep the light source as shown in the video below and look at the clouds which move as you move the light, like moving it across a pool of water waves:



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/th_2008_0711MercedesRClass20076.jpg (http://s235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/?action=view&current=2008_0711MercedesRClass20076.flv)



Light hologramming can be very hard to see, especially when in the small intense region of the Brinkman but moving the light as shown above highlights the marring more clearly...



Using the brighter camera flash also highlights the marring a little more:



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20077.jpg



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20078.jpg





Now, after the marring is removed, and the finish is hologram free you can see this from the pictures and there`s no evidence of the hologramming when moving the light source as shown in the video:



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20112.jpg



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20114.jpg



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20116.jpg



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/th_2008_0711MercedesRClass20113.jpg (http://s235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/?action=view&current=2008_0711MercedesRClass20113.flv)







3M Sun Gun



You might think hologramming would be easier to spot with the Sun Gun, but its still not obvious - the trick though here is not to look at the intense section of the light but instead look at the surrounding area to give you better contrast:



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20079.jpg



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20080.jpg



As above, moving the Brinkman we can see the waves like effect which highlights the hologramming clearly:



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/th_2008_0711MercedesRClass20081.jpg (http://s235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/?action=view&current=2008_0711MercedesRClass20081.flv)



However, better still is tilting the Sun Gun, now note the clearer hologramming, a much better view:



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/th_2008_0711MercedesRClass20082.jpg (http://s235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/?action=view&current=2008_0711MercedesRClass20082.flv)



Adding the camera flash:



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20083.jpg



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20084.jpg





Now, on the hologram free finish we can see that in the photographs, there is not evidence of marring:



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20117.jpg



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/2008_0711MercedesRClass20123.jpg



The videos below show both direct light and tilted light source and both show the finish is hologram free:



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/th_2008_0711MercedesRClass20119.jpg (http://s235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/?action=view&current=2008_0711MercedesRClass20119.flv)



http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/th_2008_0711MercedesRClass20120.jpg (http://s235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/DaveKG/Detailing/Mercedes%20R%20Class%202/?action=view&current=2008_0711MercedesRClass20120.flv)







Just a couple of little tricks for spotting holograms in a finish when you`re working :)

[imported_kwiker]

haha, thanks again.

[mr.ikon]

Very cool thread. What about the HID L.E.D light that TH0001 uses? I cant find that anywhere.

[wascallyrabbit]

HID and LED are different technologies, which type is TH0001 using? the diving world has hand held versions of both of these. they tend to be a bit on the pricey side, but are hand held and battery operated. dive-rite makes a pretty powerful led type.

[imported_advs1]

any chance you could take that same car out in the sun? i have done some work that was hologram free till about dusk, then there were some very faint ones, but only visable if you looked at a certain angle.

[mr.ikon]

HID and LED are different technologies, which type is TH0001 using? the diving world has hand held versions of both of these. they tend to be a bit on the pricey side, but are hand held and battery operated. dive-rite makes a pretty powerful led type.



He said he got it at home depot but cant remember the sku number. I`ve checked on HD`s site and havent had any luck.

[imported_advs1]

how about using bulbs that are 4700K? i was reading on the sungun and its bulb is rated at 4700K. i read somewhere about a place that sells bulbs that reproduces natural sunlight. i`ll look and see if i can find it. but seems if you could get a 50w 4700k bulb or two that would make it close??

[Eisen Hulk]

Once again, a great post from Dave! Thanks, mate!!!

[imported_Dave KG]

any chance you could take that same car out in the sun? i have done some work that was hologram free till about dusk, then there were some very faint ones, but only visable if you looked at a certain angle.



I suspect this is very much down to the "tilting" of the light source... in the videos above for the Sun Gun you see that the holograms are more apparent when the light is tilted and you dont have as bright a source on the paint... This is very much the same as the sun late in the evening, low in the sky and striking the paint such that you dont get the bright overhead glare which masks everything but rather a less bright light which is better for hunting down finer hologramming :)

[imported_fishbonezken]

brilliant info and write-up Dave, thanks!

[Accumulator]

Dave KG- Thanks for another good post! PLEASE don`t take the following the wrong way as I don`t think I`m really on the other side of the fence from you on this, much less :argue even if it might come across that way...and please comment!



Based on Dave KG`s great thread on using the rotary (where he mentioned hologram spotting via SunGun), I bought one. I tested it out on some holograms on the Denali XL, which was even a similar paint/color to the one on this thread. My results were a little different, but I can`t tell just *how* different as I dunno how similar our holograms were :nixweiss Anyhow...



I found I could only spot what I consider light-to-moderate holograms, ones that looked just like the ones in Dave KG`s pics on this thread. The *very* light ones, which were extremely difficult to spot in sunlight (took two people working together at just the right time of day to see `em at all) did *not* show up under the SunGun no matter what I tried.



Note that I knew were all the holograms were during this test, so I was able to quickly get my SunGun technique squared away and yeah, it does take a little work to do that. But no matter what, I could *never* see the really light ones. Note that I spent a *lot* of time playing around with this, so I`m confident that I did my due diligence.



So while the SunGun is the best thing I`ve ever tried for spotting holograms under artificial light, it still doesn`t compare with natural sunlight for the lighter ones. This should be something you can work around with your choice of products/procedures, but I`d sure be careful about making assumptions bases soley on inspection under the SunGun.



When it came to regular marring (light scratches/etching/etc.), I still did a lot better with incandescent lighting, but I sorta expected that. The SunGun is so bright that on metallic paint it doesn`t offer the same degree of contrast as the incandescents (which I have in numerous different wattages), even when I got my "don`t look at the dazzle area" technique figured out. On a nonmetallic paint it might be a completely different story. And again, the SunGun wasn`t *bad*, it just wasn`t the *best*.



And a reminder to everybody: do as Dave KG did and make sure the shop`s other lights are turned *off*. This stuff works infinitely better in an otherwise dark shop; that can make all the difference.



Geeze I hope the above doesn`t come across the wrong way :o

[imported_shine]

Great writeup! I was able to spot buffer holograms using this technique with my Brinkmann after compounding w/ PFW and HTEC. However, I later found out that I left some halograms that I thought no longer existed by inspecting the paint in the sun.