Novice user, new customer, great products and videos from Adam's

[radiotron]

DIY detailer here, just working on my own stuff.  I recently got a lightly used '24 VW GTI Autobahn in Atlantic Blue.  I'm loving the car, but I wanted to get the paint polished and ceramic coated to keep it looking nice.  It was a Michigan car, so the flat area of the front bumper is already very slightly dinged up from sand etc., but it still looks great.  It was also evidently driven through a car wash a few times, so it had the tell-tale scratches all over.

 

I did a lot of research prior to deciding who's ceramic coating system to use.  Adam's came out on top on several of them.  I already own a Porter Cable 7424 polisher, so I ordered some pads, some One Step Polish, and the Advanced Graphene Ceramic kit with the light.

 

It turns out that the One Step wasn't aggressive enough.  It shined it up nice, but deeper scratches were still there.  Ordered some Compound and Polish and a microfiber pad.  Now, it's not just shiny, but smooth with no scratches.  I put the ceramic on the hood last weekend, and wow!  It looks spectacular, and water just rolls right off.  Unfortunately, the UV light is almost exactly the same color as the paint on my car, so I wasn't able to use it much to verify coverage.  Just like in the videos though, I did smaller areas and overlapped slightly, so no problem getting an even finish with no high spots.  I was a bit apprehensive at first about getting the ceramic wiped at the right time.  I couldn't see much of a rainbow effect due to the paint color again, but was able to see the tiny beads on the surface, so don't be nervous if you haven't done this before, it isn't as critical as it seems, and you can make small corrections later without much trouble.

 

It's interesting how the texture of the surface changes over the first 24 hours or so...  Initially, I thought it looked pebbly and not so shiny.  Next morning, it was much flatter with a lot of gloss...  It still has a bit of texture look to it, but the underlying paint isn't perfectly flat either.  Years ago, when we painted motorcycles, we would wet sand and then compound the lacquer clear coat, but I doubt that factory clear coat is thick enough for that.  At any rate, I wanted to preserve as much of it as possible anyhow.

Nice to join the forum, and thanks for making great products!  I'll be back for more.

-radiotron

 

 

[falcaineer]

Welcome, Kevin! Nice work!!

[RayS]

Welcome to the Forum, Kevin.  Good job on getting the car wash swirls removed and the paint polished out. 

You are correct that the clear on a car is not nearly as thick as a bike, especially if the bike had custom paint work.