Paint Correction Advice Needed

[cayenne]

Somedays are good detailing days and others are just plain tedious and frustrating. I used my new Flex for the first time today, and while the results are probably 70%, it's not where I can leave it and be happy.

 

I'm using the 2 stage process with the foam pads on a 1931 Ford StreetRod painted in Dupont BC/CC the clearcoat almost seems to behave like my BMW, super hard when you need to fix something but will catch a scratch by just looking at it. My Ford collected swirl marks and hazing this show season but nothing extremely deep.

 

I tried to take pictures of my test area, but the I can't capture what I'm still seeing. Here is a before picture which shows what I'm up against pretty well. I would say the after situation, is much better, but there are still horizontal lines and haze in areas.

 

 

None of the marks that are left are in any orbital or round fashion so I don't believe it's being induced by the Flex. When I did my first run with the Flex I was running it at speed 4 for both steps with moderate pressure, but it wasn't cutting that well. I stepped it up to speed 5 and applied more pressure, but seemed like I applied too much pressure because it heated up and I dusted a bit. Last pass was both step at speed 5 but with a little less pressure.

 

I'm leaning towards one of these 3 issues but I'm only guessing...

 

Maybe I'm moving too fast through the passes?

 

Should I step back to speed 4 on the fine polish step? I read a thread on here where it seemed to help with a harder clear coat helped.

 

Is this an example where a combination of microfiber and foam would help because i need to cut better in step 1?

Edited November 2, 2013 by cayenne

[cayenne]

Grabbed a couple more after pictures. If you look to the right bottom corner of this photo you can ever so slightly see that marring. They still don't show what it's like in the sun though.

 

[Baron_Von_Awesome]

Looks a bit like hologramming - move slower with a little more pressure!  

 

And excellent call on buffer speeds - your DuPont is hard as nails, so slower buffer speed, like you said, but stay around 4.5 with slow arm speed.  You may need to go a little outside the box and use finishing polish with a black pad instead of the regular white.  I've worked on finishes like yours and the BEST success I've had came with slow arm speed and softer pads.

Edited November 2, 2013 by Baron_Von_Awesome

[cayenne]

Thanks for the feedback.

 

I'm going to try one more pass today. I'm thinking I should try just the white pad and polish rather than repeating step 1 again. Would that be correct? I've already done several full step 1 / step 2 rotations so I don't want to do too many if it isn't necessary.

[cayenne]

Small Update...

 

I went back and did just the polishing step on speed 4.5, while focusing on slowing down my arm speed. While it helped, the areas I was concerned with still had some micro scratches/marring. I went back and did both steps and that made a larger improvement.

 

At this point, I can't see any of the marring with direct halogen spot's, with the direct sun hitting the door, I can ever so slightly see a bit of haze left behind if I get myself at the perfect angle. I've done a ISO 50/50 wipe down so I'm pretty sure it's not residue, but that's what it looks like when you get that slight hazing from left over oils. Since this is still left behind after the polishing step, I'm pretty sure it's something I'm doing, just not sure what.