My in-laws purchased a cyclo polisher for my christmas gift and it arrived yesterday. Yes, I am a very lucky man! I S&W`d the tahoe, droped the garage doors, plugged in the heater, and got down to business.
Here`s an initial observation after a few hours of use.
Packaging:
Came in a cyclo box from the factory with standard instructions & warranty information. Nothing special...
Performance: Smoooooth as butter. Set your PC to 3 with a polishing pad, and that`s what the cyclo feels like. The cyclo polisher is one well crafted machine that has a solid and well balanced feel. There is a cross bar/handle over the pad heads in the front of the polisher and a thick rubber handle in the rear, which lends to the solid feel. On the down side, the cord isn`t very long, much shorter than the PC. I found this a bit annoying because my extension plug got in the way. The on/off switch isn`t very well labeled either, which is bogus for a $250+ tool.
I digress... let`s get back to the review....
Flip the switch, and off you go. This is a one speed machine -i.e. you can`t adjust the polisher speed. It runs at 3200RPM, which is slower than the PC set to 6, but in lies the secrets of the 4" counter-rotating heads that `do the magic`. It was easy to operate over the horizontal and verticle panels. I will admit that I felt a bit fatigued after running it on the verticales for an hour. I found that going around the mirrors was a bit awkward, but managed to get past it.
Cyclo vs. PC: After a few hours of use, I`m thoroughly convinced that the cyclo can outperform the PC for polishing duties, as well as save time. I was curious, so I bolted on my spot repair 4" backing plate/pad to the PC to compare it to the cyclo. With the PC set to 5.5, light polish broke down in about the same time (Tested with Hi-Temp Midnight Express -which I really like on black). For heavier polishing/compounding (Menzerna Power Gloss and Intensive Polish) the cyclo breaks down products much quicker.
Another observation I made...
Using identical pads (4" orange power pads w/intensive polish) the PC left behind light to moderate marring (which FPII x 2 with a polishing pad cleared up). The cyclo left no visable marring. Not a big deal, but a big time saver.
The cyclo doesn`t break down products quite as quick as the rotary, but they are fairly close. No, that doesn`t mean that I`m not going to put my PC on the shelf and call it a POS, but I probably won`t use it for polishing duties any longer. I`m trying to think of an easy way to explain it... If you`ve ever used a 4" spot repair pad on your PC then you know how much more aggressive it is than your standard 6-7" pad. This is what the cyclo does, but instead of one 4" pad, you have two.
Another cyclo vs. PC obervation: Pad cost are lower.
Keep in mind you need 2 pads on the cyclo, but they only cost $2.50-2.75 a piece. MUCH cheaper than PC pads.
I want to thank Bill D. for his help, insight, and review of the cyclo. It`s easy to see why Bill is such a fan of the cyclo!
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