Rotary Help

HeavenlyV6

HeavenlyV6

New member
Hello everyone. Just this week I bought a Makita Rotary in hopes to take the next step in my detailing skills. I have had a Porter Cable 7424 for two years now and I feel I have mastered that. My dad's BMW 328i is in desparate need of paint correction so I was anxious to test out my Makita. I watched alot of how to videos plus read up on alot of forums on the web.

I started out today with Wolfgang Swirl Remover and a orange pad via rotary @ the speed set at 1. I kept the polisher moving and the back edge (closest to me) tilted up slightly. The pad had plenty of product on it and after two passes I seemed to make the paint worse. I was basically putting scratches and swirls in the paint using the machine. I know this is a user error so what am I doing wrong? I basically thought all you had to worry about was keeping the Rotary moving at all times. So I stopped before I did anymore damage and went back over that area with my PC. Can someone tell me what I should do? I plan on getting a scrap hood hopefully this week to ractice on. Needless to say, this brought my detailing moral to an all time low and made me realize I am not as good as I thought I was!:( Help
 
HeavenlyV6 said:
Hello everyone. Just this week I bought a Makita Rotary in hopes to take the next step in my detailing skills. I have had a Porter Cable 7424 for two years now and I feel I have mastered that. My dad's BMW 328i is in desparate need of paint correction so I was anxious to test out my Makita. I watched alot of how to videos plus read up on alot of forums on the web.

I started out today with Wolfgang Swirl Remover and a orange pad via rotary @ the speed set at 1. I kept the polisher moving and the back edge (closest to me) tilted up slightly. The pad had plenty of product on it and after two passes I seemed to make the paint worse. I was basically putting scratches and swirls in the paint using the machine. I know this is a user error so what am I doing wrong? I basically thought all you had to worry about was keeping the Rotary moving at all times. So I stopped before I did anymore damage and went back over that area with my PC. Can someone tell me what I should do? I plan on getting a scrap hood hopefully this week to ractice on. Needless to say, this brought my detailing moral to an all time low and made me realize I am not as good as I thought I was!:( Help
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To start people think that you have to keep a rotary moving at all times...this is some what true but not in any quick motion..like your PC...you jeep guiding the rotary over the area...up and down, back and fore, sideways...working the area until the product breaks down...I think that when you start using a rotary after mastering the orbital one thinks that the rotary needs to be moved much faster because its spinning faster...not really...a bit faster but you still need to go over the area the same as you would with the orbital....that said...the orange pad is a cutting or polishing pad?

With the WG SWR I use either a cutting or polishing pad depending on what I am attacking...a SWR is going to leave some very minor marring its removing some of the clear...and because of the speed and the cutting abilities of the rotary...I think that's why your thought you where making the surface worse...had you switched over to a polish and a polishing pad you would have seen a much different result....Yesterday I laid into a 13 years old Toyota Camry...TONS of swirls and light scratches...I used a edge cutting pad...with the WG SWR...and worked some areas for a minute or better...stopped looked at the area and did it again ...the paint surface was quite warm to hot...I knew at that point that I had heated up the clear and was moving it the way I wanted
 
So are you saying that I used to agressive of a pad/and or compound. Like I said, I created alot of swirls and fine scratches where I used the rotary. Plus it's a black car which really shows my mistakes.
 
HeavenlyV6 said:
So are you saying that I used to agressive of a pad/and or compound. Like I said, I created alot of swirls and fine scratches where I used the rotary. Plus it's a black car which really shows my mistakes.
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What I was saying is it sounds like the combo of pad and product that you used was pretty aggressive..and that created the marring that you saw..coupled with the black that show everything..

I'm not familiar with what the orange pad is..if it is a cutting pad and you used a SWR which is a cutting product...then yes you created some marring...that's not bad in every case...just switch to a polishing pad....and a polish and you would have removed the marring from the previous step...the car that I did this weekend...i used a cutting pad and a aggressive SWR...the came back with a polishing pad and the WG finishing glaze...smoothed out the finish real nice...all with a rotary!
 
The orange pad is a a light cutting pad found here: Makita 9227C Circular Polisher 8.5 inch Pad Kit. Along with Wolfgang SWR 3.0. is what I used. That is to aggressive I know now! SO your saying a White polishing pad with a SWR or a polish should help level the paint and get rid of the imperfections. Since the rotary moves much faster the abrasive pads really are only for extreme severe cases? Right? Thanks for your help by the way. Its 1:00am and I am still thinking about it! Haha
 
Imagine sanding wood -- first you start off with rough paper to level the surface (say like 80 grit). But it leaves heavy scratches, so you have to follow up with finer paper (say like 120G). This leaves the wood looking smother, but there still scratches are still appearant. So you move up to an even finer paper (maybe 220G). After this step, if it was pine, and you were painting it, it would probably be just fine. Lets say though that it's walnut or oak, and you're desired results are a natural finish -- so finer paper is needed (like 400G). It's looking good -- super smooth, feels nice; you might chose to stop here. Let's say though that you are working on a carving with ebony or zebra wood -- these exotic hardwoods need even more finessing to bring out their natural beauty (like 600-800G).

The pattern here is moving up the scale each time getting finer and finer. Just as polishes (compounds, waxes, glazes, etc) have diffrent "grits" so do pads. Matching pads to polishes takes some time, experience, and lots of practice. Using one product with one pad gets this result, but changing to this pad gets this result. Even diffrent results happen on this paint but it worked just fine on that. It takes lots of practice to master the rotary -- especially on black. I might suggest starting off on some lighter colored vehicles (pine). When you gain some tequnique try working with greens and reds (walnut & oak). Only then, when you have more experience, try working with deep dark blues and blacks.

Also, don't be discouraged if you don't get it -- I have a very nice guitar but I'll never be able to play like Jimmy Hendrix, Eric Clapton, or Jerry Garcia.
 
Thanks for that write up. I am calling around today to see if I can get some scrap pieces to practice on before jumping onto the black! Thanks alot of the knowledge.
 
Also, what color is the car? If it's Jet Black instead of Black Sapphire Metallic, the paint is VERY soft and is a pain to work with.

The other thing that I noticed, is you said that you used speed 1. I understand that you want to be cautious, but you aren't going to break a polish down properly on speed 1.
 
The car is jet black, very soft paint. I called a junk yard today and I am picking up a black hood today or tom. Yeah, I know I will not be able to break the polish down at that speed. My error of using a orange cutting pad and Wolfgang Swirl Remover 3.0 at speed one however definately left its trace on the car. Luckily I have the PC I can use to clean up after my messes somewhat. Plus, once I get the hang of it hopefully I can correct it. Thanks for the advice guys, keep it coming. I have googled the Rotary videos on line, is their and actual Rotary DVD anyone recommends? Thanks
 
I'm wondering if since you were using the rotary for the first time you simply didnt break the polish down properly by being overly cautious? Make sense?
 
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