Audios S6
Active member
- Oct 12, 2011
- 1,634
- 0
With temps holding in the 40s here in MN and snow a couple days away, it was time to get the A6 prepped for winter. Plus trying out some new goodies and refining some of my technique.
Process:
Wheels got OPC followed by Iron-X
Tires got Megs Super Degreaser and dressed with CG silk shine
Wheel wells got OPC and dressed with Maxima SC-1
Foamed with MTM, 2oz. CG CW+G and 3oz Carbrite Bluemax, filled with hot water
2BM with CG CW+G
Lower Panels treated with Ardex It's OK degreaser
Iron-X Decon
DeTar the rockers with Tarminator
Clayed with Speedy prep (fine) and PB spray & wipe
Menzerna Final Finish w/ LC black CCS on GG6 speed 6
Grilles dressed with maxima SC-1, remainder of trim has Gtechniq C4, 7 months going strong.
BFWD as LSP
Windows cleaned inside and out with Car-Pro fast glass towel
OPC starting to work at the german brake dust.
Iron-X doing it's thing. The wheels have been opti-coated and are cleaned every week or so, Iron-X wasn't picking up very much, but looks like I need to do a better job weekly on the centercaps.
Foam Party. I have a few other snow foams: CG Honeydew, Ultimate Snow Foam, Avalanche, BH Surfex HD, couple other CG soaps. After looking at a lot of the true snow foams I'm finding that they are essentially a high foaming APC, but most require a much lower dilution ratio and are not as cost effective as using CW+G with an APC: this is my new go-to combo and it foams like crazy.
A little trick I'm using now: When I'm done washing wheels I repurpose the wheel bucket: I dump the water, clean it out and place a kitchen garbage bag it in, now I can throw all my towels in here and bring it right to the washing machine when done.
Picture while claying, not much on here. I've been religious about waterless and rinseless washes - doing them several time per week this summer. I think this has had a huge effect on the lack of claying required and that Iron-x had only a couple spots that reacted, all on the lower panels. I also tried out many of the towels I've picked up this year. Using the PB spray and wipe, I found my favorite towels for wiping up after clay was the CG monster towels (blue and black border). The cobra supreme 530 (gray) was also very good. The griots waterless wash towel was the poorest performer for this task. The mothers towel that comes with their clay bar was alright, but saturated too quickly. The AG buff & polish towel was also mediocre at the task, it was just too much to manhandle on vertical panels.
Claying done. The paint is in pretty good shape already, Just a mild polish to remove any light marring and all the LSPs added this year.
Boot lid polished
Door polished with a couple deeper scratches remaining (around the halogen). I try not to chase after a couple scratches here and there knowing that they will get worked out in subsequent correction sessions.
Another little trick. This is a bore mop. Can be purchased at any firearms retailer. They come as cotton or wool and fit nicely in grille work. Some lint worse than others. This one isn't too bad, I forget what brand it was.
All done, 267K on the odometer. Just a couple finished shots.
Roof
Hood
Sides
I put the fast glass towel through its paces for this detail as well; soaked it in water and rung out we very well. I was very methodical about wiping the glass, but found it didn't really take more time than trying to do it quickly with a 3 towel method and glass cleaner. I wiped with the fast glass towel and dried with a WW. One thing I really like about the fast glass is the material can really clean crevices and corners that a normal WW can only do a mediocre job on. The only thing I don't like is that you have to wash it with other MF, but not any MF that has polymer on it from QD, spray wax etc. That makes it difficult to build up enough non-polymer towels to make it worth doing a load; otherwise it will get washed alone.
Thanks for looking.
Process:
Wheels got OPC followed by Iron-X
Tires got Megs Super Degreaser and dressed with CG silk shine
Wheel wells got OPC and dressed with Maxima SC-1
Foamed with MTM, 2oz. CG CW+G and 3oz Carbrite Bluemax, filled with hot water
2BM with CG CW+G
Lower Panels treated with Ardex It's OK degreaser
Iron-X Decon
DeTar the rockers with Tarminator
Clayed with Speedy prep (fine) and PB spray & wipe
Menzerna Final Finish w/ LC black CCS on GG6 speed 6
Grilles dressed with maxima SC-1, remainder of trim has Gtechniq C4, 7 months going strong.
BFWD as LSP
Windows cleaned inside and out with Car-Pro fast glass towel
OPC starting to work at the german brake dust.
Iron-X doing it's thing. The wheels have been opti-coated and are cleaned every week or so, Iron-X wasn't picking up very much, but looks like I need to do a better job weekly on the centercaps.
Foam Party. I have a few other snow foams: CG Honeydew, Ultimate Snow Foam, Avalanche, BH Surfex HD, couple other CG soaps. After looking at a lot of the true snow foams I'm finding that they are essentially a high foaming APC, but most require a much lower dilution ratio and are not as cost effective as using CW+G with an APC: this is my new go-to combo and it foams like crazy.
A little trick I'm using now: When I'm done washing wheels I repurpose the wheel bucket: I dump the water, clean it out and place a kitchen garbage bag it in, now I can throw all my towels in here and bring it right to the washing machine when done.
Picture while claying, not much on here. I've been religious about waterless and rinseless washes - doing them several time per week this summer. I think this has had a huge effect on the lack of claying required and that Iron-x had only a couple spots that reacted, all on the lower panels. I also tried out many of the towels I've picked up this year. Using the PB spray and wipe, I found my favorite towels for wiping up after clay was the CG monster towels (blue and black border). The cobra supreme 530 (gray) was also very good. The griots waterless wash towel was the poorest performer for this task. The mothers towel that comes with their clay bar was alright, but saturated too quickly. The AG buff & polish towel was also mediocre at the task, it was just too much to manhandle on vertical panels.
Claying done. The paint is in pretty good shape already, Just a mild polish to remove any light marring and all the LSPs added this year.
Boot lid polished
Door polished with a couple deeper scratches remaining (around the halogen). I try not to chase after a couple scratches here and there knowing that they will get worked out in subsequent correction sessions.
Another little trick. This is a bore mop. Can be purchased at any firearms retailer. They come as cotton or wool and fit nicely in grille work. Some lint worse than others. This one isn't too bad, I forget what brand it was.
All done, 267K on the odometer. Just a couple finished shots.
Roof
Hood
Sides
I put the fast glass towel through its paces for this detail as well; soaked it in water and rung out we very well. I was very methodical about wiping the glass, but found it didn't really take more time than trying to do it quickly with a 3 towel method and glass cleaner. I wiped with the fast glass towel and dried with a WW. One thing I really like about the fast glass is the material can really clean crevices and corners that a normal WW can only do a mediocre job on. The only thing I don't like is that you have to wash it with other MF, but not any MF that has polymer on it from QD, spray wax etc. That makes it difficult to build up enough non-polymer towels to make it worth doing a load; otherwise it will get washed alone.
Thanks for looking.
