Spot repairs - what to use

[SVR]

I am preparing my car for a indoor show and it`s in great condition

Still want to improve it more however

There are a few marks, tiny swirls and scratches here and there and I want to remove them by adopting the advice from David B`s over polishing your paint article

I have four star paint cleanser, sonus sfx 2 and 3, clearkote VM, RMG and YMW, P21s finish restorer, DP final finishing polish, Dinitrol 7020 wet look polish, klasse aio and a few others



I am wondering in what order should I put these

Is sfx 3 stronger than four star UPC

Really don`t want to use menzerna or poorboys again



The bonnet is beautifully glossy and wet but has very minor swirls, will 4* UPC remove any of them



I am washing the car with 1Z perls and four star Ultimate shampoo (on the mitt) with Sonus der wunder wash mitt (paint only), purified water and quite warm tap water with three bucket system (1 for wheels, 1 for shampoo, 1 for rinse water) and am rinsing the mitt out after each panel)

Using a sea sponge for the wheels.

It is garaged all the time and driven only occasionally

So how come it still gets tiny swirls.



Are they inevitable

[imported_themightytimmah]

I`d use DP FFP followed by RMG on the minor swirls. Use SFX2 followed by DP FFP /RMG on the scratches and marks. Marring is just a fact of life, even if you use a foam gun you are going to get some (although it will be much less).

[Accumulator]

Marring is just a fact of life, even if you use a foam gun you are going to get some ...



Yeah, this is true, but if you *really* work at it you can keep it to an amazing minimum. I just finished inspecting the S8 and I only found two spots of very light marring- it`s been well over a year since the last time I polished it. I`m still going over a year between polishings on the MPV too.



On my wife`s car, which I clean much more "normally" (but still with the foamgun), yeah, there are a few spots here and there. No way am I gonna treat every vehicle the way I treat the S8, life`s too short :D



SVR- Can`t really help with the products you mentioned as I`m just not familiar with them.



I wouldn`t worry *that* much about the abrasives, if you want to remove the marring you`ll just have to do what it takes. And that doesn`t sound like much. I`ve polished some vehicles many, many times with the PC/Cyclo and never had a problem.



On the washing, yeah, you really oughta get a foamgun. And I`d rinse the mitt *much* more frequently. Even *with* the foamgun I can`t imagine washing an entire panel without cleaning the mitt, no matter how clean the car is. Sometimes I`ll clean it after washing a very small area, as in barely touching the car at all. I try to *never* move a dirty mitt across the paint any more than I have to, even if that means taking five minutes or more to wash a single panel. Try to barely touch the finish with the mitt- don`t apply any force, I try to not even let the full weight of the wet mitt press against the paint. And I use plenty of mitts. Seems like they always get *some* kind of dirt stuck in them no matter how well I rinse them out.



One trick is to dunk the mitt in the wash bucket with the cuff open and facing up. Let the mitt fill with wash solution and then hold it by the cuff. Let the solution seep out of the mitt while gently whisking it against your paint with barely any contact. The idea is to "dislodge and flush" the dirt away, not to scrub it off.



Heh heh, if I can drive the S8 (let alone the minivan!) and keep it nice I know you can do it with your car ;)

[SVR]

Thanks guys, some great tips there.

I use the fully soaked mitt and the hose to apply foam to the car, by adding a thin line of shampoo to it and with the mitt in a horizontal position I aim the hose to the centre of it and move from panel to panel

Dunk a couple times and it`s sudsed up.

Accumulator - that`s one very long wash method - I thought mine was long

I glide the mitt over the surface (wearing it though) which I reckon would help prevent marring

Absolutely no pressure

The way we have top wash cars at work (dealership) you would be horrified but that`s typical of the industry



I`ll double the amount of times I clean the mitts and use two of them from now on.

People wonder why I take so long to wash a car but when they seel

Anyway I`ll try those products and they should do the trick

Overall for an eight year old car, it`s awesome, the interior is better than new



Cheers

[Accumulator]

The way we have top wash cars at work (dealership) you would be horrified but that`s typical of the industry...



Heh heh, I worked in a dealer`s new car prep dept. when I was a kid, back in the days of soft single stage ;)



Sounds like you`re on the right track, just work on cleaning/swapping mitts. Even with the way you`re doing it now, I`d get a foamgun but then I`m nutty about the things.



New record for washing the S8 last night- 2 hours 40 minutes. Never did it that fast before, but then it wasn`t what most people would call dirty either.

[Bill D]

Wow Accumulator! :xyxthumbs



That was around the time we spoke?

[White95Max]

New record for washing the S8 last night- 2 hours 40 minutes. Never did it that fast before, but then it wasn`t what most people would call dirty either.





I read that first sentence, and thought "holy crap that`s a long time". Then I read the second sentence! :eek:

[Accumulator]

That was around the time we spoke?



Earlier. By the time you called I`d showered up and was dividing my time between Autopia and running to the shop to attend to the MFs in the washing machine.



Oh, and last night under the incandescents I spotted an isolated scratch (not a *scratch* type of scratch, but a single line of light marring) on the hood of the MPV :( Barely visible, and certainly not bad enough to take out with winter on the way, but it just goes to show that themightytimmah was right- no matter how careful you are it`s gonna happen.

[SVR]

Thanks timmah and accumulator - SFX 2 , DP FFP and RMG worked a treat.

Didn`t get 100% of them out (did it by hand to save clear) but the clearcoat clarity is better than ever and I have sealed the paint again with UPP

The marks are now at the level that I can live with and I found some new , pretty bad marring on the rear quarter panel and the process removed it easy as ABC



Have been using quikshine after each step and my god did it make the paint stand out and become richer this time.

tonight I removed the UPP (12 hours) with a monster fluffy towel that I am doing R & D on and WOW, they rock

I`m going to add those fluffy`s to my company`s range of products.



Cheers

[joeyb7]

FFP and RMG? Any help?

[White95Max]

FFP = Detailer`s Pride Final Finishing Polish http://www.autogeek.net/dp555.html



RMG = Clearkote Red Moose Glaze http://www.prestostore.com/cgi-bin/store.pl?ref=exceldetail&ct=29303&pd=149043&recview=31