Mercedes S320...HORRIBLE light interior..pics

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So i was 1/2 way through typing this write up andddd my internet browser shut down:bash:...and guess what...i had a virus! So 2 days later all is back to 'normal'...so i can try to do this again

So this was a detail we did a couple weeks back. Was just a simple wash/clay/wax on the outside...but the inside was all out...and man did it need it! The car was a 98'...and they told us they hadn't had it waxed since they bought it...:nomore:...so Mercedes gets props from me just because I was impressed that the paint wasn't falling off the car by now. I live in Az and the sun pounds the hell out of everything!

The interior was just bad...no other way to explain it. It was ALLEGEDLY light interior (after you see the pictures you will see why i say allegedly!), carpets and seats were in horrible shape. Nice soda and ground in dirt stains on the carpets...lovely stuff.

I'll start with a quick run down on what we used:

Exterior:

Washed with dawn soap (we were waxing after so it was all good)

Megs APC used on tired and bugs on front

Megs Mild Clay

Megs Gold Class paste wax (wanted to give it a shot, turned out nice :) )

Megs (are you noticing a trend here?) Hyperdressing 1:1 used on tires


INTERIOR:

Megs AGAIN #39 & #40 for vinyl and rubber interior

Megs APC used on bad spots on seats (aka the WHOLE SEAT!)

Pinnacle Leather Conditioner

Megs APC+,Folex, and Oxyclean used on carpets/mats.

Brissell's Little Green extractor

Annnnnd the MVP award for the interior once again goes tooooo...the PC with brush attachment. I cant stress enough how much time and effort this thing saves us. Not to mention it just outright does a better job than by hand.


So lets start out with the exterior shall we? It was simplest part...but surely needed to be done. Here is a quick picture of the exterior before we started:

Driver_Angle_Before2.JPG


Yeah, it was uhm...'dry' to say the least...heres a close up of the front

Hood_Before5.JPG




Now, id like to take a second to note that this car is actually more on the GOLD side..its just that it is so dirty that it LOOKS more like dulled silver. Scary right? Well here she is when we were finished..all tucked in the garage.

Hood_Finished.JPG


See...i told you GOLD! I don't know if anyone still watches, or has ever watched the Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer Christmas cartoon special...but if you have...then you'll know about the part where the snowman starts singing the Silver and Gold song..."Silver and Gold...Silver and Gold".....well me being the nut I am...was singing this song on and off throughout the detail....nearly pushing my sis to commit capital murder :)...so glad my sis loves me...

ANYWAY...lets get back to the photos....the silver and gold photos...Im the MAN

Ok...quick tire picture!

Driver_Tire_Before.JPG


Rather dryyyy...but turned out nice:

Driver_Tire_Finished.JPG



Now since it was a simple exterior...i wont waste too much more time on it...and i'll get to the good stuff...the interior..but here are a few after shots of the exterior:

Hood_Finished_2_.JPG


Driver_Angle_Finished.JPG



Ok...now for what you've all been waiting for...the interior. I'll just get right into it with a before picture of the steering wheel..its not like THAT gets touched a lot or anything...no no not at all :-\

Steering_Wheel_Before1.JPG


Now i know what you're thinking...'thats not so bad for a gray steering wheel..just a little dirty'...and you'd be right...if it was a gray steering wheel...it was SUPPOSE to be beige!
I was over doing the floor mats..and all of the sudden i hear my sis say 'oh my God'...i asked her what was wrong...so she called me over to see the steering wheel...it was literally running off black just from her spraying #39 on it. You can imagine what came off when she started scrubbing it. It was rather scary..just a little bit..but here is how it looked when she was done :) :

Steering_Wheel_Finished.JPG



The drivers side floor was no picnic either...the floor mats did a good job of covering the center...but unfortunately there was some spaces that it just couldnt keep clean...like the carpet on the side of the center console...you know..the part right below the CUP HOLDERS...which apparently didn't HOLD onto their soda too well, bottom of the seat was bad too:
Driver_Seat_Bottom_Before.JPG


Driver_Floor_Before1.JPG


Yup yup...coca cola was on the job with us that day. But hey we dont let little things like seriously ground in dirt...or a 2 liter of soda...or what looks like a BP oil spill in the car stop us! We hit it heavy with the APC+ and Folex (my lovely combo i came up with!) and then wet the carpet with hot water with Oxyclean in it...and then broke out the MVP PC! Here's how it turned out:

Driver_Seat_Bottom_Finished.JPG


Isn't it beautiful. Like a new car...here is another picture of it...I dont want you to think we used the steering wheel in that picture to block off the oil spill that was there:

Driver_Dash_Finished2.JPG




Magnifico!


The drivers seat....*takes deep breath*...the drivers seat was...special. I don't know HOW they managed to get the entire Az desert all onto that one little seat...but they did it..yes they did.

Driver_Seat_Back_Before.JPG


Now...is the word ALLEGED popping back in your head from earlier? I'm sure you understand now :). I think it turned out ok..you know...nothin special..just ok

Driver_Seat_Back_Finished.JPG


Hah, kidding...we kicked ass! Now i mentioned earlier the floor mats did a good job of shielding the poor carpet...but they took a good beating themselves. I'll tell you something though, these were good mats...super thick..thicker than whats in most peoples houses! Heres what we were dealing with:

Floor_Mats_Before.JPG


I dont know how the soda spill actually transferred to the back mats, but it did lol. You can see the drops all over them (the bottom 2 mats)...crazy stuff. Here is the after:

Floor_Mats_Finished.JPG


Now lets take a glance over at the passenger side. It was noooooo better...not by a long shot.


As usual i've reached my picture limit for this post...soooo i'll continue below
 
Passenger_Seat_Bottom_Before.JPG


Isnt that nice of the shadows...they're trying to block all the nastiness thats on the seat lol. Just to show how bad it was, i've got a 50-50 for ya

Passenger_Seat_50-50_1_.JPG


I wont insult your intelligence by saying which side is done :)..i will say that picture was only after the cleaning...it hadn't been treated yet.

This is how it looked when it was ALL cleaned and treated:

Passenger_Seat_Bottom_Finished.JPG


Clean enough to eat off of wouldnt you say?

The back seat wasn't as bad..thank goodness..but it surely was dirty. Take a look

Passenger_Back_Seat_Before1.JPG


It still had a dramatic turn around too...here is the after

Passenger_Back_Seat_Finished.JPG


And of course another huge wear area on any car is the drivers door...

Driver_Door_Before2.JPG


Even the carpet on the DOOR was dirty! We shampoo that too though so no worries :)

Driver_Door_Finished.JPG



Well thats about it folks. Some of the craziest looking seats we had come across (other than our famous Dodge Durango turn around)...but that was dark interior...and as anyone who has detailed a few cars knows...light interior is the equivalent to black exterior...it will tell on you if you don't do a good job:). Here is one last 'finished product' picture.

Passsenger_Dash_Finished.JPG


I'd say this turned out pretty nice wouldn't you? As always I hope you guys enjoyed the write up and the pictures :). I'll have a few more up pretty soon...a couple single pass jobs on a pearl Accura TL and a metallic blue RAV4..both turned out quite nice...and also a couple more interiors that made for some very nice before/after photos :). I'll get em up as soon as i can.

In the mean time i leave you with this: [video=youtube_share;oMlqn_Hjyi8] - Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer "Silver and Gold"[/video] ....SILVER N GOLD video!

take care guys
 
Thanks guys...appreciate the kind words as always. Just sucks i had to do the write up twice because the computer crashed
 
Mmmmm! A job you did awesome, yes indeed! To the Dark Side you did not succumb - a fine Jedi you will make!


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Amazing job my friend! I have a Bissell Little Green that I just got. What's your method for doing the carpet striping with it?
 
Mmmmm! A job you did awesome, yes indeed! To the Dark Side you did not succumb - a fine Jedi you will make!


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haha, cute. the force didn't help me any with this one but i did kind of have the same expression on my face as yoda does in that picture when i first saw the inside :)

i really enjoy your posts

glad you do john...i try to make them some what entertaining ...maybe ill get a sponsor one day :-P

Amazing job my friend! I have a Bissell Little Green that I just got. What's your method for doing the carpet striping with it?


Thank you...you'll like the little green monster. Which carpet stripping are you referring to...the one on the door or the part sort of in the 'middle'...light below the console or what?
 
The stripes in the carpet of the floor. I guess the concourse stripes?


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Fun and informative write-up. Nice turn around. The Silver-Gold transformation was amazing.
 
Beautiful Benz it turned out to be but honestly I got scare I stop breathing for 3 seconds lol of the steering wheel transformation.:)

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The stripes in the carpet of the floor. I guess the concourse stripes?


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Oh those stripes...you do that by going in opposite directions...so say i go UP with one row...the next row i'll go DOWN...it gives it the striped look because one row will have the nap facing up and the other row will have the nap facing down...so one looks darker than the other. That is what you were asking about right?

Nice job..Looks super clean. Interior looks new again.

Thank you :dblthumb2:

Entertaining write up. Helluva turnaround on a disgusting interior.

Glad you liked the write up and the pictures...it was pretty bad but we fix it up:)

Fun and informative write-up. Nice turn around. The Silver-Gold transformation was amazing.

haha yeah the silver and gold was pretty nice...was just a matter of REALLY cleaning it...it was just pure dirt...and then claying the hell out of it...the wax was just a nice finishing touch to make it 'pop' a little bit more

Beautiful Benz it turned out to be but honestly I got scare I stop breathing for 3 seconds lol of the steering wheel transformation.:)

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Man that steering wheel was crazy. For a second my sis thought she was scrubbing part of the vinyl off but it was just actually REALLY thick dirt/grim and who know what else
 
Oh those stripes...you do that by going in opposite directions...so say i go UP with one row...the next row i'll go DOWN...it gives it the striped look because one row will have the nap facing up and the other row will have the nap facing down...so one looks darker than the other. That is what you were asking about right?

Yep! Thanks, I thought that's what you did!
 
Yep! Thanks, I thought that's what you did!

Ok good :). It can be kind tough to do it in tight spaces...usually what i do is when im actually extracting...ill go in ALL direction to make sure i suck up as much dirt as possible...ill usually go in a cross pattern...up/down then left/right...then if there is any water left ill go in a diagonal all over...and then the stripes or 'rows' are just to make it look really nice...so on some parts of it...to get the rows nice and straight in the tight areas you might have to even use your finger to sort of brush the nap of the carpet either up or down depending on which way you want it...just a little tip is all..that way you arnt trying to break your arm using the head of the extractor to get into small areas lol
 
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