Ever do a stupid thing while detailing?

I

imported_Marksman

New member
Just the other day I decided to quickly wash and Z-6 my car while I had the time. It was VERY dirty. I used a water blade to initially dry my car and after I had done that, and gone over it with a towel to remove any remaining water, I looked at my hood and noticed that I missed a couple spots while washing. There were a few areas where light dust could be seen but the worst part was I went over all that with the water blade!:eek: You could even see the marks in the dust where the blade had skid along the hood! That made me want to cry. Not only did I potentially scratch the hell out of my paint but I just finished drying and now I had to do it all over again. DOH!

So, that got me thinking... How many of you have screwed up big like that before and what's your story?
 
Sounds like me. Ever so often something stupid happens to me. Last stupid thing I did was after wash and dry pulled her into the garge and decide to sweep the driveway down, put broom back into the garge and it slid off the wall onto the car door. Lucky it didnt cause any damage.
 
Day one with my PC. Freshly washed, wet, crappy white foam pad on it(Coastal tool). Tried the spin dry method. All the water went to one side of the pad. Force was too great. A large chunk of soaking wet pad tore off and went flying across the garage. No more spin drying for me.
 
When I first started using the PC I was working on my friends' beater and had become enamored with how well DACP and a yellow pad was thinning out a 4 inch scratch just below and parallel to the drivers side window. Well, if a little work was good then a lot would be better, so I loaded up the pad with DACP, cranked it up to 6 and went after the rest of the scratch. After about 30 seconds of basically boring the pad into this scratch, I pulled the PC away and the scratch was all but gone...so was the pinstriping just below it. So now there's this 6 inch section of almost non-existent pinstripe right where you have to look at it everytime you get in the car. Considering the rest of the car looked much better and it was a beater to begin with, the owner didn't mind, but all I could think about was what if this had been a real beauty queen I'd just botched and how I'd have been handing the owner a personal check along with his keys when they came to pick it up. Thank goodness for forgiving friends and for a cheap lesson learned.
 
popped my hood with the wipers in the "upright" position. then went around to the front and lifted it up the rest of the way.. :O it look about an inch of paint off the pack lip of the hood. :(
 
How about spending the day detailing and after the final wipedown was done and I stepped back to look at my work, I stepped right on the hose nozzel and here comes a rain shower, all over me AND the car!!
 
Ok one time was pulling the hose to reach the other side of the truck.It was stuck on the tire, so I went to unhook it and saw it was also wrapped around the soap bucket. Yup dumped a brand new batch of Sonax soapy water over. :doh The funny thing is I did it twice!!!! On the same wash.:angry

Now I keep the bucket next to the stairs and I walk to it.

Haven't dumped another bucket since! :xyxthumbs
 
The hose got wedged by the rear tire while I was rinsing so I gave it a big heaveho and I guess I pulled a little too hard and fell back. The only problem was I got a bad knee and it locked up on me and I ended up writhing on the ground for a few minutes. The neighbours thought I was having a seizure or something. I was limping for a good week after that one.
 
While detailing my dark red '92 Vette, I decided to check the oil and it was about 1/4 quart down so I decided to top it off. Took off the filler cap and added the oil. As I was taking the oil bottle back to the cabinet, my son showed up to introduce me to his girlfriend. We chatted a while, then they went in to meet mom and I went back to work, closed the hood on the Vette, took a couple steps away and turned around. Imagine my horror when I noticed a small bulge poking up from the hood where I had left the oil filler cap on top of the cowl. The bulge in the fiberglass went away after I opened the hood but the paint/clearcoat is cracked in about a 3" circle now. The first bad spot in the paint since new in 1992! I have resisted having "Stupid" tatooed on my forehead, but that spot, though almost invisible to others, jumps out at me every time I look at the car. Oh to be able to get those few seconds back to try over again! LOL
 
Just got through detailing a mates car, when I decided to get all my pads that I have soaking and spin dry them. Probably best to do it away from the freshly detailed car.......LOL. I got gunky polish water all over his car. Lesson learnt.



Ive had a fair few near misses where I have picked up a tire shine or window cleaner instead of my QD and vice versa ( touch wood )
 
For a couple of years I moved away from the idealogy of the importance of Prep and got skewed towards LSP as the answer to finish (paint) problems.

"Our product eliminated swirls, oxidation, etching and creates the ultimate shine in one-step"



I started chasing these claims and lost my bearings for the perfect shine - Surface Prep.



Now I am back on course, thanks to many here at Autopia, and now almost any LSP creates an excellent look.



Tattoo this to your grey matter - Prep, Prep, and more Prep is the secret between a clean and shiney vehicle and one that turns heads at all visual angles and lighting (see Avatar). :wavey
 
6cyl's_of_fury said:
Just got through detailing a mates car, when I decided to get all my pads that I have soaking and spin dry them. Probably best to do it away from the freshly detailed car.......LOL. I got gunky polish water all over his car. Lesson learnt.
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I've done that before!



Another thing I've done a few times was to open the hood of the car while the wipers were raised. Takes the paint right off! Fortunately I only seemed to do it to my old Maxima.
 
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