"We'll fix that for you!" Famous last words for a new car. When a dealership offers to do this, run!
Thanks to the referral we received from Wes Walz of Elite Finish Detailing out in California the owner of this Volt had recently had us polish and coat her new Lexus last month. It, was in good shape. The Volt however, received the dealership special. Free swirls with any purchase.
Yeaaaah thats "new". I believe they had either left some towel marks, or water spots on the hood at the dealership…the owner made note of it and the dealer offered to fix it. Well, it looks like they just used some turtle wax rubbing compound by hand and laid into the paint real good. Not a good end result.
While the hood and the back hatch were in the worst shape, the rest of the car surely had its fair share of damage.
As always, we started out with our prep process. Hand wash with Iron X Soap to remove dirt/grime and a TON of bugs on the front bumper. We also had to remove whatever wax the dealer had applied (there was definitely something on there - as the water was beading pretty good).
Next up we decontaminated the paint…which was surprisingly rough for a new car. But with both of us working the paint at the same time with our prep towels, we were able to make fairly quick work of it.
Then of course it was time for the polishing.
The Rupes 21 as always was doing the heavy lifting for this baby.
Paired with a Buff n Shine white and Adapt…it was dealing deadly blows to all those nasty swirls!
Black plastic like this is often times a royal pain to finish down…but Adapt along with using a slower speed on the Rupes took this:
And got it to this:
And that mess on the hood:
Became insanely glossy and deep:
Gotta say, this really was a very rich color. While a Volt may not be considered an "exotic" lol, it sure as heck had some exotic looking paint when we were through!
Back towards the hatch there were a few little surprises awaiting us. First off…some super deep scratches along with some etching:
Nasty right?
Did i mention the car was…"new" ?
While this area took a few extra section passes to get into acceptable shape, the result was the same as the rest of the car:
Pretty….
Tail lights were equally messed up:
Adapt too cleaned them up nicely. Had a little bit left to touch up towards the top…but pretty good for one pass:
Now here was the other surprise….the drop down part of the back hatch had a few nasty spots. First…right under the "Volt" emblem. It almost looked like the emblem had been applied, then scraped off and removed and then reapplied. The reason i say this is because right under them emblem looked like this:
Ouchy…
While the whole drop down was swirled, this area was noticeably worse.
The Volt was lookin like it got struck down:
A 4" pad was needed to really get into that small area right under the emblem. It too took a couple of extra passes and some very slow arm movement to correct, but in the end - we won:
And for our final act - sanding mark removal. Yeah…there were 2 or 3 spots of 3" sanding disc marks to the left of the Volt emblem. Looked to me like there was some de-nibbing going on here…but this is why we check every inch of the paint - incase little goodies like this are hiding:
Notice the tight "squiggle" look…like a pig tail..thus the name…pig tails. Dead give away signs of left over sanding marks…on a Volt!
There were two or three spots that looked just like that…but again, a little extra Adapt and slower passes and it pulled those marks right out:
After the polishing was complete, it was time for the CQuartz Package.
CQuartz Finest applied to the paint, wheel faces, head and tail lights - CQuartz Dlux applied to all plastic trim and CQuartz Flyby30 applied to the windshield.
Tires were dressed - as were wheel wells and an interior vacuum and thorough wipe down (to remove the armor all splatter the dealer had left inside) left this baby looking like it should. The best looking Volt in the state!
I swear i love Dlux, it really brought some life to the plastic trim. And as the owner said….Finest just brought the paint to another level of depth.
See what i mean?
I really liked this picture Dani took…very cool angle and pretty sweet lighting:
Then again so was this side lol:
No more swirls, just pools of gloss:
Tires looked nice and black and the rims looked sharp coated with Finest as well:
And of course the paint under LED looked sharp as could be:
As always the story has a happy ending…and happy owner. Now its ready to go out and get bug beaten again!
Thank you all for taking the time to read - hope you enjoyed it and hope to have more for you soon.
Take care.
Thanks to the referral we received from Wes Walz of Elite Finish Detailing out in California the owner of this Volt had recently had us polish and coat her new Lexus last month. It, was in good shape. The Volt however, received the dealership special. Free swirls with any purchase.
Yeaaaah thats "new". I believe they had either left some towel marks, or water spots on the hood at the dealership…the owner made note of it and the dealer offered to fix it. Well, it looks like they just used some turtle wax rubbing compound by hand and laid into the paint real good. Not a good end result.
While the hood and the back hatch were in the worst shape, the rest of the car surely had its fair share of damage.
As always, we started out with our prep process. Hand wash with Iron X Soap to remove dirt/grime and a TON of bugs on the front bumper. We also had to remove whatever wax the dealer had applied (there was definitely something on there - as the water was beading pretty good).
Next up we decontaminated the paint…which was surprisingly rough for a new car. But with both of us working the paint at the same time with our prep towels, we were able to make fairly quick work of it.
Then of course it was time for the polishing.
The Rupes 21 as always was doing the heavy lifting for this baby.
Paired with a Buff n Shine white and Adapt…it was dealing deadly blows to all those nasty swirls!
Black plastic like this is often times a royal pain to finish down…but Adapt along with using a slower speed on the Rupes took this:
And got it to this:
And that mess on the hood:
Became insanely glossy and deep:
Gotta say, this really was a very rich color. While a Volt may not be considered an "exotic" lol, it sure as heck had some exotic looking paint when we were through!
Back towards the hatch there were a few little surprises awaiting us. First off…some super deep scratches along with some etching:
Nasty right?
Did i mention the car was…"new" ?
While this area took a few extra section passes to get into acceptable shape, the result was the same as the rest of the car:
Pretty….
Tail lights were equally messed up:
Adapt too cleaned them up nicely. Had a little bit left to touch up towards the top…but pretty good for one pass:
Now here was the other surprise….the drop down part of the back hatch had a few nasty spots. First…right under the "Volt" emblem. It almost looked like the emblem had been applied, then scraped off and removed and then reapplied. The reason i say this is because right under them emblem looked like this:
Ouchy…
While the whole drop down was swirled, this area was noticeably worse.
The Volt was lookin like it got struck down:
A 4" pad was needed to really get into that small area right under the emblem. It too took a couple of extra passes and some very slow arm movement to correct, but in the end - we won:
And for our final act - sanding mark removal. Yeah…there were 2 or 3 spots of 3" sanding disc marks to the left of the Volt emblem. Looked to me like there was some de-nibbing going on here…but this is why we check every inch of the paint - incase little goodies like this are hiding:
Notice the tight "squiggle" look…like a pig tail..thus the name…pig tails. Dead give away signs of left over sanding marks…on a Volt!
There were two or three spots that looked just like that…but again, a little extra Adapt and slower passes and it pulled those marks right out:
After the polishing was complete, it was time for the CQuartz Package.
CQuartz Finest applied to the paint, wheel faces, head and tail lights - CQuartz Dlux applied to all plastic trim and CQuartz Flyby30 applied to the windshield.
Tires were dressed - as were wheel wells and an interior vacuum and thorough wipe down (to remove the armor all splatter the dealer had left inside) left this baby looking like it should. The best looking Volt in the state!
I swear i love Dlux, it really brought some life to the plastic trim. And as the owner said….Finest just brought the paint to another level of depth.
See what i mean?
I really liked this picture Dani took…very cool angle and pretty sweet lighting:
Then again so was this side lol:
No more swirls, just pools of gloss:
Tires looked nice and black and the rims looked sharp coated with Finest as well:
And of course the paint under LED looked sharp as could be:
As always the story has a happy ending…and happy owner. Now its ready to go out and get bug beaten again!
Thank you all for taking the time to read - hope you enjoyed it and hope to have more for you soon.
Take care.
