De-badge disaster

G

gle_helle

New member
Well, o.k., disaster is a little strong, but I removed the badges from my Audi A4 trunk, and because I am a moron I put many small, shallow scratches around the letters from where I scraped with a "safe, non-marring" plastic scraping tool. Sorry, no pics available right now. The scratches are minor, but there are a lot of them, and the outline around the former letters is visible.



I've hit the area with a couple of passes of Scratch-X, but they're not much better. I plan on hitting it a couple more times, but should my next step be Meg's #105, #80, #83, or something else. This will have to be by hand - no orbital yet.



Thanks.
 
M105 by hand will rock it.



How hard are you pushing with the ScratchX? You really need to push hard for that to work.
 
Platic usually doesn't cause too deep of scratches. They should polish right out with some M105 and at the same time remove all the shadowing from the emblems.
 
Sometimes the "shadow" left behind after taking off an emblem is due to the paint getting lighter over the years. My 96 Lexus ES300 was like that. It kept the original color due to the fact that the sun did not hit under the emblems. If that is the case you're pretty much stuck...
 
eyezack87 - Did yours ever eventually fade to match?



If I was to think about it, I am guessing not, as they should fade the amount from that point on. Just curious about debadging older cars.



chris
 
wow that sucks that is why i like my steamer cause i just heat it up they peel right off an leave no residue.you should look into getting one they are great to have.
 
Here is what my car looked like then and still looks like now lol. Although I do like the darker emblem color without an external piece, the holes do start to bug me...



DSCN5201-1.jpg




If you think about it, now the sun is hitting all parts of the paint at the same time. I think the only way to fade back to match is to vinyl the car off except for those emblem pieces :nixweiss
 
I think a cleaner look would be to paint the emblem body color (or as close as you can get) and put it back on. Even another accent color would look stealth, like a mirage paint with earthtone accents to blend into your cars color.



Those holes gotta go!
 
Thanks. I'll try the 105. I went to NAPA today, and they didn't have it, only #2, 9, and 24. Carquest sometimes carries 105, don't they?



On my car, the shadowing is not from fading; you can actually feel the edge where the badges were. It almost feels like the badges were pressed into the clear and made an impression.
 
gle_helle- I've debadged quite a few Audis and any ghosting has always faded away over the course of a few polishings. Did you take off the rings as well as the other stuff? I took *everything* off my S8 but left the rings on my wife's A8...most people prefer how hers looks (but not me ;) ).



I recently removed some scratches (grr...dealership carelessness) from the trucklid of the A8, right beside the rings, *by hand* using M106 on a MF. Took about six tries but I reduced the marring as much as I felt comfortable doing (to the point that nobody else would ever notice it).



I tried a few of my usual faves before the M105 and decided that they'd take *way* too long. Go with the M105, otherwise you'll spend at least an hour on this (that's what happened when I did fingernail scratches behind door handles by hand in pre-M105 days).



Give the M105 a shot and then follow up with something milder to achieve the best possible finish. I used 1Z High Gloss but one of your Meg's polishes should work too.
 
No, I left the rings - don't care for the totally naked look (no offense).



I've done a few more passes with Scratch-X because I can't find M105 locally, and it seems to be getting a little better. I'll definitely try M105, though.
 
gle_helle said:
No, I left the rings - don't care for the totally naked look (no offense)...
Click to expand...



Oh, no offense taken at all :D On any other Audi I'd probably leave the rings too. Never known *anybody* other than myself who saw our two cars side-by-side and preferred mine and I wouldn't have done mine that way had it not been an S-car.



I've done a few more passes with Scratch-X because I can't find M105 locally, and it seems to be getting a little better. I'll definitely try M105, though.
Click to expand...



If the Scratch-X is making it better then it oughta be an OK follow-up to the M105.



IIRC (and I could be wrong), some e-retailer was selling small sizes of M105, maybe 12 oz. or so.
 
eyezack87 said:
Sometimes the "shadow" left behind after taking off an emblem is due to the paint getting lighter over the years. My 96 Lexus ES300 was like that. It kept the original color due to the fact that the sun did not hit under the emblems. If that is the case you're pretty much stuck...
Click to expand...



I've removed decals and painted lettering on tons of work vans (single stage& bc/cc) that were left on for almost a decade and was able to buff down the surface to make it look like they were never there. I can't imagine that the base coat faded and you can remove the ghosting from a nameplate? Doesn't sound right.
 
It wasn't a shadow. The paint faded overtime due to being outside 24/7 and rarely waxed by the owner before me. Trust me when I say that I tried everything I could to remove it. If I had a choice I would plug the holes and leave it as a hood with no emblem on it but it just doesn't look right with the darker shade of paint under the emblem.



If you want, I can go take pictures of my car's driver side since that side was repainted the original color. They failed to see that the entire car had lightened overtime with age and the sun so I have a tri-toned ES now :(
 
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