Re: First BIG Project Need Advice Please!
OK,
So my mom has this 2003 Dark Metallic Blue GMC Yukon that on it's best day was ran through a drive through car wash
I took a picture of the hood in the Sun to give you all an idea of what the total paint job looks like. It has swirls. RIDS, small dents, rock chips, dried on car wash soap, water spots, you name it it has it and it's a dark color. I think this may be hard for me to have total success on being a noob and all but I'm looking at it like, no way can I make it worse!
Here's a larger size picture, if I were buffing this out I would definitely run a tape line down the middle and get a great before and after shot.
Ouch! This hurts my eyes just to look at it!
If she's going to continue to take it to a car wash then any swirls and scratches you remove are just going to be put back into the paint only now the paint will be thinner.
If it's a daily driver and going to see a car wash over and over again, then wash it, clay it and use a cleaner/wax on it. It will still look great and there will be more paint on the car for the service life of the car and you're mom will think it looks great.
If you want to use this for training purposes then go for it!
:xyxthumbs:
What do you all think? Will I need a more aggressive polish than the IP PO91E?
The first thing to do is a Test Spot with the pads and chemicals you already own.
"You don't know what you can do until you try"
So wash and dry the car and then clay the paint if needed and now you're ready to do a
Test Spot.
Note: YOU DON"T HAVE TO GET AS ELABORATE AS I DO IN THIS EXAMPLE BUT INSTEAD, JUST PLACE A SINGLE STRIP OF PAINTER'S TAPE ON THE HOOD TO SEPARATE BEFORE FROM AFTER, THIS WILL MAKE IT REAL EASY FOR YOUR EYES TO SEE THE DIFFERENCE.
Doing a Test Spot by Machine
Next we're going to do a Test Spot by machine using the new
Porter Cable 7424XP. Again, in keeping with the philosophy of,
"Use the least aggressive product to get the job done"
We'll first tape off a small section on the hood and try using a light finishing polish with foam finishing pad and check to see if this combination with good technique will get the finish to where we want it, if not then we'll try again using a more aggressive pad and product combination.
Now when you do a Test Spot, by hand or machine, you don't have to get this elaborate, if fact you don't even have to tape off a section. We do this because we're as D.O. as anyone and often times more D.O. than most.
If you do decide to use painters tape then just one strip of tape on the hood to separate the before side from the test section is more than enough. For those of you wondering why we used microfibers to cover the surrounding paint that's because we want to preserve the original condition of the paint to compare our test section too and if we were to get any splatter on the surrounding paint, sometimes just the act of wiping off the splatter can improve the paint appearance and our goal is to
preserve the ugly, that is preserve the original condition of the paint before we do our test section.
Sometimes you will end up with some very dramatic before and after shots, for example if you're doing a bonafide Extreme Makeover. In our case this finish is actually in pretty good shape overall in that the worst portions have light water etchings as the swirls and scratches are pretty minimal. So afterwards we didn't get any dramatic before and after shots but again, we're starting off with finish in good condition. Just to note, most of our project cars will follow this same routine as matter of consistent testing and documentation.
Mark your backing plates
If you're new to machine polishing with a DA polisher that uses a clutch, here's a tip that will help you to monitor your technique as well as what's happening at the surface level with your buffing pad.
Take your backing plates and mark them with a permanent black marker like a Sharpie; by doing this it will be easy to see if your pad is rotating or just jiggling or vibrating against the paint.
Marking the
6" Lake Country Dual-Action Hook & Loop Flexible Backing Plate
Marking the
3.5" Lake Country 3.5" Dual Action Flexible Backing Plate
Attaching the backing plate to the 5/16" spindle using the PC Spanner Wrench
Removing Below Surface Paint Defects
Anytime you're doing correction work the goal is to remove a little paint from the surface surrounding the defects in an effort to level or smooth-out the surface. More specifically you want to
level the upper most surface of the paint with the lowest depths of the defects you're trying to remove as discussed in this article.
What it means to remove swirls, scratches and water spots out of automotive clear coats
For an in-depth article on how to use the PC 7424XP Dual Action Polisher check out this thread,
Tips and Techniques for using the PC 7424XP Dual Action Polisher to remove Below Surface Defects
When you attach the foam pad to the backing plate the goal is to center it as best as you can.
Set the speed setting to the 5.0 on the variable speed dial. If you prefer you can bump it up to the 6.0 setting for even more power but for our test spot we're going to use the 5.0 speed setting.
For this first test we'll be using the
Pinnacle Advanced Finishing Polish with a
LC Flat 6.5" White Light Cutting Foam Pad
Apply some product to the face of the pad. For your test spot you don't need a lot of product so don't overdo it but take into mind that if your pad is new and/or used but clean and dry, then some of your product will penetrate into the pad. If you like you can take a little extra time to work the product over the entire face of the pad as this will insure the entire surface of the pad is working. For our test spot we're going to skip this procedure as we're pretty confident we're going to find out if this combination of pad and product is going to remove the defects after 6 to 8 passes over this small test section.
After only buffing for a few passes you can see a little pigment coming off the tinted clearcoat. This is normal for a tinted clear and nothing to worry about.
After wiping the test spot off and inspecting the results, we didn't feel this combination of product was working fast enough or effectively enough to meet our expectations.
While the paint was greatly improved, we felt we would need to substitute a more aggressive pad and product to produce the quality of finish we and our customer expects. If the car in question is a daily driver, keep in mind it's going to see everyday wear-and-tear and for this reason don't try to remove each and every one of the deeper defects as this means removing more and more paint. Remember, this is a
daily driver, not a show car.
Best Practice
Anytime you're removing a buffing pad from off the backing plate, do your best to pull the pad back at an angle, not straight off as this can loosen the Velcro on the pad and the backing plate over time.
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