From Crappy 2 Happy - Extreme Dealer Detailing

David Fermani

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Thought I'd share with everyone this pile of style Subaru Tribeca we worked on that was tore up from the floor up & beat up from the feet up. We do a ton of crappy cars, but this one was a bit dirtier than most. It didn't have to come out perfect and in fact it didn't, but I thought you'd get a kick out of the transformation we were able to salvage out of it. After checking out these preliminary pics, it's pretty obvious that this vehicle lived most of its life on a dirt road. In fact it looked like they hauled dirt inside of it from how much ground in dirt & sand that was trapped in the carpeting. Many Detailers wouldn't even want to (or know how to in fact) attempt to tackle a car this brutally dirty, yet we have no problem rolling up our sleeves and getting things done!

Here's how it looked when it came in:












































It's 10,000% critical to not introduce ANY kind of wetness into this vehicle before trying to remove as much ground in soiling as possible 1st. (water + dirt = MUD). So instead of prepping this car in the wet bay like we do on most of our full details, we 1st pulled it into a detail bay to start working on getting as much ground in filth removed from the carpeting. We used a combo of 3 different types of Tornadors, compressed air, stiff brushes & vacuums to loosen up and remove the soiling that had been ground deep into the nap of the carpeting. It was so bad that while doing this there was a dust cloud surrounding this car! This recon would have been a cream puff if they would have invested in some floor mats before trashing it.

My shop Manager Ted suited up ready to go to battle:













Check out the transformation of the carpeting after just removing the ground in soiling. It was almost like all this dirt/sand acted like a insulator for the topical soiling.










After de-dirting the carpet, we 1st used our Mytee Lite II to remove even more soiling. Check out how much of a difference it made!






We then used a dedicated carpet shampoo (3D Carpet & Upholstery Shampoo) followed again by extraction. This netted some excellent results. (no, we didn't need to power wash this one) We then used 3D Orange Citrus Degreaser @ 5 to 1 on the rest of the interior. Basically spray > scrub > wipe > compressed air.

After doing the carpet, we started to pre-soak the engine, door jambs & body with 3D Orange Citrus Degreaser. We left it to marinate for about 10 minutes before blasting with our pressure washer.



Here's the mud that kept falling from the wheel wells as we power washed the exterior:







Not much could be done about the bleach damage although the soiling around it was just about gone...



 
And here's how everything came out....again, not perfect, but good enough to get dropped off at the auction so it could be introduced to its potential new owner.
































We used 3D Ultra Protectant on the tires (straight), Engine & Wheel Wells (4 to 1).













And HD Speed via green B&S foam pad with our Makita rotary on the exterior.



 
Fantastic Work

Great Photography

I have the Tornador Vacuum attachment, but have yet to use it

What do you think the minimum CFM is at 90 PSI? The manufacturer suggests 5 CFMM @ 90 PSI
 
Fantastic Work

Great Photography

I have the Tornador Vacuum attachment, but have yet to use it

What do you think the minimum CFM is at 90 PSI? The manufacturer suggests 5 CFMM @ 90 PSI

Do these things really work?
 
Great Job Dave. It seems like there was no shortage of those kind of cars when i was in Macomb. In jacksonville people tell me how trashed their cars are but when i see them they seem like garage queens compared to what im used to. How do you like the Tornador Vac attatchment? Is it worth the price? I do deal with quite a bit of beach sand down here.
 
Ughh! I just threw up a little :(

Nice work there buddy
 
Who could ever imagine seeing this car after how beaten it was... almost to death.

Unimaginable, reminds me ugly duck story hahah Very nice work.

Thanks for sharing,

Kind Regards.
 
These kind of jobs are the hardest obviously, but the most gratifying once you see the end result. I'm extremely impressed with your engine bay detail. It doesn't even look like the same car!

I once had carpet mats get stained exactly like that interior. I was able to mask the stain pretty well by treating them with RIT. But in my case, it was black, which was easy to match. Eventually the stain came back, but it looked good for several months.
 
Great work.

I will never understand why some people do not use floor mats.
 
Seeing the interior makes me wonder if the engine ever saw an oil change and what other maintenance was neglected.
 
Amazing transformation. Looks much better. Its a shame people do this to their cars.
 
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