First, let me say I'm not a professional detailer and this is only my 3rd full correction detail. I was really happy with the results and welcome any constructive criticism. I'm an American detailer, but I LOVE your website and have learned a lot.
My mother owns a 2006 Nissan Maxima and intends to sell the car and buy something new in the coming months. She maintains the car pretty well, but it does not live in a garage, has never been waxed, and gets death tunnel washed half the time and washed at a hand car wash place with grimy towels and sponges half the time. She also has hedges at the end of her driveway that get dragged along the sides of the car with regularity! You'll see the evidence of this shortly.
I wanted to try a couple things with the car that I haven't done before so this was the perfect test mule. Mainly, I wanted to Plasti Dip the black trim below the windows and in the fender wells.
I drove an hour each way to trade cars with my mother for a week and worked on her car after my job each weekday and a full day on two Sundays.
Befores:
I picked the leaves and straw out by hand, used a leaf blower to get another large amount out, then vacuumed out the rest. Next, I sprayed dilute Meguiar's APC Plus liberally on the engine and then agitated with various brushes. I then sprayed 303 protectant liberally all over the engine, shut the hood, and let it idle for about 15 minutes while I started working on the wheels. This is one new technique I wanted to try and I think it came out great! I very quickly wiped it down to even out the gloss with an all purpose microfiber.
The wheels are up next. I removed them from the car so I could first clean them with APC, then about 3 hits of Sonax, then about 4 hits of Tarminator, another round of APC, and then Adam's sealant on the barrels. I later hand polished the outer portion of the wheels with a microfiber cloth and Meg's 105.
I didn't worry about every little nook and cranny that you can't see when they're on the car because my mother will never even notice the 4 hours I spent on them as it is.
I then went on to clean the exterior of the car with Dawn dish soap with a kick of APC for the heck of it. I then clayed it with an Adam's clay bar. Check out the contamination.
Clean clay bar and dilute Adam's detail spray as lube:
After only doing the hood:
Folded it around right before doing the rear bumper and vertical portions of the back of the car:
Yikes! That's just contamination off of the back of the car.
I cleaned all shuts, caps, etc with dilute APC and a Swissvax brush (GREAT brush):
And this car was dirty! Check out behind the front license plate frame and look at the dirt that dropped to the ground when I removed it:
The exhaust tips weren't horrible, but I used Adam's metal polish #1 and some 000 wire wool to clean them.
After:
I'm not really going in order for this one, but here is the mess around and in the trunk:
This mat was stained beyond repair. I considered trying to dye it back to stock, but I found a guy parting out a Maxima and bought a mat in good shape for $15.
Pulled the leaves out, air blower, vacuum, APC and brush:
So, at this point I felt like doing some interior work. We thought here interior was a tan color, but it turns out it's more of a cream after 6 years of getting wiped down at the local hack job hand-wash place. I used a leather brush, dilute APC, and then wiped clean with a microfiber. Later, I dressed it with Adam's leather conditioner which is one of my favorite Adam's products. I used tape to make nice 50/50 shots.
Piece of tape around the wheel and cleaned around it:
General after shot:
Here's another little jewel I uncovered. I found out that this nasty grey and fading strip had some attractive chrome underneath when I was machining the paint. I decided to tape off either side of the strip and later use my wire wool and then microfiber cloth to polish it up beautifully.
Another 50/50:
Besides the 20 or so hours of machine polishing, my favorite part of this detail was the use of Plasti Dip to freshen some plastic trim.
Plastic strip below the window before:
Taping up for it:
Afters of this strip:
I also wanted to fix up the fender wells because they were faded and looked horrible. Here they are clean, but faded:
Taped them off too:
And looked better than brand new again:
I used Adam's super VRT on this because it's an awesome product and looks great. I also used it on the area around the wipers. I even hand polished the wiper arms with a microfiber cloth and Meg's 105 which is a godsend for a DA polisher.
Before:
After:
So now it's machine polishing time!
I messed around first getting the haze off of the headlight. I made a little square and hit it once in this shot:
Here was a before:
My mother owns a 2006 Nissan Maxima and intends to sell the car and buy something new in the coming months. She maintains the car pretty well, but it does not live in a garage, has never been waxed, and gets death tunnel washed half the time and washed at a hand car wash place with grimy towels and sponges half the time. She also has hedges at the end of her driveway that get dragged along the sides of the car with regularity! You'll see the evidence of this shortly.
I wanted to try a couple things with the car that I haven't done before so this was the perfect test mule. Mainly, I wanted to Plasti Dip the black trim below the windows and in the fender wells.
I drove an hour each way to trade cars with my mother for a week and worked on her car after my job each weekday and a full day on two Sundays.
Befores:
I picked the leaves and straw out by hand, used a leaf blower to get another large amount out, then vacuumed out the rest. Next, I sprayed dilute Meguiar's APC Plus liberally on the engine and then agitated with various brushes. I then sprayed 303 protectant liberally all over the engine, shut the hood, and let it idle for about 15 minutes while I started working on the wheels. This is one new technique I wanted to try and I think it came out great! I very quickly wiped it down to even out the gloss with an all purpose microfiber.
The wheels are up next. I removed them from the car so I could first clean them with APC, then about 3 hits of Sonax, then about 4 hits of Tarminator, another round of APC, and then Adam's sealant on the barrels. I later hand polished the outer portion of the wheels with a microfiber cloth and Meg's 105.
I didn't worry about every little nook and cranny that you can't see when they're on the car because my mother will never even notice the 4 hours I spent on them as it is.
I then went on to clean the exterior of the car with Dawn dish soap with a kick of APC for the heck of it. I then clayed it with an Adam's clay bar. Check out the contamination.
Clean clay bar and dilute Adam's detail spray as lube:
After only doing the hood:
Folded it around right before doing the rear bumper and vertical portions of the back of the car:
Yikes! That's just contamination off of the back of the car.
I cleaned all shuts, caps, etc with dilute APC and a Swissvax brush (GREAT brush):
And this car was dirty! Check out behind the front license plate frame and look at the dirt that dropped to the ground when I removed it:
The exhaust tips weren't horrible, but I used Adam's metal polish #1 and some 000 wire wool to clean them.
After:
I'm not really going in order for this one, but here is the mess around and in the trunk:
This mat was stained beyond repair. I considered trying to dye it back to stock, but I found a guy parting out a Maxima and bought a mat in good shape for $15.
Pulled the leaves out, air blower, vacuum, APC and brush:
So, at this point I felt like doing some interior work. We thought here interior was a tan color, but it turns out it's more of a cream after 6 years of getting wiped down at the local hack job hand-wash place. I used a leather brush, dilute APC, and then wiped clean with a microfiber. Later, I dressed it with Adam's leather conditioner which is one of my favorite Adam's products. I used tape to make nice 50/50 shots.
Piece of tape around the wheel and cleaned around it:
General after shot:
Here's another little jewel I uncovered. I found out that this nasty grey and fading strip had some attractive chrome underneath when I was machining the paint. I decided to tape off either side of the strip and later use my wire wool and then microfiber cloth to polish it up beautifully.
Another 50/50:
Besides the 20 or so hours of machine polishing, my favorite part of this detail was the use of Plasti Dip to freshen some plastic trim.
Plastic strip below the window before:
Taping up for it:
Afters of this strip:
I also wanted to fix up the fender wells because they were faded and looked horrible. Here they are clean, but faded:
Taped them off too:
And looked better than brand new again:
I used Adam's super VRT on this because it's an awesome product and looks great. I also used it on the area around the wipers. I even hand polished the wiper arms with a microfiber cloth and Meg's 105 which is a godsend for a DA polisher.
Before:
After:
So now it's machine polishing time!
I messed around first getting the haze off of the headlight. I made a little square and hit it once in this shot:
Here was a before:
