Is my buffing process wrong???

[nosed_b18b]

Ok. I worked on my neighbor's hood today. There was a big scratch where a girl decided to run her nails across with. Anyways, while I was buffing there seemed to be buffer swirls whenever I wiped off the hazed polish. I don't get it. I thought that if you moved at a decent speed that you would not get these??? I think I managed to remove most of them while I was working on the hood, but there was still a light amount of them on there still when I finished. Here's what I did:



-2 passes with light - moderate pressure pressed down onto rotary

-2 passes with weight of buffer holding it down

-2 passes with slight pressure taken off of buffer



Is this a bad procedure??? Please let me know. Here is the link to the work I did.

http://www.autopia.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=34096

 

[nosed_b18b]

Well, there are a lot of variables when using a rotary, but mostly it comes down to the amount of heat generated between the pad & paint...



Firstly, I never "press down" on a rotary... that alone can be enough to induce swirls. If you have the speed set correctly, the polisher is generating all the heat & friction it needs to do its job.



What speed were you running the rotary at?

(About 1500 rpm. Maybe a little more/less. )



Higher RPM builds more heat, more heat means softer paint, softer paint is easier to swirl up.



Were you keeping your pad flat, or running it up on its edge?

(It was flat. I did use the edge of it on parts that were harder to reach though.)



Were you keeping the pad "wet" with product?

(Ummm...I'm assuming so. I just worked in lines of product every 1-2 feet of the car.)



Were your pads clean?

(I started with a new pad and I was constantlly brushing product off my pad every other section.)



Were you working in small areas to make sure you'd worked the product fully?

(Every 1-2 feet.)



Sorry for all the questions, but as I'm sure you know there is a lot more to running a rotary than just product and number of passes.



All that being said, it also just takes a lot of practice. I've been running my rotary for about 4 months now, and there are still times I can't bring out a perfectly swirl free finish. In those cases, a few extra passes with a DA & 1Z Paint Polish clears it right up.

(I'm not really worried about swirl marks or any marring. I'm just wondering about the buffer holograms. My #9 took most of it out though. But it still seems like it's still in there. Also, what causes these???)