how to clear marring from vinyl stripes?

[imported_tuffluck]

i literally bought my car brand new today. brought it home and washed with ONR. didn`t do anything out of the ordinary, but there are 2 racing stripes--one is matte gray, one is gloss red. the gloss red i noticed after drying is swirled and marred. nothing was caught in the MF WW, the vinyl is just extremely sensitive i suppose. heck, i`m not even certain i did it, but i`ve been blaming myself all day for it :(



is there anything i can put on those stripes to cover up the marring? i don`t want to screw them up, but surely there has to be something i can do. i read someone did PC, green pad, and poly-seal over on the autogeek forums and had 100% success, but then others say don`t put anything on your exterior vinyl. so i`m nervous about trying anything whatsoever. any help is appreciated.

[gmblack3]

I removed some deeper swirls from a friends green with envy challenger black vinyl stripes with MF pad and D300 using a G110v2. If yours are not factory go very easy with the pressure.

[lostdaytomorrow]

I`d take it back to the dealer and ask ***?

[SuperBee364]

I`d take it back to the dealer and ask ***?



Chances are that they`d just offer to give the car and the stripes a free buff job in their "Detailing bay", and you`d be worse off than you are now.



This one`s best fixed yourself, or by a local pro detailer.

[Accumulator]

Are today`s vinyl appliques as sensitive to UV as they used to be? As in, a bit too much correction (it didn`t always take much at all!) and sunlight would fade `em in no time.

[imported_tuffluck]

Are today`s vinyl appliques as sensitive to UV as they used to be? As in, a bit too much correction (it didn`t always take much at all!) and sunlight would fade `em in no time.



i had another thought. what about covering it with a clear bra? it will mask small swirls and keep it protected in the future. the only problem is if the clear bra ever fades and needs to come off, it will probably rip off the stripe as well (since they are both applied by adhesive).



Scottwax is going to look at it for correction purposes today. this is a limited edition car that`s only been out for 3 months, so i`m afraid the manufacturer did not do a swirl QC on these stripes. i saw the same car last night with the same problem. i was very delicate in my washing process and it still got marred, so quite frankly i don`t know how i`m going to avoid swirls in my next wash. maybe i just don`t wash the stripe at all?

[Accumulator]

tuffluck- Well, you`ll have to wash it sooner or later.... Not sure what to suggest :nixweiss

[imported_tuffluck]

Scottwax polished all the marring out :)



also we found that it did not have swirls after using a microfiber to wipe off the polish, so that concludes it is not that sensitive. we believe the dealership just goofed up when they installed the stripes.



i searched, searched again, and searched some more for the answer to "can you polish out swirls or swirling in vinyl racing stripes" for hours and really found no substantiating evidence that you could do it safely. i found people that said they would "try" it and never post back their results, and i hate that! so for any future searchers, it did work. a pro detailer did it and said it is not dangerous to glossy stripes if you just use a small amount of cut in a product. Scottwax used something from 3m, but he said any light, light polish would do the trick with a PC and a finishing pad.

[Accumulator]

tuffluck- Glad Scottwax was able to sort it out. I`d still keep subequent polishing of the stripes to a minimum.

[Scottwax]

I started off as light as possible, 3M Ultrafina and a blue Propel finishing pad. That was enough to polish out the marring. Went back over the whole area with Quikshine and a 530 gram 16 x 16 MF towel, still no visible marring, none in the sun either.



Glad I could help you out! :wavey