This is an example of what can be achieved by rotary polisher using one of the most popular polishes on the market - Meguiars #83. Been around for ages, but a mighty fine product and capable of getting rid of nasty swirls in harder paint types like you may find on your GTi
So - down to the detail. A Y-reg Jaguar S-Type 3.0 litre. Being prepped for sale, the car has general swilrs and many many RDS on the outside and generally flat looking paint. Inside the light coloured leather was looking rather grubby, as were the carpets.
I'm going to split this write up into two sections, one for the exterior and one for the interior... Exterior work was largely carried out by myself and Stu, while out resident interior expert Bryan tackled the cream leather insides of the car.
ExteriorThe car is Jaguar Racing Green - a metallic green with a blue glow to the paint from the flake. On arrival though, the paint was looking rather flat, even after a wash and there were many RDS to see:
Before machine polishing colur start to deal with the swilrs and the RDS, the car was clayed using Sonus Grey Clay:
The contamination was, as you can see from this pic, quite severe:
So a more abrasive clay was used - Sonus Grey. Plenty of Last Touch was used as a lube and care exercised so as not to inflict clay bar marring using the more aggressive clay - no pressure, plenty of lube.
Once clayed, the car was rolled into the garage ready for machine polishing. The bonnet was used as a test section to assess the polish combo required.
First off was a trial of Menzerna PO106FF Final Finish on a Meguiars W8006 polishing pad, and while this removed the swilrs on the soft to medium Jaguar paint, the RDS remained. So a stronger combo was required. Now, normally on details, I reach for Menzerna PO85RD3.02 Intensive Polish on a W8006 pad... but today, it just wasn't to be. It flashed white and the rotary did not run smoothly, the polish refused to break down evenly and required regular spritzing to fully work it... It finishes down but just wasn't a nice polish to use today as the conditions were not ideal. So, back in the box it went and out with an old friend: Meguiars #83 Dual Action Cleaner Polish. A medium abrasive polish which I always carry with me on a detail owing to its good cut, finishing abilities, and more crucially, its reliability. Spread at 600rpm, a couple of passes at 1200rpm and then up to 1800rpm until the residue nearly vanised, then two finishing passes at 1200rpm got this result:
Happy with this result, the finsih was sharp and clear and the defects well removed, I decided to go with this combo for the rotary work on the car... The PC work, Stu was having good success with 85RD3.02. :)
Onto the driver's door: Before...
and after...
The rear driver's side door before (camera flash used to highlight the defects):
and after:
Another after shot on the rear 3/4 of the car - I am very impressed with the gloss left onthe paint after polishing:
To show the #83 at work: Here's the boot lid before:
Now, starting by dividing the boot into thirds (about an 18" sqaure area at a time), the polish was spread at 600rpm with medium pressure to ensure an even spread. The speed was stepped up to 1200rpm and the pressure lightened for two quite fast passes to start the polish off. Then up to 1800rpm for many passes (I'd say circa 20) until the residue nearly vanishes. The polish has a steady cut and keeps cutting until this stage of vanishing residue so its important to keep polishing to this stage to avoid holograms. Two finishing passes with little pressure at 1200rpm were made to refine the finish and remove any hint of hologramming. The #83 in the middle of the set, showing a residue even across the panel:
At the end of the set, the residue has almost vanished completely:
And this generated the following result under the Sun Gun, swirls and RDS gone and a sharp finish allowing the flake to ping through:
With the sun out, the excellent gloss left by the polishing stage is evident, and with the flake the paint is alive:
And, under full sunlight, we can see the finsih is hologram free and sharp - just how it should be after machining...
On to one of the deeper scratches:
After assessing the paint thickness this was given two hits of Meguiars #83 to achieve good minimisation of the mark, after this the paint thickness was reduced enough and I didn't want to go any further, choosing instead to leave the clearcoat with plentiful thickness so its not at risk and can be happily machine polished in the future should it need it... The results of two hits:
And for fun, another before shot this time on the passenger side rear door:
And the afters on this door:
And finally, some pictures of the car just after the polishing stage - the paint now fully prepared and ready for an LSP and left with an excellent clarity and gloss from the #83. The majority of the finish comes from the polishing stages, its important to get this right if the finished article is to stand out from the crowd in the car park...
Now, onto the LSP stage. For Jaguar Racing Green, we chose to go with Meguiats #7 Show Car Glaze first of all for wettness. This was applie by hand using a foam applicator to a panel at a time. This is not a wipe on product, as a glaze it benefits from being worked into the paint to work the oils into the paint to get the best results... Several pases with light pressure in circular motions followed by straight lines with light to medium pressure to work the glaze in and then remove with two microfibres: one to remove the residue, one to buff to a shine.
Then, the wax of choice today was 3M Show Car Paste Wax, applied again by hand in a nice thin layer - foam applicator, circular motions to spread and then finish in straight lines to ensure even coverage, leave about five minutes to dry to a haze and then buff off the residue.
The results of this combo on the pre-prepared paintwork:
InteriorWhen the car arrived, on first glance the interior didn't look too bad, espeically condsidering its light colour... However, on closer inspection it was pretty grimy with a lot of general dust and dirt around. The before shots before Bryan worked his magic on it:
To start with, the matts were removed and cleaned using the capet extractor. Meguiars Upholstery Cleaner was sprayed on the matts, and worked in with a brush before removing with water through the extractor. Here's the colour of the water after just two of the floor matts!!:
Here's Bryan cleaning the front passenger seat leather using Croftgate Leather cleaner, removing any residue with a microfibre towel:
And the results of the leather cleaning on the seat:
The leather was then conditioned using Croftgate Leather Conditioner (the owner commented on the nice smell on pick up), interior plastics cleaned and dressed with Poorboys Natural Look, carpets treated the same as the matts above and the glass cleaned with Victoria Lite Cleanse. A couple of after shots on the interior:
Final Complted PicsFor completion, the interios surfaces were wiped down with a microfibre, tight spots brushed out with a brush. Exterior was spritzed with Last Touch and as a finishing touch, Optimum Opti-Seal was applied (wipe on *very* thinly, and walk away) to help protect the finish a little further and maintain the shine.
The end results (over two full days):
