MusicMan
03-31-2012, 04:50 PM
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020127.jpg
There she is....a beautiful red 2006 Corvette. Jim (the owner) saw one of the write ups I did on another Vette we did, a black 08` z06, and thought our work looked great. He was hoping that we could perform the same magic to his ride.
We met up with him after work one day to take a look at it. And yes it needed some serious love! It had its fair share of road grime and a few bugs here and there and of course it was swirled like crazy. Good ole Vette paint...doesn`t take too much to scratch it, but MAN is it hard to polish! We talked for a minute, explained what we would do and then set a date for the weekend. He told us he had bought the car off of a ball player who played over sea`s...and while the swirls and dirt were bad on this car....it was nothing compared to what the ball players girlfriend did to it when she found out he was breaking up with her....i guess she got inspired to play some ball herself...and took a bat to the windshield! Ladies i understand if you get mad but...leave the car out of it...it didn`t do anything!
It was another early morning detail...a bit chilly, but it`s finally getting around to the time of year where the weather is warming up nicely out here in Arizona. He backed it in and with the sun still pretty low in the east, you could really see how bad the swirls were:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020134.jpg
Oh yeah, GOTTA love the dark colors! He had some nice etched in water spots as well:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020131.jpg
The back hatch was no picnic either...it actually ended up having some of the deeper swirls...but we`ll get to what all it took to correct those in a minute...for now just check out the damage
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020140.jpg
These guys were pretty deep...took some serious work to get them out:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020141.jpg
Up on the quarter panel was some good deep scratches as well:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020142.jpg
So like i said...it was swirled pretty bad. Now not only was it swirled but, she was pretty dirty too. Remember that road grime i mentioned earlier...
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020130.jpg
Yeahhhhhhhh thats not pretty. You can see the nice brown look mixed with the lovely red dirt/clay of Arizona on the tires. When i hit those things with our tire cleaner it looked like toxic sludge was rolling off...quite scary actually lol.
The rims weren`t half steppin` either:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020129.jpg
Oh yes look at that brake dust! What you can`t see is how bad the brake dust was in the barrels of the wheels. My trusty EZ Detail Brush took care of that along with some Wheel Brightener and our pressure washer.
I always like to start with the tires and rims first...99% of the time they are the nastiest and dirtiest part of the car and i want to get all that grime out of the way before we start washing the rest of the car. It doesn`t make much sense to go clean the car and THEN go sling some brake dust gunk all over the clean paint!
Then for those lovely bugs....oh yes the front bumper of this thing was an insect massacre!
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020145.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020147.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020146.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020148.jpg
Well hey, i guess if you`re a bug and you`re gonna bite the big one..what better way to do it than on the front bumper of a Vette right? I told my sister that they died an honorable death...she just started at me like "Are we really related?" lol
Ok ANYYYYYYYYWAY....back to the detail. We have now confirmed that this thing was dirty as hell and equally as swirled...so its time to do something about it! I already said how we knocked out the grime on the rims...the tires needed soaking...I`ve actually come to really like Purple Power....for $5 a gallon this stuff is quite impressive. We use a foaming trigger with it to spray it onto the tires...if the tires aren`t too bad...ill just use the Turbo Nozzle on the pressure washer and it knocks the grime right off.....but in a case like this...it was time to snap the ole` gloves on, grab the tire brush and get to scrubbin`, cause these things needed a more thorough cleaning. After a good scrub, they were then rinsed with the turbo nozzle and whalah! Rubber was revealed!
For those wheel wells...well there is no trick for them...its called elbow grease...LITERALLY. Because i had grease and grime ALL THE WAY up to my damn elbows! We spray them first with our cleaner...then use our fender brush to get all that we can...but as anyone who owns a Vette..or has detailed a Vette will tell you...you only have SO MUCH room to work in those wells. This is where some old, kinda tattered wool wash mitts have come in very handy for us lately. I won`t even THINK about using them on paint, even though most would think they would be soft enough once wet. But for nasty wheel wells...these things are PERFECT. They have a good pile so they can encapsulate a good amount of dirt, but they have enough `bite` to them to where they can really scrub off a lot of grime. Its still not easy getting your arms up under there...but ya do what ya gotta do. This is what we would call the "grunt" work.
Again, after washing...we`ll pressure wash them clean. Now i know thats a lot of info on cleaning some stupid wheel wells...but some nice clean wheel wells are REALLY a nice finishing touch on a polished out car. Add some dressing to the plastic covers to get them nice and black...and man they look sweet. Some cars its not possible on...the clearance is just TOO low, you`d just have to remove the whole tire...but this Vette had JUSSSSSSSST enough room for me to get my arm up in there. Cleaning and dressing the tires really makes things look sharp...but if the wheel wells are left dirty as hell it really takes away from the whole detail.
Now unfortunately there was some damage we couldn`t completely repair. What do you get when you take an a**hole with no life and give him a set of keys? You get this:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020136.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020170.jpg
There were two of these guys on his passenger rear QP. I spent extra time on these to try to remove them but they were just too deep to go after. They got lighter, but didn`t get completely removed. Neither did this...looks like someone actually kicked it with their heel:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020137.jpg
I was hoping it would come out but...no luck...this was lower on the same QP.
Now it was time to break out the foam cannon...foam this bad boy up...wash it and get it nice and clean and get ready to clay it.
Having a little detail brush is good for getting the dirt out of the tight spots...like the gas chamber:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020150.jpg
Tail lights:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020151.jpg
And emblems:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020152.jpg
Sometimes a little APC is needed where the dirt is really bad to help loosen it up so that way you don`t have to be over agressive with the brush.
Now it was time to clay...except...i wasn`t going to be using clay today. Nope...I was going to be trying out a new product put out by SM Arnold called the "Speedy Surface Prep Towel".
It is microfiber on one side and sort of a rubbery type of substance on the other...hard to describe but take a look:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020153.jpg
I rinse it out in warm water first to sort of `prep` the towel...seems to help it work better...its still aggressive but not OVERLY aggressive. The FIRST time you use it...its going to be pretty damn aggressive so what i do is i `break it in` on the front windshield to get all the grime off of the windsheild but also help to get rid of that initial extra bite it has when you first use it. It doesn`t take long to break it in and then its good to go to the paint.
The cool part...you can fold it into quarters and thus have 4 sides to work with:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020155.jpg
You want to keep this thing LUBRICATED on ALL sides...the side you`re using, the side your hand is on and DEFINITELY the sides that are folded onto each other. If you don`t then you`re going to have a real fun time peeling it off your hand or peeling it apart from itself. DO NOT use it dry or even dryish on the paint, it will leave a nice trace of the rubber on the paint that you will then have to work to remove with the same towel that put it there to begin with lol. Doesn`t do any damage, just creates extra work. I got mine from ADS a couple weeks back and so far i like it. Its pricey, but re-useable many times over AND you can use it on trim and its very easy to get into tight spots where as with clay, you can`t use it on trim because it would leave bits of clay all over...and using it in tight spots risks the same thing...leaving bits of clay wedged into areas that then takes extra time to remove.
If you get it, be sure to do a test spot on the vehicle you`re working with. Clay an area and then check with the light to see if there is any light marring left. So far i`ve had only one vehicle do this...and it was the first time i used the cloth. But because I did a test spot, there was only a small area of very light marring.
After that i`ve used it on quite a few vehicles, including this Vette, which is red and would be VERY easy to see if any marring was occuring, but none did...so we were good to go!
After claying and getting the surface nice and silky smooth, Dani taped off all the trim and emblems and also put a couple towels up over the front and back windshields...it just keeps compound dust from getting where you really dont want it (small cracks and such). Takes a few extra minutes but saves a lot of time in the end, when you`re tired and don`t really want to have to screw around with little specks of dust in small areas.
Now it was time to choooooooose your weapon!
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020156.jpg
Aren`t they pretty :-D
I forgot to put my DeWalt rotary there too, but it ended up saving me some time and getting a good amount of use.
For this bad boy I ended up going with the Makita rotary with a 6" Lake Country Hydro-Tech Caynne Cutting pad and some Meguiars 105. Yes, the clear coat was THAT hard and the swirls were THAT bad.
This would be my first FULL correction using just a rotary for cutting. I had done bad areas on certain cars that needed the extra cut of the rotary, but this WHOLE CAR needed it. And since I would be using the Makita and DeWalt (I hooked the DeWalt rotary up with a 4" cutting pad for small areas) that meant my sister would have her first crack at the Flex 3401 to follow up behind me and do the polishing after i was done compounding.
Here`s a quick story about my first try with the Flex about a year back...I got it...i was excited...went out to try it out on our little Taurus...and the damn thing walked all over the place with me! The Flex does NOT allow you to just play patty-cake with it like the PC or Griots will...you have to have very good and balanced pressure on the head of it because if you don`t and you end up pushing down unevenly on the head..the Flex has a tendancy to want to just walk right along in that direction! I...had to learn this the hard way...it only took me a few sections to figure it out...and it took me about a whole car to finally get a good feel for how to be able to control the Flex when doing curves and edges...but once i did, i fell in love with the thing.
I gave my sis a quick run down on my experience when i first tried it, mainly warning her to be sure to keep the pressure on the head as centered as possible.
Then I went and taped off a test spot on the hood as we always do. I compounded the area with Meguiars 105 and then polished it with the Flex and a LC Hydro Tangerine Polishing pad and some Meguiars 205 (my sister was still taping at the time so thats why i did the polishing on that one spot). The outcome was awesome. I had PLANNED on getting a sweet before and after shot side by side in the sun...but AS ALWAYS, when we get a damn Vette...it got cloudy on us!
So, I did the best i could with the sun gun to show the 50/50 shot.
Left side is done, right side is not:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020161.jpg
A big closer...
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020162.jpg
Not the best and clearest pictures ive taken but...you can still see the difference. Our neighbor came over about the same time and we showed it to him side by side and he was blown away...i think this was the final nail in the coughin for him to finally have us come do his black Silverado.....but thats another write up :)
Dani had finished the taping by then...gave her the flex and told her to try a spot out on the hood first in a flat area to get a good feel for it and i`d watch.....and i just kinda smiled and shook my head cause...she took that damn thing and did her first spot and she looked like she had been using it for 10 years. NO wobble...NO walking, NO struggling to control it....and it`s not like we were on speed 3 here...it was cranked up to 5...and she just had that thing gliiiiiiiiiding across the paint like the pro she is. Then we both took a look at the area she had just done to make sure all the swirls and light holograms were gone that had been left from the rotary....and man it just looked like a jewel. Maybe it was the color but, i swear the paint had more of a gloss by going with the Makita/cut and Flex/polish than other cars had when i would go with the Flex/cut and Griots/Polish. Either way, the paint looked AWESOME. At that point i told her ok, OBVIOUSLY you`ve got it under control! So i continued on down the car compounding while she followed up polishing.
Everything was going a long just fine..we were getting VERY good correction...all swirls were coming out...yeah...all...there was a deep scratch here n` there that wouldn`t come out but man that Makita with 105 is a lean, mean cutting machine. I had it on about 1500 RPMs which seemed to be doing the trick. I had to do pretty slow passes to be sure to create enough heat to remove all the swirls out of this super hard clear coat...so it took some extra time..but i`d rather do 1-2 passes and get it done right, then to have to go over n` over n` over an area because i tried to rush it the first couple times.
We got to about the half way point...which was the trunk...and THIS is where i ran into those deep scratches i mentioned earlier....you can really see how deep they are in these pictures:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020171.jpg
Yeah..see thats not even my sun gun...thats just our little over head light in the garage!
With the sun gun, the true depth (literally) of the scratches really showed up:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020172.jpg
As you can see, this was the very thin area right in front of the spoiler. This is where the DeWalt and 4" pad earned their keep.
I had to go over this area three times to fully cut the swirls out..they were that deep...but i was finally able to get them to level out and get that area to match the beauty of how the rest of the car was starting to look:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020173.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020174.jpg
Mmmm...glossy!
Now let me tell you something about cutting with a rotary...you`re gonna get SOME holograms when you`re going this aggressive with your cut. So after you follow up with your polishing step (in this case, Meguiars 205 Polish on the Flex), its very important to not only check your work head on and up close to make sure the haze is gone...but its EQUALLY important to stand back at a distance with your light and move very slowly side to side over the entire panel. And then...even if it looks good...LOOK AGAIN. I found holding the light at a slight angle, so it is INdirectly hitting the paint...was a very good way to check the paint. The reason is because now the light is slightly dimmer...still bright, but not so bright that it can cause too much of a glair in the exact spot you`re shining the light...which can actually blind you from seeing a small hologram.
Note, looking for a very SMALL hologram, is a whole hell of a lot harder than just looking at a car that has been hacked by someone with a rotary..where you could stand 50 feet away and be able to tell "Wow, someone used a rotary on that and left holograms/buffer trails EVERYWHERE". No, its not like that...this is harder...because you`re now looking for very small spots where...maybe the person doing the compounding (me in this case) allowed the rotary to stay JUST a bit longer in one spot than the rest of the section that was being polished at the time...or maybe the pressure was slightly uneven and cause the pad to level out one area a bit more than the other....we`re talking a small area here...maybe the size of an apple...maybe smaller in some cases. Or maybe the person doing the polishing (Dani in this case) didn`t quite get ENOUGH pressure in a certain area and thus didn`t completely remove a hologram left from when the compounding was done.
There are a lot of varriables because...even if you`re careful, which we are, and even if you`re pretty good...which i think we are (note i know there are 20 and 30 year vets out there that could run circles around us...not trying to be cocky here), you`re not perfect....things happen...not BIG things but little thigns like described above. And i think the best thing you can do is realize that hey, no matter HOW good you are, little stuff like that can happen...its not the end of the world and its surely not doing any damage to the car...it just means you have to spend a little extra time checking your work and being humble enough to know that you COULD have missed something.
I think having this type of mindset is just as important, if not MORE imporatant than what products you use, what machines you use, how much experience you may have, how much knowledge you may have or even how good you are. None of those things matter if you don`t approach what you do with the right attitude...be it detailing or anything else.
Now, back to the story of the detail....I had carried around to the drivers side now...and Dani had just finished up about 1/2 of the trunk. We figured it was about time for our 10 minute lunch break but she asked me to go check out the 1/2 she had done to see how it looked. So I did...and to show that we are not immune to what i said above..i found three very small hologramed areas. One on a very low portion of the door and then two near that deep scratch i showed you above where it looked like someone kicked it. They were all roughly the size of an apple or a fist...nothing huge...heck no one else probably would have even noticed them because they were on very low areas of the car and I had to be on my knees to even see them...but the point is they were there...so i marked the areas with a piece of tape so she could go back over them. I think THATS how you`re suppose to do a job.
And I do the same thing to her...i ask her to check my work. She probably gets tired of me asking but...usually once every panel or so i`ll ask her `How`s it coming out"...and she`ll tell me "Good" or "There are some deeper ones left here that i think you should go back over again". I miss things too...but thats whats so beautiful about team work :)
Well...forward about 2 or 3 more hours....we were coming to the end. I had finished compounding and all Dani had left was half of the hood, the front bumper and the front quarter panel. The Flex however is a bit heavier than the Griots...and after polishing with the Flex for 7 hours straight, her arms were getting a bit tired. So she asked me if i could finish up the hood and QP while she grabbed the Griots with the 4" pad to do the front bumper.
Here`s another thing people don`t realize...if you are REALLY detailing and are REALLY polishing every inch of paint...the hardest areas...in my opinion...and the most time consuming...are the front and rear bumpers and the low running rails (on most cars). Why? Because they are SMALL and HARD to get to and you have to do such a small area at a time. Case in point...I was able to completely finish the 1/2 of the hood and the front drivers QP a few minutes quicker than it took Dani to do just the front bumper. Most would look at just the AREA of the hood alone, especially on a Vette and say, man...thats gotta be harder....nuh uh...thats usually not the case. You notice on most detailing clinic videos or `how to` videos....where are they showing the work or having the new guys try out buffing for the first time??? 99% of the time...its the hood...something nice and BIG and flat to learn on. Even the verticle panels like the doors and the curved quarter panels, to me, are more difficult than the nice big hood. I`m sure there are some exceptions with certain cars, but most times i find what i said above to be true.
Now it has come time to apply the wax. Ohhhh yes...the icing on the cake! We first wash the car down with ONR to remove alllllllll the dust, then brush/blow all the dust out of the cracks. Pop the hood and trunk to get the dust that fell into those areas (some always gets in there). We just try to get the car as clean as possible before apply the final product.
Todays wax was going to be different than our last couple details. We were going to be using DoDo Juice`s Supernatural Hybrid Paste Wax:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020175.jpg
That little sucker right there is pretty pricey for its size, but it was well worth it (as you will see further below).
I applied via DA onto the big sections while my sis went around and got all the tight spots by hand (door handles, side mirrors, areas near trim etc.)
Heres a shot of the wax curing...my sis says "You`re the only person who likes to take pictures of wax drying all over the car...it just looks like the paint is hologramed!"
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020179.jpg
Yeah, it kinda does hahaha...but since we KNOW its wax..i say it looks sweet.
You can see too the tires were nice and dressed with Wolfgang Tire Gel and the wheel wells were dressed with Meguiars HyperDressing.
Wax on the hood!
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020181.jpg
Look...a Vette with clean wheel wells & tires (see i told you it makes a difference, its the little things that count!)
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020183.jpg
And now, the time had come...to see the finished product. Jim had arrived just as we were finishing the wax...it looked like a possible storm was coming...but we asked if he would mind if we grabbed a few after photos before he took off...he kindly agreed....and so here is what we had accomplished that day in about 8-9 hours (16-18 total working hours between the 2 of us)
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020184.jpg
I say you can put it next to any Vette sitting in a showroom right now and it will outshine it, but maybe im being prejudice lol :)
Remember how i said that wax was worth its price...well...this is why...look at how liquid the paint is.
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020185.jpg
Even the shaded side had insane gloss:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020186.jpg
Heres a BAM IN YOUR FACE shot:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020187.jpg
You can`t ever tell it was riddled in bugs and grime can you?
And of course, most importantly, we have to show you it looks good in direct light, so take a look:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020188.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020189.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020190.jpg
Heres a good shot of that ole beat up rear hatch:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020191.jpg
Not so beat up lookin now is it!
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020194.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020195.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020203.jpg
And as for that horribly swirled up Quarter Panel seen here:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020157.jpg
No more:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020201.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020202.jpg
Ready to ride out!
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020192.jpg
Serious reflections:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020193.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020196.jpg
And the owner was nice enough to send me a couple sun shots a few days later:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/sun1.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/reflection.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/sun2.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/sun3.jpg
Lookin sweeeeeeeeeeeet I`d say.
When Jim came to pick up his car, he was with his wife in their white BMW 5 series. He said he was going to probably have us do it next once he finished changing the timing belt on it (ouch...not a fun job)...but wanted us to come take a quick look at it while it was there. He said it was dirty, but he didn`t think it had a scratch on it. Now personally, i figured it was probably nice and swirled up too, but was just harder to see because it was white.
So we walked over and right away i could see the swirls...i tried showing them to Jim with my sun gun but he couldn`t make them out...so i figured the best way to show him was the same way I`m showing everyone here...i took a picture of what I was seeing...so that way i could show him exactly what i was looking at...and honestly ive found this to be a very effective way to show car owners exactly what I`m seeing...its as close as i can get to actually being able to show them things through a `detailers` eyes. I mean this is what we do so of course I can see swirls without much work, its my job lol! And on dark colored cars, like red in this case...its pretty easy for even the un-trained eye to see the damage...but white...white is hard to show someone. But by snapping this picture:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020199.jpg
He said "Ohhh! Ok yeah now i see it!" So hopefully we will be able to get our hands on this baby sometime soon. Its a very nice looking car that just happens to be covered with some very ugly swirls lol. But we can fix that.
I actually got a text from Jim today asking me to call him, he wanted to know what exactly caused swirls. I had tried to explain about all the different ways swirls can be instilled into paint and to not use a duster etc. He said he saw a few starting to show back up on the trunk and that nothing had been done to it except he had wiped the back end once with a microfiber in a straight line. To anyone trying to care for their car...its really so important to know that ANY wiping, be it with a duster or super soft microfiber, can cause swirl marks if the paint is dry. Water WITH CAR SOAP is your friend...and yes, you will encounter new obstacles with water such as water spots...you can work with those. Wash in the shade where its cool.
You see when you wipe dirt away on dry paint, even if you wipe in a straight line...the fibers themselves in the cloth do not stay perfectly straight, they move while wiping and thus you get a `swirled` look. If you trace almost any ONE scratch in a cluster of swirls (which is hard to do but ive done it lol), you will see most times, they`re pretty straight...but when there are 100s or 1000`s of them together traveling in different directions...they appear as swirls.
And of course its important to note that....things happen. Ive seen people go up and write `wash me` on the back of a car that wasn`t even theirs...which of course scratches the hell out of the paint. You honestly have no way of KNOWING nothing is happening to your car unless you have it parked 24/7 in your garage in a bubble! Other than that, things can happen, but the idea is to avoid any unnecessary damage to the paint. Its hard and frustrating, its so easy to scratch and yet so difficult and time consuming to fix. Its impossible to keep it perfect...but its very possible to keep it in very very good shape.
In the end this was a very good detail and really it came out better than even i expected. This wasn`t a "Show Car" detail...this was a double pass with a little extra attention paid to some spots (like the back hatch)...but if you put that many hours of passion into something, you end up with some pretty damn good results:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020200.jpg
Thanks all for reading, Hope you guys enjoyed it and maybe learned a trick or two :)
There she is....a beautiful red 2006 Corvette. Jim (the owner) saw one of the write ups I did on another Vette we did, a black 08` z06, and thought our work looked great. He was hoping that we could perform the same magic to his ride.
We met up with him after work one day to take a look at it. And yes it needed some serious love! It had its fair share of road grime and a few bugs here and there and of course it was swirled like crazy. Good ole Vette paint...doesn`t take too much to scratch it, but MAN is it hard to polish! We talked for a minute, explained what we would do and then set a date for the weekend. He told us he had bought the car off of a ball player who played over sea`s...and while the swirls and dirt were bad on this car....it was nothing compared to what the ball players girlfriend did to it when she found out he was breaking up with her....i guess she got inspired to play some ball herself...and took a bat to the windshield! Ladies i understand if you get mad but...leave the car out of it...it didn`t do anything!
It was another early morning detail...a bit chilly, but it`s finally getting around to the time of year where the weather is warming up nicely out here in Arizona. He backed it in and with the sun still pretty low in the east, you could really see how bad the swirls were:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020134.jpg
Oh yeah, GOTTA love the dark colors! He had some nice etched in water spots as well:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020131.jpg
The back hatch was no picnic either...it actually ended up having some of the deeper swirls...but we`ll get to what all it took to correct those in a minute...for now just check out the damage
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020140.jpg
These guys were pretty deep...took some serious work to get them out:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020141.jpg
Up on the quarter panel was some good deep scratches as well:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020142.jpg
So like i said...it was swirled pretty bad. Now not only was it swirled but, she was pretty dirty too. Remember that road grime i mentioned earlier...
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020130.jpg
Yeahhhhhhhh thats not pretty. You can see the nice brown look mixed with the lovely red dirt/clay of Arizona on the tires. When i hit those things with our tire cleaner it looked like toxic sludge was rolling off...quite scary actually lol.
The rims weren`t half steppin` either:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020129.jpg
Oh yes look at that brake dust! What you can`t see is how bad the brake dust was in the barrels of the wheels. My trusty EZ Detail Brush took care of that along with some Wheel Brightener and our pressure washer.
I always like to start with the tires and rims first...99% of the time they are the nastiest and dirtiest part of the car and i want to get all that grime out of the way before we start washing the rest of the car. It doesn`t make much sense to go clean the car and THEN go sling some brake dust gunk all over the clean paint!
Then for those lovely bugs....oh yes the front bumper of this thing was an insect massacre!
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020145.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020147.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020146.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020148.jpg
Well hey, i guess if you`re a bug and you`re gonna bite the big one..what better way to do it than on the front bumper of a Vette right? I told my sister that they died an honorable death...she just started at me like "Are we really related?" lol
Ok ANYYYYYYYYWAY....back to the detail. We have now confirmed that this thing was dirty as hell and equally as swirled...so its time to do something about it! I already said how we knocked out the grime on the rims...the tires needed soaking...I`ve actually come to really like Purple Power....for $5 a gallon this stuff is quite impressive. We use a foaming trigger with it to spray it onto the tires...if the tires aren`t too bad...ill just use the Turbo Nozzle on the pressure washer and it knocks the grime right off.....but in a case like this...it was time to snap the ole` gloves on, grab the tire brush and get to scrubbin`, cause these things needed a more thorough cleaning. After a good scrub, they were then rinsed with the turbo nozzle and whalah! Rubber was revealed!
For those wheel wells...well there is no trick for them...its called elbow grease...LITERALLY. Because i had grease and grime ALL THE WAY up to my damn elbows! We spray them first with our cleaner...then use our fender brush to get all that we can...but as anyone who owns a Vette..or has detailed a Vette will tell you...you only have SO MUCH room to work in those wells. This is where some old, kinda tattered wool wash mitts have come in very handy for us lately. I won`t even THINK about using them on paint, even though most would think they would be soft enough once wet. But for nasty wheel wells...these things are PERFECT. They have a good pile so they can encapsulate a good amount of dirt, but they have enough `bite` to them to where they can really scrub off a lot of grime. Its still not easy getting your arms up under there...but ya do what ya gotta do. This is what we would call the "grunt" work.
Again, after washing...we`ll pressure wash them clean. Now i know thats a lot of info on cleaning some stupid wheel wells...but some nice clean wheel wells are REALLY a nice finishing touch on a polished out car. Add some dressing to the plastic covers to get them nice and black...and man they look sweet. Some cars its not possible on...the clearance is just TOO low, you`d just have to remove the whole tire...but this Vette had JUSSSSSSSST enough room for me to get my arm up in there. Cleaning and dressing the tires really makes things look sharp...but if the wheel wells are left dirty as hell it really takes away from the whole detail.
Now unfortunately there was some damage we couldn`t completely repair. What do you get when you take an a**hole with no life and give him a set of keys? You get this:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020136.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020170.jpg
There were two of these guys on his passenger rear QP. I spent extra time on these to try to remove them but they were just too deep to go after. They got lighter, but didn`t get completely removed. Neither did this...looks like someone actually kicked it with their heel:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020137.jpg
I was hoping it would come out but...no luck...this was lower on the same QP.
Now it was time to break out the foam cannon...foam this bad boy up...wash it and get it nice and clean and get ready to clay it.
Having a little detail brush is good for getting the dirt out of the tight spots...like the gas chamber:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020150.jpg
Tail lights:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020151.jpg
And emblems:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020152.jpg
Sometimes a little APC is needed where the dirt is really bad to help loosen it up so that way you don`t have to be over agressive with the brush.
Now it was time to clay...except...i wasn`t going to be using clay today. Nope...I was going to be trying out a new product put out by SM Arnold called the "Speedy Surface Prep Towel".
It is microfiber on one side and sort of a rubbery type of substance on the other...hard to describe but take a look:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020153.jpg
I rinse it out in warm water first to sort of `prep` the towel...seems to help it work better...its still aggressive but not OVERLY aggressive. The FIRST time you use it...its going to be pretty damn aggressive so what i do is i `break it in` on the front windshield to get all the grime off of the windsheild but also help to get rid of that initial extra bite it has when you first use it. It doesn`t take long to break it in and then its good to go to the paint.
The cool part...you can fold it into quarters and thus have 4 sides to work with:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020155.jpg
You want to keep this thing LUBRICATED on ALL sides...the side you`re using, the side your hand is on and DEFINITELY the sides that are folded onto each other. If you don`t then you`re going to have a real fun time peeling it off your hand or peeling it apart from itself. DO NOT use it dry or even dryish on the paint, it will leave a nice trace of the rubber on the paint that you will then have to work to remove with the same towel that put it there to begin with lol. Doesn`t do any damage, just creates extra work. I got mine from ADS a couple weeks back and so far i like it. Its pricey, but re-useable many times over AND you can use it on trim and its very easy to get into tight spots where as with clay, you can`t use it on trim because it would leave bits of clay all over...and using it in tight spots risks the same thing...leaving bits of clay wedged into areas that then takes extra time to remove.
If you get it, be sure to do a test spot on the vehicle you`re working with. Clay an area and then check with the light to see if there is any light marring left. So far i`ve had only one vehicle do this...and it was the first time i used the cloth. But because I did a test spot, there was only a small area of very light marring.
After that i`ve used it on quite a few vehicles, including this Vette, which is red and would be VERY easy to see if any marring was occuring, but none did...so we were good to go!
After claying and getting the surface nice and silky smooth, Dani taped off all the trim and emblems and also put a couple towels up over the front and back windshields...it just keeps compound dust from getting where you really dont want it (small cracks and such). Takes a few extra minutes but saves a lot of time in the end, when you`re tired and don`t really want to have to screw around with little specks of dust in small areas.
Now it was time to choooooooose your weapon!
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020156.jpg
Aren`t they pretty :-D
I forgot to put my DeWalt rotary there too, but it ended up saving me some time and getting a good amount of use.
For this bad boy I ended up going with the Makita rotary with a 6" Lake Country Hydro-Tech Caynne Cutting pad and some Meguiars 105. Yes, the clear coat was THAT hard and the swirls were THAT bad.
This would be my first FULL correction using just a rotary for cutting. I had done bad areas on certain cars that needed the extra cut of the rotary, but this WHOLE CAR needed it. And since I would be using the Makita and DeWalt (I hooked the DeWalt rotary up with a 4" cutting pad for small areas) that meant my sister would have her first crack at the Flex 3401 to follow up behind me and do the polishing after i was done compounding.
Here`s a quick story about my first try with the Flex about a year back...I got it...i was excited...went out to try it out on our little Taurus...and the damn thing walked all over the place with me! The Flex does NOT allow you to just play patty-cake with it like the PC or Griots will...you have to have very good and balanced pressure on the head of it because if you don`t and you end up pushing down unevenly on the head..the Flex has a tendancy to want to just walk right along in that direction! I...had to learn this the hard way...it only took me a few sections to figure it out...and it took me about a whole car to finally get a good feel for how to be able to control the Flex when doing curves and edges...but once i did, i fell in love with the thing.
I gave my sis a quick run down on my experience when i first tried it, mainly warning her to be sure to keep the pressure on the head as centered as possible.
Then I went and taped off a test spot on the hood as we always do. I compounded the area with Meguiars 105 and then polished it with the Flex and a LC Hydro Tangerine Polishing pad and some Meguiars 205 (my sister was still taping at the time so thats why i did the polishing on that one spot). The outcome was awesome. I had PLANNED on getting a sweet before and after shot side by side in the sun...but AS ALWAYS, when we get a damn Vette...it got cloudy on us!
So, I did the best i could with the sun gun to show the 50/50 shot.
Left side is done, right side is not:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020161.jpg
A big closer...
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020162.jpg
Not the best and clearest pictures ive taken but...you can still see the difference. Our neighbor came over about the same time and we showed it to him side by side and he was blown away...i think this was the final nail in the coughin for him to finally have us come do his black Silverado.....but thats another write up :)
Dani had finished the taping by then...gave her the flex and told her to try a spot out on the hood first in a flat area to get a good feel for it and i`d watch.....and i just kinda smiled and shook my head cause...she took that damn thing and did her first spot and she looked like she had been using it for 10 years. NO wobble...NO walking, NO struggling to control it....and it`s not like we were on speed 3 here...it was cranked up to 5...and she just had that thing gliiiiiiiiiding across the paint like the pro she is. Then we both took a look at the area she had just done to make sure all the swirls and light holograms were gone that had been left from the rotary....and man it just looked like a jewel. Maybe it was the color but, i swear the paint had more of a gloss by going with the Makita/cut and Flex/polish than other cars had when i would go with the Flex/cut and Griots/Polish. Either way, the paint looked AWESOME. At that point i told her ok, OBVIOUSLY you`ve got it under control! So i continued on down the car compounding while she followed up polishing.
Everything was going a long just fine..we were getting VERY good correction...all swirls were coming out...yeah...all...there was a deep scratch here n` there that wouldn`t come out but man that Makita with 105 is a lean, mean cutting machine. I had it on about 1500 RPMs which seemed to be doing the trick. I had to do pretty slow passes to be sure to create enough heat to remove all the swirls out of this super hard clear coat...so it took some extra time..but i`d rather do 1-2 passes and get it done right, then to have to go over n` over n` over an area because i tried to rush it the first couple times.
We got to about the half way point...which was the trunk...and THIS is where i ran into those deep scratches i mentioned earlier....you can really see how deep they are in these pictures:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020171.jpg
Yeah..see thats not even my sun gun...thats just our little over head light in the garage!
With the sun gun, the true depth (literally) of the scratches really showed up:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020172.jpg
As you can see, this was the very thin area right in front of the spoiler. This is where the DeWalt and 4" pad earned their keep.
I had to go over this area three times to fully cut the swirls out..they were that deep...but i was finally able to get them to level out and get that area to match the beauty of how the rest of the car was starting to look:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020173.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020174.jpg
Mmmm...glossy!
Now let me tell you something about cutting with a rotary...you`re gonna get SOME holograms when you`re going this aggressive with your cut. So after you follow up with your polishing step (in this case, Meguiars 205 Polish on the Flex), its very important to not only check your work head on and up close to make sure the haze is gone...but its EQUALLY important to stand back at a distance with your light and move very slowly side to side over the entire panel. And then...even if it looks good...LOOK AGAIN. I found holding the light at a slight angle, so it is INdirectly hitting the paint...was a very good way to check the paint. The reason is because now the light is slightly dimmer...still bright, but not so bright that it can cause too much of a glair in the exact spot you`re shining the light...which can actually blind you from seeing a small hologram.
Note, looking for a very SMALL hologram, is a whole hell of a lot harder than just looking at a car that has been hacked by someone with a rotary..where you could stand 50 feet away and be able to tell "Wow, someone used a rotary on that and left holograms/buffer trails EVERYWHERE". No, its not like that...this is harder...because you`re now looking for very small spots where...maybe the person doing the compounding (me in this case) allowed the rotary to stay JUST a bit longer in one spot than the rest of the section that was being polished at the time...or maybe the pressure was slightly uneven and cause the pad to level out one area a bit more than the other....we`re talking a small area here...maybe the size of an apple...maybe smaller in some cases. Or maybe the person doing the polishing (Dani in this case) didn`t quite get ENOUGH pressure in a certain area and thus didn`t completely remove a hologram left from when the compounding was done.
There are a lot of varriables because...even if you`re careful, which we are, and even if you`re pretty good...which i think we are (note i know there are 20 and 30 year vets out there that could run circles around us...not trying to be cocky here), you`re not perfect....things happen...not BIG things but little thigns like described above. And i think the best thing you can do is realize that hey, no matter HOW good you are, little stuff like that can happen...its not the end of the world and its surely not doing any damage to the car...it just means you have to spend a little extra time checking your work and being humble enough to know that you COULD have missed something.
I think having this type of mindset is just as important, if not MORE imporatant than what products you use, what machines you use, how much experience you may have, how much knowledge you may have or even how good you are. None of those things matter if you don`t approach what you do with the right attitude...be it detailing or anything else.
Now, back to the story of the detail....I had carried around to the drivers side now...and Dani had just finished up about 1/2 of the trunk. We figured it was about time for our 10 minute lunch break but she asked me to go check out the 1/2 she had done to see how it looked. So I did...and to show that we are not immune to what i said above..i found three very small hologramed areas. One on a very low portion of the door and then two near that deep scratch i showed you above where it looked like someone kicked it. They were all roughly the size of an apple or a fist...nothing huge...heck no one else probably would have even noticed them because they were on very low areas of the car and I had to be on my knees to even see them...but the point is they were there...so i marked the areas with a piece of tape so she could go back over them. I think THATS how you`re suppose to do a job.
And I do the same thing to her...i ask her to check my work. She probably gets tired of me asking but...usually once every panel or so i`ll ask her `How`s it coming out"...and she`ll tell me "Good" or "There are some deeper ones left here that i think you should go back over again". I miss things too...but thats whats so beautiful about team work :)
Well...forward about 2 or 3 more hours....we were coming to the end. I had finished compounding and all Dani had left was half of the hood, the front bumper and the front quarter panel. The Flex however is a bit heavier than the Griots...and after polishing with the Flex for 7 hours straight, her arms were getting a bit tired. So she asked me if i could finish up the hood and QP while she grabbed the Griots with the 4" pad to do the front bumper.
Here`s another thing people don`t realize...if you are REALLY detailing and are REALLY polishing every inch of paint...the hardest areas...in my opinion...and the most time consuming...are the front and rear bumpers and the low running rails (on most cars). Why? Because they are SMALL and HARD to get to and you have to do such a small area at a time. Case in point...I was able to completely finish the 1/2 of the hood and the front drivers QP a few minutes quicker than it took Dani to do just the front bumper. Most would look at just the AREA of the hood alone, especially on a Vette and say, man...thats gotta be harder....nuh uh...thats usually not the case. You notice on most detailing clinic videos or `how to` videos....where are they showing the work or having the new guys try out buffing for the first time??? 99% of the time...its the hood...something nice and BIG and flat to learn on. Even the verticle panels like the doors and the curved quarter panels, to me, are more difficult than the nice big hood. I`m sure there are some exceptions with certain cars, but most times i find what i said above to be true.
Now it has come time to apply the wax. Ohhhh yes...the icing on the cake! We first wash the car down with ONR to remove alllllllll the dust, then brush/blow all the dust out of the cracks. Pop the hood and trunk to get the dust that fell into those areas (some always gets in there). We just try to get the car as clean as possible before apply the final product.
Todays wax was going to be different than our last couple details. We were going to be using DoDo Juice`s Supernatural Hybrid Paste Wax:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020175.jpg
That little sucker right there is pretty pricey for its size, but it was well worth it (as you will see further below).
I applied via DA onto the big sections while my sis went around and got all the tight spots by hand (door handles, side mirrors, areas near trim etc.)
Heres a shot of the wax curing...my sis says "You`re the only person who likes to take pictures of wax drying all over the car...it just looks like the paint is hologramed!"
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020179.jpg
Yeah, it kinda does hahaha...but since we KNOW its wax..i say it looks sweet.
You can see too the tires were nice and dressed with Wolfgang Tire Gel and the wheel wells were dressed with Meguiars HyperDressing.
Wax on the hood!
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020181.jpg
Look...a Vette with clean wheel wells & tires (see i told you it makes a difference, its the little things that count!)
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020183.jpg
And now, the time had come...to see the finished product. Jim had arrived just as we were finishing the wax...it looked like a possible storm was coming...but we asked if he would mind if we grabbed a few after photos before he took off...he kindly agreed....and so here is what we had accomplished that day in about 8-9 hours (16-18 total working hours between the 2 of us)
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020184.jpg
I say you can put it next to any Vette sitting in a showroom right now and it will outshine it, but maybe im being prejudice lol :)
Remember how i said that wax was worth its price...well...this is why...look at how liquid the paint is.
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020185.jpg
Even the shaded side had insane gloss:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020186.jpg
Heres a BAM IN YOUR FACE shot:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020187.jpg
You can`t ever tell it was riddled in bugs and grime can you?
And of course, most importantly, we have to show you it looks good in direct light, so take a look:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020188.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020189.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020190.jpg
Heres a good shot of that ole beat up rear hatch:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020191.jpg
Not so beat up lookin now is it!
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020194.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020195.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020203.jpg
And as for that horribly swirled up Quarter Panel seen here:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020157.jpg
No more:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020201.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020202.jpg
Ready to ride out!
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020192.jpg
Serious reflections:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020193.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020196.jpg
And the owner was nice enough to send me a couple sun shots a few days later:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/sun1.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/reflection.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/sun2.jpg
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/sun3.jpg
Lookin sweeeeeeeeeeeet I`d say.
When Jim came to pick up his car, he was with his wife in their white BMW 5 series. He said he was going to probably have us do it next once he finished changing the timing belt on it (ouch...not a fun job)...but wanted us to come take a quick look at it while it was there. He said it was dirty, but he didn`t think it had a scratch on it. Now personally, i figured it was probably nice and swirled up too, but was just harder to see because it was white.
So we walked over and right away i could see the swirls...i tried showing them to Jim with my sun gun but he couldn`t make them out...so i figured the best way to show him was the same way I`m showing everyone here...i took a picture of what I was seeing...so that way i could show him exactly what i was looking at...and honestly ive found this to be a very effective way to show car owners exactly what I`m seeing...its as close as i can get to actually being able to show them things through a `detailers` eyes. I mean this is what we do so of course I can see swirls without much work, its my job lol! And on dark colored cars, like red in this case...its pretty easy for even the un-trained eye to see the damage...but white...white is hard to show someone. But by snapping this picture:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020199.jpg
He said "Ohhh! Ok yeah now i see it!" So hopefully we will be able to get our hands on this baby sometime soon. Its a very nice looking car that just happens to be covered with some very ugly swirls lol. But we can fix that.
I actually got a text from Jim today asking me to call him, he wanted to know what exactly caused swirls. I had tried to explain about all the different ways swirls can be instilled into paint and to not use a duster etc. He said he saw a few starting to show back up on the trunk and that nothing had been done to it except he had wiped the back end once with a microfiber in a straight line. To anyone trying to care for their car...its really so important to know that ANY wiping, be it with a duster or super soft microfiber, can cause swirl marks if the paint is dry. Water WITH CAR SOAP is your friend...and yes, you will encounter new obstacles with water such as water spots...you can work with those. Wash in the shade where its cool.
You see when you wipe dirt away on dry paint, even if you wipe in a straight line...the fibers themselves in the cloth do not stay perfectly straight, they move while wiping and thus you get a `swirled` look. If you trace almost any ONE scratch in a cluster of swirls (which is hard to do but ive done it lol), you will see most times, they`re pretty straight...but when there are 100s or 1000`s of them together traveling in different directions...they appear as swirls.
And of course its important to note that....things happen. Ive seen people go up and write `wash me` on the back of a car that wasn`t even theirs...which of course scratches the hell out of the paint. You honestly have no way of KNOWING nothing is happening to your car unless you have it parked 24/7 in your garage in a bubble! Other than that, things can happen, but the idea is to avoid any unnecessary damage to the paint. Its hard and frustrating, its so easy to scratch and yet so difficult and time consuming to fix. Its impossible to keep it perfect...but its very possible to keep it in very very good shape.
In the end this was a very good detail and really it came out better than even i expected. This wasn`t a "Show Car" detail...this was a double pass with a little extra attention paid to some spots (like the back hatch)...but if you put that many hours of passion into something, you end up with some pretty damn good results:
http://i1232.photobucket.com/albums/ff374/Wills_WindowsAndWheels/Jims%202006%20Corvette/P1020200.jpg
Thanks all for reading, Hope you guys enjoyed it and maybe learned a trick or two :)