Automatic car wash queen – makeover

jjkacz

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Below is a car that has been taken through a brush type car wash about once a week since new. The swirls on the hood weren’t all that bad, but the scratches on the side of the vehicle were horrific! Go ahead and take a look for your self. They were particularly bad in the sun, which I was unable capture correctly with my point and shoot. Thankfully a 250w halogen light and my Brinkman dual xenon light helped to show the scratches. I used a hoist to get the vehicle to my level. This worked especially well since the worst part was the sides of the vehicle.

PRODUCTS AND PROCESS:

Soap: Meguiars Deep Crystal Wash
Clay: Meguiars Smooth Surface Clay Kit, white in color
QD: Meguiars QD included in the kit
Tape: Scotch blue painters tape – almost a whole roll was used.
Polisher: PC 7427XP
Compound: Meguiars Ultimate Compound
Pad: Lake Country CCS 5.5in and 4in orange and yellow were used
Polish: Menzerna PO85RD
Pad: Lake Country CCS 5.5in and 4in gray pads were used.
LSP: Pinnacle Liquid Souverän Wax
Pad: Lake Country 4in red pad
Microfiber: Cobra Arctic White Edgeless & Indigo Blue
IPA: 91% IPA 50/50 with H20

Camera/s used: Sony P100 (most of the before shots) and a Sony W290 (for some of the after shots). A DSLR will be purchased in the next 6 months…

Lessons Learned: I defiantly could have used a rotary with M105. I feel that this two would have enables me to cover more ground and correct more of the RIDS.

After viewing the severity of the carwash scratches I was glad that I had almost a week with the vehicle. This is a daily driver, so the idea was to get the paint to about 95%. There were defiantly some RIDS that I wasn’t going to address. This was hard for the ‘DO’ type of person, as I always want to get the vehicle back to 100%. The idea was to only do one buffing cycle per section with the UC, but some ended up taking two. Meg’s UC had a VERY long working time, which was great. I started off using the orange pad and soon switched to the yellow one. Wow, what a work of difference a more aggressive pad makes. The UC did leave some micro marring here and there. This was easily corrected with the PO85RD. An IPA wipe down was performed after compounding and polishing.

This was the first time I used Pinnacle Liquid Souverän Wax and let me say I AM IMPRESSED!!! The product smelled great and was so easy to work with. I applied with the red pad at speed 3-4. A little product went a long way. I let it sit about 5 min. while I waxed the next panel/s. It was very was very easy to remove with the Arctic white towels. I have to give credit to the new sample program, which put this amazing product in my hands. I have been converted to this LSP!

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All taped up and ready to go

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50/50 shot after Meg's UC and one buffing cycle

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Another 50/50 shot after Meg's UC and one buffing cycle

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The bottom section was corrected. The top section shows some minor swirls

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After:

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Before

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After Meg's UC

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After UC

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The next four shots are after UC and PO85RD

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Pinnacle Liquid Souverän Wax just applied to the drivers side

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and a shot of it applied on the roof

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some shots after the LSP was removed, but before the final wash
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Oh yeah. That Susuki IS a Automatic car wash queen!!! :iagree:

Good thing you are able to correct the car wash mess. :props:
 
It was very overcast when I finished. The Brinkman shows the true correction in the suns absence...

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A couple shots after the final wash. I will have some full body shots in the sun coming soon.

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Oh yeah. That Susuki IS a Automatic car wash queen!!! :iagree:

Good thing you are able to correct the car wash mess. :props:

It almost looked like someone had taken 3000 grit to the sides of the vehicle.

Thanks!
 
Very Very nice sparkals on the paint!! :xyxthumbs:
 
Thanks! It's sad that people have no clue what the automatic brush type car wash is doing to their car.

Welcome to Deep South Texas. LMAO..... If it's not the automatic washes, then, they take thier vehicles to all the hole in the wall places that really never change their waters, soaps and/or pads. ewwwww
 
wow it looked bad. nice recovery though.

Thanks!

Welcome to Deep South Texas. LMAO..... If it's not the automatic washes, then, they take thier vehicles to all the hole in the wall places that really never change their waters, soaps and/or pads. ewwwww

Unfortunately you see the same thing in Dealerships too...

WOW That looks awesome! Great job!

Thanks, it was really rewarding to see the finished results.
 
Unfortunately you see the same thing in Dealerships too...

Correct. The Ford, Lincoln-Mercury dealership, where my father is a main manager at, causes swirles on almost all of the vehicles that go through their automated car washing system.
 
Amazing transformation.

I just posted this to another thread,

http://www.autogeekonline.net/forum/auto-detailing-101/24231-what-would-you-use.html

For what it's worth, when someone asks me to detail their car and then when I look at it I can see it's never been taken care of in the past, the first thing I wonder is

What's changed that now the owner is going to take care of the car?


Usually the answer is 'nothing'


That means even if I take the job and restore a show room new shine to the car, it's likely going to just go downhill again because the owner is going to do the same thing to it that they've been doing all along.

So let's hope your customer stops running it through the Automatic Car Wash!



Great pictures of what a brush type automatic car wash will do to car paint...

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The Finger Technique for getting your camera to focus on the surface.

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Nice work taping the car off to save you time getting polish and wax off trim and out of the cracks and crevises...

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"Polishing paint is polishing paint, detailing is getting the wax out of the cracks"


:xyxthumbs:
 
Very nice transition! Even in the before pictures, you can see that there is a beautiful layer of paint underneath all of those scratches. In the after shots, that metalic paint job looks fantastic. That looks like it was a very rewarding job to do...
 
Wow... One hell of a job you did. Looks great and I hope the owner appreciates the work as much as all of us.

Does leaving the tape on the car like that for a few days cause any problems? I don't like to leave the tape on more than a few hours really.
 
Does leaving the tape on the car like that for a few days cause any problems?

Yes it can, if it gets warm or hot outside the glue or adhesive will soften and make GREAT CONTACT with the paint, (the adhesive is just doing it's job), and then this can make it a lot more difficult to remove and sometimes leave itself behind.

I don't like to leave the tape on more than a few hours really.

Me neither, that's why I was having a heart attack about a week later when I de-taped the El Camino...

Luckily it never became warm outside and I used a soft, careful surgeon touch when removing...

If it has paint... it gets polished...


:)
 
The Automatic Carwash, smoothing out factory Orange Peel one trip through at a time......


you did a damn fine job. WTG!
 
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