surface prep

[ClimberGuy4]

I asked a little while ago about using p21s cleanser after 3m SMR, as opposed to using it before (which is what the ebook says). I thought this because it was less aggressive, so it should be like sanding, working your way up to the highest grit. Is swirl removal like sanding in that it cuts the surface while introducing superfine scratches which then have to be hidden with a less abrasive product which puts even finer scratches in the surface? Or can you just use the appropriate product and end it there?

Would continuing to use less and less abrasive products enhance gloss similar to when polishing metal?

[Knight]

This might help. Think of polishing your car like you would sanding wood. (lol funny) When sanding wood, you use a pretty ruff grit with big rocks on the paper to cut away all the nooks and pieces of bark. ( We are creating a toy soldier ) Then you would move up to a piece of sand paper with smaller rocks " grit" to make the wood smoother and taking away the scarring of the last sandpaper that it made in the wood. Then you would move up to, let`s say to make it short, a very " fine grit " of paper with TINY rocks and the paper is saturated with them. You would use this to make the wood smoother by removing the scarring from the last paper, to have a nice smooth toy soldier. Now, you have sanded this piee of wood. Notice something? The piece of wood has gotten smaller. Just as a clearcoat gets thinner when you polish. When you polish you do the same thing as above. Also, if you had your smooth little toy soldier you would not want to take out the big grit paper and sand the toy thinking it would get smoother with that big rock grit paper you would scar it and have to redo all the paper again. Relating it to polishing, you would not go to a heavy compound, and butcher your car and having to go through all the steps all over again when all you had was just a couple of fine scratches. Go with least aggressive product to do the job.



The sand paper is like the polish, pad, or both.

I hope this helps. LOL I had fun with it!



:up

[ClimberGuy4]

Yea I`m familiar with the whole sanding process (I spent over 20 hours polishing a steel panel for my computer...nice mirror finish) and I was wondering if the same applied to paint. Everyone says to use ppcl or p21s gepc then follow it with number 9 or 3m smr. Shouldn`t it be the other way round? I also wanted to know if after having gotten rid of swirls with the right product, using a less abrasive product would enhance shine, similar to smoothing out the wood even more.

[F 355]

You are correct Subterfuge..the smr is the more aggresive one...

PakShak helped me with this "scale" that I use - starting with most aggresive:



Meg DACP

3M SMR

Meg 9

Meg 7

Zymol HD Cleanse

P21 GEPC



I`m switching over to synthetic and been working on my car for the last few days..sounds like a long time but I pulled the wheels to clay them, detail the wheel wells, etc etc.



On the car I did Dawn, Clay, 3m SMR with a PC, Zymol HD Cleanse by hand, P21 GEPC by Hand and the results were amazing!

[ClimberGuy4]

F355: So you went from most aggressive to least aggressive. That`s what I`ve been doing but the guides say to use gepc first to reveal surface defects, then use a swirl remover. Whatever, if you say it looked good, I`m sticking to it.