PAC Shine Insititue pictures; Richmond, VA

[imported_Intermezzo]

There is a bit of a sale going on at our favorite cotton towel outlet (`http://www.fieldcrestcannonoutlet.com/`). Now, I`m not sure if they do these kinds of sales all the time, but just thought I`d let you all know.

This is a quote from their main page:

"On orders that total $50 or more, enter "save10" in the coupon box on your order form to save $10. If your orders equals $100 or more, enter "save25" to save $25. When your order total reaches $250 or more, enter "save50" to save $50. This offer is available only at our ONLINE OUTLET - not at our affiliated online stores or our physical outlet stores and expires 01/26/02.

Shipping to continental US addresses is free for orders over $50."

This is the way I figure it. Just get five Charisma bath towels for 10 bucks each (free shipping). Each bath towel can be cut up into probably 4 good sized buffing towels and serged. If you can get them serged, this means you can get 20 high-quality buffing towels for 40 dollars. Not a bad deal.

[imported_Dude]

AWESOME! Thanks Inter!



P.S. Love your "market neutral" sig!

[jkochis]

While you`re on their site, check and see if there is a local outlet store. At the physical outlet, they are about half the price of the web sale prices.

[imported_Intermezzo]

Dude, hehe... thanks. I knew you`d be one of the few who knows what it means.



RH, Thanks for the info.

[Don2000g]

Thanks for the info. I like your math as well. 20 quality towels for $40 is a good deal.

[Todd@RUPES]

Thank`s to Euroclassic Porsche for hosting the two day event, to Proper Auto Care for sponsoring the class, and most importantly to the crazy car people (including the pesky G35 crowd ;) ) for making it a very fun time.

Euroclassic Porsche lent us four bays in their shop. Here we are about an hour prior to the class starting setting up chairs.

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Brian explaining to the owner of this gorgeous `69 Z/28 Camaro what is wrong with his paint. "Swirls, Rids, some weird stuff right their that could be from an UFO...."

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Seeing his heart broken, I offered some advice..."There are no UFO`s in Richmond, those things are out West but you do have a ton of swirl marks...."
It didn`t help.

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The first four hours or so of class on Day One consisted of `shop room` talk. We covered everything from proper washing and drying techniques to cleaning the carpets, engine, interior. My lab top crashed (or so I thought, it turns out something is wrong with the keyboard) so I could not access my Power Point, so we went Old Skool with a particularly cool easel and well packaged dry erasers.

Here I use my artistic skills (going for something form the Impressionist Era) to illustrate the difference between the different types of leather, and the different theories on how to care from them. Brian was in the corner, gently strumming Here Comes The Sun, entrancing the class with George Harrison inspired Indian melodies.

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Brian hosts a discussion on one of the car lifts after we broke for lunch with Pizza. I don`t know what they where saying, but occassionaly they would all stop, look at me, and fall down laughing...

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After lunch we went into the basics of machine polishing. Armed with enough information to be dangerous we grabbed those power tools called buffers and turned them loose on their own cars. (Okay not really, but we did include plenty of personal instruction with the various tools).

Brian, a Flex, some Meguiar`s pads, and a nervous owner approach the beautiful Z/28. After an hour of Brian`s time and experience the owner was polishing away, restoring one of the most memorable Pony Car`s to it`s original beauty. (The Alien scratches did come out, sorry but I lied: There are UFO`s in VA).

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Nothing like a vintage Mini to make you feel big.

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So we stuffed all 6`6 of Brian into the cockpit. Surprisingly he fit... (He couldn`t get out though.)

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The next victim, errr student, was a dark red Corvette, with deep scratches. Day One was supposed to be about using a DA, but the many wanted to use a rotary. I contemplated purposely burning the paint off of the Vette in order to keep the class focused on a DA.

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We inspect the paint with a Brinkman "Swirl Finder".

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"We want the rotary."

"No, it`s dangerous and you can reverse Earth`s orbit if you are not careful."

"We want the rotary."

Okay rotary it is....

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I covered the basics of rotary polish, picking up a bead, etc, the showed the basics of operation, the polished out a test spot. The owner of the Vette approached...

"I want to use the rotary."

"No, you will shoot your eye out..."

"Listen kid, I am a NASA engineer, and your comments about reversing Earth`s orbit are false. Now give me that little angle grinder and get out of my way."

At least that`s how I remember the exchange. In reality we kept the speed very low and worked on technique.

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The owner `picks a bead` up like a pro then works the Vette`s hard paint to a perfect finish.

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Day One ended at 5pm and Day Two started at 10 the next morning. The original purpose of Day Two was to cover both DA polishing and Rotary polishing in great detail, focusing on all the fun stuff like pad compression, abrasive grain`s, pad movement, etc... but the class wanted a lot of hand`s on time. So after we concluded a brief class room instruction, it was back to work.

Brian and I alternated through out the day on the different machines: A rotary, a Forced Rotation DA, and a Random Orbital DA.

Brian gets busy on a black G35.

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And spends the rest of the day in that bay, instructing on the proper use the various tools.

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Meanwhile Mike (who claims to be drunk) and I spent a lot of time with a DA. Mike graciously let anybody who wanted a shot at polishing his car. I think it was a ploy to get his car polished for free.

http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x121/tropicaldetailing/truth/class18.jpg

We didn`t get a lot of pics from the second day because it was one crazy polishing session. We did however have another break for more Pizza, and towards the end of class PAC gave me permission to auction off some of the tools and products. I Flex DA sold for $200 :O

"This is why we use a pad brush instead of our hands to brush out pads"
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Once again it was a great time. We met some really cool people and made some great friends.

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[gmblack3]

Looks like a great time!

[imported_RaskyR1]

Very cool!


LOL, I think we`ve all seen the look the Camaro owner has before after pointing out defects to them. :D


So when is the Shine Institute coming to MN? :)]

[bmw5541]

Great write-up Todd. Looks like you guys had a great time, and everyone learned a lot. :thumbup:

I wish I could have been there.

[imported_Brian_Brice]

It was a great time, I was hoping for some of you guys in NC and Georgia to show up buy maybe next time.

As for the mini, Todd conducted a few sample passes on it and by few I mean two. After those two passes the car was half way done. The owner was putting it on the lawn at Classics on the Green so he asked if I could finish the polishing with him so I checked my calendar and found five minutes to finish polishing it.

Here it is on the green where it took home two awards, including best in class.

So proud of Bennie (one of our students) and his very cool car.

http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o104/superiorautodetailing/classics%20on%20the%20green/DSC01150.jpg

http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o104/superiorautodetailing/classics%20on%20the%20green/DSC01148.jpg

[bmw5541]

Looks great Brian!!:clap:

[balls2dawalls]

I was there for this class :D

It was, indeed, a great time. I still haven`t found time to attack my subie.. but I have a meet tomorrow and am probably gonna find a garage to love on it afterward :)

[imported_juliom2]

thats a very very cool class!!!!
hopefully the earth orbit wasnt affected...
:scared:

[imported_Pats300zx]

Looks like it was an awesome time. I need to get you and Brian up here for an "East Coast Tour" :cornut:

[imported_Bunky]

I want a got shine? T-shirt..where do we get them?