2010 Ford Focus PBL Surface Coating

[Tato]

Good evening.

This project was done for a client willing to give his own car to his daughter before getting himself a new one. We talked for some time and he said he would like the car cleaned and well protected.

His words: 'I don't care about scratches, I just want it clean and with the best protection you can offer'.

That words were translated into a general wash+clay procedure followed by 1-step polish to get fair (as much I could in 6-8 passes) correction. The best protection I can offer is Pinnacle Black Label Diamond Surface Coating, and it was applied after prepping with PBL Cleansing Polish.

Full interior detail is not an optional in my package. Leather seats, full thorough clean on all surfaces, trim restore and protection are all and always included. Fact is, the impact of my details is always in double.

End of history, let's see what we had and what we've got.

Interior
• Vacuumed interior
• Carpets / floor mats scrubbed with CG All Clean+ APC
• Leather upholstery cleaned with Mothers leather cleaner
• Leather upholstery protected with Mothers leather conditioner
• Interior Surfaces cleaned with CG Inner Clean
• Interior Surfaces protected with 303 Aerospace Protectant

Wheels and Tires
• Wheels, wheel jambs and tires cleaned with CG All Clean+ APC, Citrus W&G using Daytona wheel brushes
• Tires Dressed with CG New Car Shine Premium Dressing

Washes
• Pre-Wash (twice):
• Foam with CG Citrus W&G
• Thorough rinse down to remove all soap residues

• Former Wash (triple):
• Foam and 2BM with CG Citrus W&G

• Pre-Coating Wash:
• Foam with Detailer's Pro Xtreme Foam
• Thorough rinse down to remove all soap residues

• Dried with Meguiar's water magnet drying towel

Correction
• Clayed with Nanoskin Clay Mitts and Sponges and CG Wash and Wax Soap for Lube.
• Glass Polished with Pinnacle Glasswork Waterspot Remover on Orange Constant Pressure 4" Pads - speed and 4-6 passes
• Correction with G220v2, Cyan Hydrotech 5.5" Pad, and Uber Compound - speed 6 and 6-8 passes

Coating prep and Coating
• Polish with G220v2, White flat polishing pad and Pinnacle Black Label Surface Cleansing Polish speed 5 and 2-3 passes
• Coated with Pinnacle Black Label Diamond Surface Coating

Pictures:

Car arrived. Incredible how difficult is it to get a decent before picture on silver. Based on this single picture, the car looked fine!

Let's get closer and find some squirrels


Happy Package: Dirt, stain, scratch, contamination... and TOGWA!

Sunroof got lots of water spots

Wheels need some clean up


Interior

Starting to Foam with CG W&G

Now that I've removed some months of dirt accumulation, I could notice the paint was very stained

Closer to stains:

After 1-step polish with Cyan HT Pad + WG Uber Compound

Looking to sunroof from inside (not the greatest view over waterspots stain):

After Pinnacle Waterspot remover:

For Prepping and for Coating:

Interior After:

After Coating:

That's it. I've enjoyed doing this job and I've done it like if I was doing for myself and my daughter (maybe in the future). All care was taken and no spot was kept out of total attention. I've put a lot of passion on this project.

The owner picked up the car today, and was really impressed with results. He was willing to pay me twice for the job, I've refused. I was charging enough for what we've agreed and for what I've done. He accept my negative, but scheduled his wife's car. Now, that's a Win/Win Scenario.

Luckily enough, tomorrow I go back to black car detailing! Silver is not the fairest paint color to demonstrate worth our efforts. It takes twice to look half better.

Thank you very much for watching,

Questions, comments, critics, always welcome!, please.

Kind Regards.

 

[281]

Great job Tato!

 

[Shane731]

Lookin' good! rops:

 

[Pureshine]

Looks great nice job

 

[Mike@DedicatedPerfection]

Wow very nice work Rafael. The Focus came out great. Im sure the owner was pleased with your work! Looks like you just earned a valuable customer.

I see your dedication to this profession is improving. Your write up and pictures are starting to come along. Keep up the outstanding work. You are on the right track to becoming the finest detailer in Sao Paulo.

 

[scshaysc]

Car looks great. Love your write-ups. Thank you for posting!

 

[Pinpoint_Precision]

Great work Rafael. Keep it up.

 

[Ray@Autogeek]

That's it. I've enjoyed doing this job and I've done it like if I was doing for myself and my daughter (maybe in the future). All care was taken and no spot was kept out of total attention. I've put a lot of passion on this project.

The passion shows Tato! Great job!

 

[RobertJ34]

Great work, looks excellent

 

[Tato]

Good afternoon,

It's impossible not to feel good after reading every kind comment, I appreciate your input and that truly encourages me to move on through this.

I owe all this Detailing thing that is happening in my life to AGO community. Few here may know from where I'm coming, but in short, I've switched from Ph.D. (coursing) and 'former profession' to a full time detailing business (my own).

Family and close friends that 'thought I was crazy' are now my #1 supporters. I had to fight a huge misconception for switching 'a career' to 'start washing cars', like they said.

- No, I'm not a car washer, I'm a Detailer!

But only saying haven't done much. I'm yet proving it, everyday.

Knowing that, I wish you could really believe me when I say how important AGO members and staff are being to me. I mean it.

I just can't say or do anything to payback all the goodness life turned since I've joined you.

It's a pleasure being here, to work on this and share with you.

2 good news:

a) Today I'm working on coating a 2013 black Mitsubishi Outlander, and that will be my next topic here.

b) I have scheduled delivery of my Flex 3401 (plus pads and some more products) for Wednesday!

Please, feel free to criticize or to give suggestions. Your opinion interests me a lot.

Thanks for all support,

Kind Regards.

 

[Justin M.]

Keep up the great work!

 

[vinharski]

Nice job Tato...exige muita coragem fazer uma mudança de carreira assim...falo por experiência própria.

O que achou do Black Diamond?

 

[Tato]

Olá Vinharski, como vai?

Pois é, ainda não larguei tudo, estou com um pé em cada barco... Porém, como estou fazendo detailing todos os dias, é fato que estou muito mais neste barco do que no outro!

Cara, Black Label Diamond Surface Coating é sem dúvida o melhor LSP que já utilizei. A lisura da superfície, o brilho duradouro que não se esvai com lavagens, a repelência à água, dentre outros, tornam este produto um show a parte. Sempre me surpreendo com a facilidade de aplicação e o resultado. Dica: (você já sabe melhor do que eu) - Preparação. De fato, este produto vem 'coroar' seu trabalho duro.

Estou usando também no meu próprio carro, e isto mudou a forma de mante-lo... toda semana eu dou uma 'ducha' ao estilo detailer e estou conseguindo segurar bem meu carro sempre em ordem desta maneira. A sujeira não gruda nem a ... hahahaha

Thank you everyone for comments,

'Dear Vinharski, how are you doing?
That's it, I've not thrown my entirely career away (yet), I have one foot in each boat. However, I'm detailing everyday so fact is I'm much more on this boat than the other.

'Man', PBL Surface Coating is without a doubt the best LSP I've used to date. Durable Slickness, shine and water beading, and other features as easy of application turns this product in it's own show. I'm always impressed with easy of application and the results.

Tip (you know it better than me): Preparation is the key. It comes as a 'crown' to our hard work.

I'm using it even on my own DD, and it changed the way I take care of it. I'm foaming and rinsing every week, and that way it's really easy to maintain my car always looking good. Dirty won't stick to surface.'

Again, thanks for comments,


Kind Regards.

 

[FrankS]

Nice job and nice write-up. :dblthumb2:

 

[Eandras]

Great Job. Show pictures of the black car before and after pictures.

Ed

 

[Tato]

Great Job. Show pictures of the black car before and after pictures.

Ed

Greetings.

Thanks everyone for input, I appreciate you taking your time to post your comments here. Critics, questions, suggestions, always welcome.

Hey Ed, thank you for kind words. No doubt working on black is my favorite. Sure I do like any color indeed...

In fact, I've received a brown car, not black. For your kind words, I've prepared a small preview on what's to come. It'll be a similar preparation (~different correction step) for Black Label coating.

Car is not finished yet, but I can advance I was able to remove 90%+ Swirls and deep scratches disappeared or are barely. Scratches correction were done using Lake Country MF Pads and M100 Compound. The rest of the car is being polished with Menzerna PF2500 (listed bellow).

Hope to finish the topic (and the car!) tomorrow, in a few hours.

Enjoy:

Preview of 2013 Mitsubishi Outlander - Paint Correction and Black Label Coating Application:

What we'll be dealing with:

Swirls and Random Isolated Deep Scratches

4 months old car looks several abused by car washes

Foamed dirty away (touch less wash until this time) and swirls appeared even more.

Many Rinses and Former Washes after, I've clayed the car using nanoskin fine grade clay mitt.

Here the car is absolutely clean and clayed (and dried!). Surface is now smooth and reflective as glass.

But we still have a lot of swirls to go after... Closer look:


Here they are showing by my garage lighting:

I've put 2 favorite polishes at proof for this job: Menzerna PF2500 and Meguiar's M205. They are different 'beasts', being M205 a finishing polish and PF2500 has more cut yet finishes very good as well. To advance, M205 was not able to get the correction I was looking for, but I always start from the least abrasive method I believe would tackle the job.

Based on quick tests, I've decided to use HT tangerine Pad with PF2500 as 1-step polish, and all I can say is that this duo performs.

Here are some passes:

(PS: My notebook volume level appears at the picture, please, ignore this fault).

The results of this passes (also much more) and coating application will be posted as soon as possible, tomorrow evening.

Thanks for comments, hope you've liked the preview.

Kind Regards.

 

[Eandras]

Greetings.

Thanks everyone for input, I appreciate you taking your time to post your comments here. Critics, questions, suggestions, always welcome.

Hey Ed, thank you for kind words. No doubt working on black is my favorite. Sure I do like any color indeed...

In fact, I've received a brown car, not black. For your kind words, I've prepared a small preview on what's to come. It'll be a similar preparation (~different correction step) for Black Label coating.

Car is not finished yet, but I can advance I was able to remove 90%+ Swirls and deep scratches disappeared or are barely. Scratches correction were done using Lake Country MF Pads and M100 Compound. The rest of the car is being polished with Menzerna PF2500 (listed bellow).

Hope to finish the topic (and the car!) tomorrow, in a few hours.

Enjoy:

Preview of 2013 Mitsubishi Outlander - Paint Correction and Black Label Coating Application:

What we'll be dealing with:

Swirls and Random Isolated Deep Scratches

4 months old car looks several abused by car washes

Foamed dirty away (touch less wash until this time) and swirls appeared even more.

Many Rinses and Former Washes after, I've clayed the car using nanoskin fine grade clay mitt.

Here the car is absolutely clean and clayed (and dried!). Surface is now smooth and reflective as glass.

But we still have a lot of swirls to go after... Closer look:


Here they are showing by my garage lighting:

I've put 2 favorite polishes at proof for this job: Menzerna PF2500 and Meguiar's M205. They are different 'beasts', being M205 a finishing polish and PF2500 has more cut yet finishes very good as well. To advance, M205 was not able to get the correction I was looking for, but I always start from the least abrasive method I believe would tackle the job.

Based on quick tests, I've decided to use HT tangerine Pad with PF2500 as 1-step polish, and all I can say is that this duo performs.

Here are some passes:

(PS: My notebook volume level appears at the picture, please, ignore this fault).

The results of this passes (also much more) and coating application will be posted as soon as possible, tomorrow evening.

Thanks for comments, hope you've liked the preview.

Kind Regards.

You got your work cut out for this black car.

Ed

 

[Romans5.8]

Silver IS hard to look great but it always looks clean. My wifes car is silver, and I hate when she parks next to me. Though they were both just washed yesterday, my black car is covered in winter road grit. Hers is too, but you can't see it; so it still looks nice and clean.