BMW E39 528i

**imported_Dave KG** · 03-20-2008, 07:17 PM

I`ve been in a but of detailing time out for the past few weeks over the winter period to step back and think about ways to improve my detailing and also to prepare a set of new dtailing guides and spend some time on my Physics book (for schools)... Took a wee break from writing detailing guides to do an actual detail over the past couple of days with Bryan and Stu.

This E39 is owned by an enthusiast who knows all about thw two-bucket wash method and has a fair collection of detailing gear, so the purposes of this detail was simply to correct the paintwork by machine polishing to bring it up to a standard which is easily maintained... so the interior was left untouched by request and the two days efforts (with three of us working) were focussed on getting the paintwork the best it would allow (boy, it was thin in some places - but it was nice and thick in others too!

)

The car was prepared for machine polishing by Bryan and Stu - claying took a good couple of hours as the car was covered in ingrained tree sap... but by the time I arrived (had to work unexpectedly on the first morning of the detail, and the car turned up earlier than expected too - thumbs up to the owner!

), Stu was already testing combos on the machines...

Indeed, I was greeted with the fact that the paint was simply laughing at Menzerna Final Finish on a polishing pad!! Oh goody... hard BMW paint - good job we have two days!

So, what exactly were we up against... on this mid blue, its quite hard to photograph the marring, but I decided to kick off on the bonnet...

Doesn`t look too bad really, does it?

Well, with the report that Final Fuinish was a no-goer, I went in with Menzerna PO85RD3.02 Intensive Polish on a Meguiars W8006 Polishing Pad. Technique was my "standard" method:

Spread at 600rpm for one pass
Beine to work at 1200rpm for a couple of passes
Work the polish at 1800rpm until the residue goes clear (about 10 passes)
Refine the finish with two or three passes at 1200rpm
Final pass at 900rpm

The results... see the picture above!!

No really... it took the edge of the general swirls, yes, but so much remained that it was clear this was going to be a fight with defect correction. Out with the cutting pad (Meguiars W7006 Burgandy) and Menzerna S34A Power Gloss. Technique I used for this:

Spread at 600rpm
Begin to work for a couple of passes at 1200rpm
Work for four or five passes at 1500rpm
Work at 2000rpm for four or five passes until residue starts to vanish
Stop, spray pad with Last Touch
Work polish again at 1500rpm for four or five passes
Work polish at 2000rpm for four or five passes

No effort was made here to refine the finish - it would be getting followed with a finishing polish anyway, the focus here was on the removal of the defects. As PG has quite a brittle abrasive, I find using only the weight of the machine gets better correction, using additional pressure seems to destroy the abrasives before they fully work. The use of Last Touch above is because PG is quite dry, and the little extra QD brings the polish back to life mid way through to get extra work from the abrasives - water will work just as well, my QD bottle was nearest

I chose to follow this Power Gloss with Intensive POlish as described above on the rotary as it softened better a couple of deep RDS that were there and delivered a finsih that to me was equivalent in terms of clarity and gloss to using the lighter cutting Final Finish - I believe this being down to the paint being as hard as it was, more on this later...

For now, the results of a couple of hours in total on the bonnet, machine finish only, around 95% correction:

On to the wing...

Power Gloss and Intesive Polish gave:

Making progress

On the passenger front door, to give you an idea of the way the paint was behaving... Here is the paint before any polishing:

The result after one hit of Intensive Polish as described above:

Yes, general swirling pretty much gone, but all of the deeper marks were still sitting there... plenty of paint left, so removal of these by more aggressive means was deemed safe so there was leaving them in - out with the Power Gloss, used as described above and followed with Intesive Polish to get:

Much better!

While I worked down one side, Stu worked down the other with Power Gloss and Intensive Polish - after about 3 hours each, we had completed the sides! And it was time to call it a day at that.......

.... And onto day 2!

Rain overnight had cleared, so I was looking forward to seeing this finish out in the sunlight, there`s nothing better after having spent hours as a team polishing than seeing your finish in direct sunlight

I started on the Rear 3/4

Two hits of Power Gloss this time as there were deeper RDS here but plenty of paint to handle the multiple compouding hits - the RDS were all over the panel. Followed with Intensive Polish to get:

Now, just as an inication to how hard this paint actually is... This is a shot of the bootlid after it had been machined with Power Gloss only, as described above with no effort made to refine the finish:

Looked a really nice gloss and clarity, and under the light:

I`d say that finish was pretty good myself! Bearing in mind this came from a harsh compound used at high speeds - softer paints would have been covered in holograms after that but not this car - with hard paint, it may be ahrder to correct but the finishing process is more forgiving and this of course means that once complete, it will be more resistant to marring being put back in

Still, the finish was refined further with, on the bootlid, Menzerna PO106FA Final Finish applied as described above for Intensive Polish to get the following result:

Hard to really see a difference in gloss and clarity in the pictures, and in person the difference was equally hard to spot - its there, but its not much at all... worth it for the little extra in the finish though

With the car machine polished, it was time to glaze and then protect the finish that in total had taken about 15 - 16 man hours to produce.

The glaze of choice was Malco Plum Crazy Glaze - was very kindly sent a sample of this some time ago by Marc at Krystal Kleene, and I was very impressed with it - seemed to clean paint really rather well (mfs and pads always came up with evidence of a cleaning effect), as well as add a definite nice wettness to the finish to compliment a machine finish and ready it for the application of a wax. Appplied using a PC, Meguiars W9006 tan finishing pad, spread at speed 2 and then worked in for four or five passes at speed 4-5. The residue wiped off with ease, and left a nice wettness ontop of the gloss achieved from the machine efforts...

A durable wax was requested, so we went for Collinite 915. This topped the whole effort off just perfectly, added its own little touch of gloss but as with all waxes, nothing spectacular - it was the protection of the underlying finish we are after here! With the paintwork completed, Bryan polished the glass and tail pipe, dressed the tyres and exterior plastics with Meguiars ASD.

Rolled out into the sunlight (yay!) for final pictures... Enjoy!

**imported_Dave KG** · 03-20-2008, 07:18 PM

And my favourite pic...

**nmxdaven** · 03-20-2008, 07:29 PM

Awesome shine!!

**Old Pirate** · 03-20-2008, 08:28 PM

Awesome work Dave and crew!:up

**Ron Harris** · 03-20-2008, 08:38 PM

Great work Dave. I feel this car will be a sought after classic for BMW lovers in the years to come. Just as the first M3 are now here in the states. The sports package and your detail work really makes the car look timeless.