cbenjes

Thanks, Doc!  Not sure if it was lint from a recent wash or the fibers actually starting to shed.  Nice to have you back at Adams, Dylan!  You need to do a twofer sale on microfiber!

All:

I noticed last night as I was applying the H2O Guard and Gloss thet the dry microfiber towel I was using was starting to leave lint on the surface?  Has this happened to anyone?  Is this towel useless?  It's an Adams single density 16x16 with the black border that's about 2 years old.  Is this about their lifespan?

Chris

Amazing what you can do with the right products.  People just don't understand sometimes.... Someone key'ed my Accord all around the whole car.  Insurance company set the damage at $2500.  I told the adjuster who looked at it that I could probably buff it out, but he said no way.  I insisted.  He still said no and wrote me a check on the spot.

Later that day, 1 hour with clay, a PC 7424XP, some swirl and haze remover, fine machine polish, sealant and Buttery wax and 98% of the scratch was gone.  You have to look real close to see any remnants.  Thanks, insurance company!

Nice job on the door ding.

True.  Thanks for the responses.  TIme to save for a paint job...

_{That may be the safest bet.  Not the easiest, but the safest...}

I have a Porter Cable.  I was surprised to see metal, but blame the thinness of the old paint.  Now I'm really paranoid that using the orange pad and anything abrasive, I'm going to end up with a paint-less Jeep.

I have a 1991 red Jeep Wrangler YJ with very faded paint.    I used an orange pad with some swirl and haze remover and actually got the paint down to bare metal on one of the corners of the hood.  I guess over time the paint is very thin.  Any suggestions for restoring paint this old short of a paint job?  I'm afraid if I used anything even slightly abrasive, I'll take what's left of the paint off.  TIA!

OK, so I didn't wait the 10-12 hours after applying the sealant and I applied the glaze and wax after removing the sealant after ti hazed over.  What should I do now?  What step do I have to go back to to make things right?  Something tells me I'm not the only one ever to do this....

Insurance is definitely a must. I have a friend who started out like you and now has a client-list that contains $100,000+ exotic vehicles. In some cases, the owners don't even let him bring a cell phone to the site because they don't want pictuers of their cars on the Internet. Get insurance.....You don't want to have to pay out of pocket to repaint a Ferrari if you accidentally drop your polisher on the hood... No matter how good and careful you are, accidents can happen.

Thanks to all so much. Let's see if we can get some warmer weather here in Maryland so we can make this work.

OK, thanks. THis white paint is pretty stained and streaked up from years of neglect. Where will the bulk of this get removed? With the wash the clay, or the swirl remover?

And can you use swirl remover on the sunroof to get rid of those scratches?

Chris

I'm relatively new at detailing, but I can tell you that my GTI and my son's Accord now have that better-than-showroom finish thanks to Adam's products and the PC RA polisher. My Sienna is next. But in the meantime....

My next-door neighbor just picked up a used 2000 Celica. It's white with a black leather interior. The car has relatively low miles, but I'll bet that the original owner maybe might have washed it 3 times in the 12 years that he owned it. Needless to say, it's a 911 emergency and the paint needs a lot of work to get back to white. There are black smudges all over it where you can see where the road grime, salt spray and dirt is just imbedded in the paint. Running your hand across the smudges comes up empty, but they are there nonetheless. It's pretty ugly.

So I guess my question is, what steps do we need to take to restore this finish, or at least get it to an acceptable level? My thoughts are:

Dawn wash twice.

clay

Severe swirl

Swirl and Haze

Fine machine polish

Sealant

Wax

Am I missing a step? Is there a really good cleaner between the clay and the severe swirl?

Also, is there a good product that can take the scratches out of the sunroof. It looks like a pack of wolves made the sunroof their den.

Thanks,

Chris

Well, we picked the car up used, so I can't be responsible for the sins of the original owner. My son waxed it a couple of times since we bought it, and was pretty impressed with the way the PC cleaned up my GTI, so he asked me to do the Accord. I'm thinking it was just oxidized paint coming off. I don't think the original owner ever really waxed it, but it looks great now.

Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of the process, as we were concentrating on getting the job done, not documenting the process. As it stands now, the car looks better than ever. Swirls are gone for the most part, it has a nice shine, ready for some decent wax over the sealer.

Thanks to all who replied. I guess 12 years of old paint, grime, road dirt, salt and pollution just built up. I promise it won't happen again. The next target is my 8 year-old Sienna.

This weekend we washed, clayed, polished, sealed and waxed my silver 2000 Accord. Even after the clay, the machine polishing pads pulled out an amazing amount of dirt with the Swirl&Haze and Fine Machine polishing steps. I was really afraid that the pads were ruined. Happy to say thay they cleaned up just fine with the All-Purpose cleaner.

So my question is, is this normal? Is there some other step I should have/could have done to remove more of the 12 year-old dirt from the car after or before claying? The car looks great now, better then it has since we bought it in 2009. Is this normal to pull out so much dirt with the polishing steps?