Hi fellow autopians. I've been a lurker on the forums for quite some time and recently just started to detail for $$. This is my 2nd detail for money.
So I brought all my stuff up from my apt. in san diego to detail my friend's brother new black c300. As I was pulling into the driveway, the mom was outside taking stuff out of the trunk. I told her I was here to do a quick detail on the c300 since it was only a month old and she mentioned she was going to take her car to a car wash soon. Obviously I offered to do it for her. Neither of us mentioned price.
I decided to do her red g35 sedan first just because it was in a more worse condition. After I washed it, I clayed the rear wing and polished out half of it. Had the mom come outside to see my progress and she was really impressed. Asked me if I could do that to the whole car and how much it would be. Being new to detailing for $$$, I just said $150 since she's my good friend's mom. She said that is fair and I proceeded to polish the whole car.
They live on a dead end street in a gated community in the best part of their city, cerritos... for those that know. Since i setup my canopy and making noise with my PC I was attracting the attention of people out on sunday strolls. I ended up with 2 more details. One is a very swirled/rockchipped 2001 black slk320 with only 61,000 miles. Owner said it was garaged but didn't really look that way. Thinking about it now, I probably should have charged more than the $200 I asked for. But it is a smaller car. The other car is a great condition 2004 gold mercedez e320. As i was inspecting the car to quote her a price, she opened the door and asked if i did interiors, and i said yes. The crazy thing was the interior looked spotless....i'm guessing this could be a case of a super anal customer maybe??? . I quoted her $150 since it was really in a good condition and just needed a light polish and wax.
What a weekend......now i just have to figure when i'm going to do it since I live 1 hr 30 mins away and go to school full time........
Process:
Rinse with pw
Tires/wheel wells with APC+
2 bucket dawn wash
clay entire car - clay was pretty much black afterwards
Re-wash 2 bucket /w dawn
Headlights restored using Prima swirl /w PC on White LC
Prima Swirl /w PC and Orange LC x 3
Prima Swirl /w PC and White LC x 1
Prima Amigo /w PC and White LC x 1
Prima Epic /w PC and Black LC x 1
black wow trim
Total Time: 7.5 hrs
I really need a rotary. I'm waiting for my 9227c later this week.
Here is the link to my flickr slideshow.
rlguy28's slideshow on Flickr
My Arsenal.
Before
Before
Before
Before
Headlights need to be polished
Lots of swirls
Test spot turned out well. This is what I showed the mom which impressed her.
Washing car with Dawn using 2 buckets and pw to rinse off
Claying the hood. yikes! :shocked
50/50 of hood.
Plastic Trim Restored
not the best tape job but it'll do
headlight before
headlight after polishing with Prima Swirl on Pc with white lc pad
Since it took longer than anticipated (always seems to be the case) I was worried I couldn't get any after pics but setting up two halogen lamps aiming up towards my white canopy tent.....i was surprised to find that it turned out pretty nice. It was like a photo shoot......hahahha..check them out...
Cool pic of the interior. (at least i think so)
kinda looks like a porsche....kinda....
So I brought all my stuff up from my apt. in san diego to detail my friend's brother new black c300. As I was pulling into the driveway, the mom was outside taking stuff out of the trunk. I told her I was here to do a quick detail on the c300 since it was only a month old and she mentioned she was going to take her car to a car wash soon. Obviously I offered to do it for her. Neither of us mentioned price.
I decided to do her red g35 sedan first just because it was in a more worse condition. After I washed it, I clayed the rear wing and polished out half of it. Had the mom come outside to see my progress and she was really impressed. Asked me if I could do that to the whole car and how much it would be. Being new to detailing for $$$, I just said $150 since she's my good friend's mom. She said that is fair and I proceeded to polish the whole car.
They live on a dead end street in a gated community in the best part of their city, cerritos... for those that know. Since i setup my canopy and making noise with my PC I was attracting the attention of people out on sunday strolls. I ended up with 2 more details. One is a very swirled/rockchipped 2001 black slk320 with only 61,000 miles. Owner said it was garaged but didn't really look that way. Thinking about it now, I probably should have charged more than the $200 I asked for. But it is a smaller car. The other car is a great condition 2004 gold mercedez e320. As i was inspecting the car to quote her a price, she opened the door and asked if i did interiors, and i said yes. The crazy thing was the interior looked spotless....i'm guessing this could be a case of a super anal customer maybe??? . I quoted her $150 since it was really in a good condition and just needed a light polish and wax.
What a weekend......now i just have to figure when i'm going to do it since I live 1 hr 30 mins away and go to school full time........
Process:
Rinse with pw
Tires/wheel wells with APC+
2 bucket dawn wash
clay entire car - clay was pretty much black afterwards
Re-wash 2 bucket /w dawn
Headlights restored using Prima swirl /w PC on White LC
Prima Swirl /w PC and Orange LC x 3
Prima Swirl /w PC and White LC x 1
Prima Amigo /w PC and White LC x 1
Prima Epic /w PC and Black LC x 1
black wow trim
Total Time: 7.5 hrs
I really need a rotary. I'm waiting for my 9227c later this week.
Here is the link to my flickr slideshow.
rlguy28's slideshow on Flickr
My Arsenal.
Before
Before
Before
Before
Headlights need to be polished
Lots of swirls
Test spot turned out well. This is what I showed the mom which impressed her.
Washing car with Dawn using 2 buckets and pw to rinse off
Claying the hood. yikes! :shocked
50/50 of hood.
Plastic Trim Restored
not the best tape job but it'll do
headlight before
headlight after polishing with Prima Swirl on Pc with white lc pad
Since it took longer than anticipated (always seems to be the case) I was worried I couldn't get any after pics but setting up two halogen lamps aiming up towards my white canopy tent.....i was surprised to find that it turned out pretty nice. It was like a photo shoot......hahahha..check them out...
Cool pic of the interior. (at least i think so)
kinda looks like a porsche....kinda....
