The below is more information than you can share in 10 minutes, so read through it and feel free to use any portion of the material for your presentation.
My guess is a Mustang club is going to have some "seasoned" members that will remember single stage paints so the part bout how the
paints changed and how the change makes a
huge difference to them when they go out to try to remove scratches by hand or with an
old fashioned orbital buffer, which just doesn't work very well as compared to any of the tools we talk about on our forum.
The Traditional Orbital Buffer aka The Wax Spreader
Connecting that little tidbit of information is usually something people not up to date with detailing understand till someone like you breaks it down for them.
Here you go...
Definitely have a one page
bulleted list outline with
short once sentence topics to jog your memory about the main point you want to get across and practice what you're going to say.
There's going to be older guys in this club that have owned pre-clear coat Mustangs and they are going to remember very well the oxidation issue with single stage paints. Knowing this, here's what I would do...
Introduction: Your name, your business, keep it short and sweet.
Tell them what you're going to tell them, that is you're going to go over the basics of polishing paint.
- Washing
- Inspecting both physically with your hand and visually with bright light
- The major correction step - removing a majority of the below surface paint defects
- The minor correction step - polishing to a high gloss
- The protection step, that is sealing the paint with a wax, paint sealant or coating.
Also tell them that you only have 10 minutes so you're going to be talking pretty fast and ask everyone to save their questions till after your speaking session.
From my experience the majority of car enthusiasts are focused on creating a show car finish, if they want to know about polishing metal, glass or cleaning door panels and carpets tell them to talk to you after your presentation.
Then I would start by stating what's obvious to all of us but it's quite possible nobody has ever explained it to them and made the "connection" in their minds that paints have changed.
By this I mean, starting in the 1980's car manufacture started switching over to basecoat/clearcoat paint systems instead of single stage paints and the reason it's important to explain this is so they understand just about everything else about polishing paint.
Here's what I type and say in front of crowds...
"Generally speaking, modern clearcoat paints tend to be harder than traditional single stage paints and what that means to you and I when we go out into our garage is that it's going to be more difficult to remove swirls, scratches and water spots due to the hardness factor of the paint"
Read this article,
The practical differences between single stage paints and a clear coat paints
Modern clear coats
last longer, but don't confuse that to mean they will
look good longer as we all know a swirled-out clear coat can still last a long time. Because of this hardness factor, more and more people have switched to working by machine instead of working by hand because machine polishing is faster and more effective than working by hand.
Polishing by hand worked pretty well for all the years cars were painted with single stage paints since the paints were softer you could remove swirls and scratches pretty easily by hand, but no so with the new basecoat/clearcoat paint systems.
The tool that is primarily responsible for helping people to move from working by hand to working by machine is the Porter Cable DA Polisher because unlike a direct drive rotary buffer the Porter Cable uses what we call a
Free Floating Spindle Bearing Assembly and to show you what that means let me demonstrate.
Read this article...
The Free Floating Spindle Bearing Assembly - The Story Behind The Story...
Then do what I do in this video... you'll need a DA plugged in to do this demonstration.
To see how safe these tools really are, check out this video where I place extreme pressure to the back of my hand using a Porter Cable Dual Action Polisher
Pushing down as hard as I can
Then what I would do is hold up a rotary buffer and show with your hand rotating a pad attached to a backing plate how the buffing pad is under tension because it's a direct drive tool. What I usually say is this provides a lot of power for removing defects fast but if you're not skilled and careful you risk doing some damage or instilling swirls.
Then take a PC, or G110v2 or a Griot's Garage polisher, and again, using your hand spin the pad in front of them to show them it's
not a direct drive tool.
THEN DEMONSTRATE like I show in the above video by placing the polisher on the 5.0 speed setting, placing your hand on the podium or a table and then turn the polisher on and push the pad against the back of your hand as hard as you can. Run the polisher for a few seconds then turn it off and
show them the back of your hand and tell them in the same way that it didn't hurt your hand, used correctly it's not going to harm your car's paint by burning through the clear coat or instilling swirls.
You can also explain how the Flex is safe even though it's a direct drive oscillating tool. If you haven't watched these two videos, then watch them, maybe you can use something I share in the videos to explain the details but due to time constraints it would be better to say something like, after my session I would be glad to show you all these tools.
I show some of the above in these videos...
How To Pick a Polisher
An overview with demonstrations of the Porter Cable 7424XP, Meguiar's G110v2,
Griot's Garage 6" Random Orbital Polisher, Griot's Garage 3" Mini Polisher,
Flex 3401, Flex 603, Flex 3403, Cyclo Polisher, Makita 9227C, DeWalt 849
Part 1 - How To Pick the Right Car Polisher for your Detail Project
[video=youtube_share;LtrdTvnZX3I] - Part 1 - How To Pick the Right Car Polisher for your Detail Project[/video]
Part 2 - How To Pick the Right Car Polisher for your Detail Project
[video=youtube_share;2k92m5cJxCk] - Part 2 - How To Pick the Right Car Polisher for your Detail Project[/video]
Then quickly share how a Professional approaches the art of polishing paint...
Wash the car, get it surgically clean because machine create their own air current and you don't want any abrasive particles to be pulled out of any body seams, cracks or crevices and enter into the machine polishing process.
After washing you inspect the paint, both physically with your hand and sense of touch and then with your eyes for swirls. You first need to know what's wrong with the paint as this will help you determine what you'll need to do to restore the paint. Some guys call it diagnosis or diagnosing the paint.
Explain briefly how clay works, it abrades anything sitting on top of the surface off the paint and traps the particulates into itself, for this reason you need to knead the clay and at some point dispose of it. Explain the Baggie Test, show a plastic baggie on your hand.
The Baggie Test - How to inspect for above surface bonded contaminants
If you haven't already, watch this video, it goes over pretty much everything you need to know about clay and claying.
How to use detailing clay to remove
"Above Surface Bonded Contaminants"
and restore a smooth as silk surface.
Part 1 - How To Use Detailing Clay
[video=youtube_share;gfxAesk4Po4] - Part 1 - How to use detailing clay[/video]
Part 2 - How To Use Detailing Clay
[video=youtube_share;opfK408uIxM] - Part 2 - How to use detailing clay[/video]
Then talk about swirls, explain they are "Below Surface Defects" and the way you remove them is you carefully level the paint till the upper surface is level with the lowest depths of the defects you're trying to remove. Also explain RIDS that is some scratches are too deep to safely remove and if the cars in question are daily driver it's safer to improve them instead of trying to completely remove them. (If you talk about RIDS keep it short and sweet, non-forum people don't understand our acronym lingo)
RIDS - The Definition of RIDS and the story behind the term...
Maybe talk a little bit about the compounds, polishes and foam pads
you use and are knowledgeable and comfortable with.
NOTE: Anytime you can pass a pad, or product, or tool around the audience do so, these are called
"props" and they engage your audience and help them to pay attention and retain what you tell them.
The explain after removing the defects and polishing to a high gloss it's time to seal the paint. Compounds and polishes are mostly water soluble at least on the Pro side of this industry and even if the paint looks like it's been waxed after polishing you still need to apply a protection product, wax, paint sealant or coating.
3-Categories: Waxes, Paint Sealants and Coatings
Then wrap it up... if you can, fit in spray detailers and spray waxes as a quick and easy way to maintain a show car finish in-between normal washing and waxing.
If you get into water spots be sure to let them know there's different types. In my life I find most people not into detailing don't understand the idea of a topical mineral deposit versus an etching "in" the paint and of course the ramifications of what it takes to remove the Type II etching type spots. Also, it won't do any good to remove water spot etchings if the root cause of the problem isn't addressed, for example parking next to a sprinkler that runs at 4:00am every morning.
3 - Types of Water Spots - Type I, Type II and Type III
Demo after the meeting is over
If possible, arrange to have do a demo on a mundane daily driver that's medium in color with a hood you can look down on after the entire meeting is over. Bring a few extension cords.
That's a lot of information, so just use what you feel comfortable with and be yourself and have fun.
Also, have someone take some pictures of you making your presentation, both from the audience point of view and if possible from behind you so you have a shot of your audience in front of you, you never know, pics like these might come in handy.
:xyxthumbs:
icture:. 
