My New Project - 2003 PAL Expedition

[scrib13]

My work vehicle is a 2003 ford expidtion. It has been through the county cleaner several times, meaning the inmates take bruches and some sort of soap and wipe them down. That is the extent of the cleaning this vehicle has seen since 2004. It now has 107k and thought since I am in the mode of doing this and have some community service youths that i would take this on.
My take on this, is i will have them wash, clay and then go to the XMT360 and live with that. I do have the vinyl panels at the bottom which are bad and i have no idea of what to do with them. The chrome wheels are pitted and pretty dirty so would use help in that area also. As you can see from the pic, it has a custom paint job and have no idea of the type of clearcoat that was applied after. It is a work vehicle, my daily driver but thought it would be nice to get it to look a little better. What do you think, any suggestions?

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

My work vehicle is a 2003 ford expedition. It has been through the county cleaner several times, meaning the inmates take brushes and some sort of soap and wipe them down. That is the extent of the cleaning this vehicle has seen since 2004. It now has 107k and thought since I am in the mode of doing this and have some community service youths that i would take this on.

Sounds like a worthy goal... teaching youth skills they can use forever is always a worthy goal and rewarding experience...

"Each one teach one"

My take on this, is i will have them wash, clay and then go to the XMT360 and live with that.

That should work great... remember with neglected paint to use your product heavy or wet because you want the wetness, which is in part chemical cleaners, working for you. Buffing with too little amount won't work as well, so just use the product a little wetter than you would normally do when using a one-step on neglected paint.

I do have the vinyl panels at the bottom which are bad and i have no idea of what to do with them.

I'm assuming you mean the gray plastic cladding below the graphics?

Look into either Black Wow or Meguiar's new Trim Protectant, but are supposed to restore faded plastic cladding and be fairly water and soap resistant so they will last longer.

Ugh... the engineers who came up with the idea for plastic cladding should have came up with the products to clean, beautify and protect these surfaces.

The chrome wheels are pitted and pretty dirty so would use help in that area also.

As you can see from the pic, it has a custom paint job and have no idea of the type of clearcoat that was applied after.

Chrome is easy to clean with just about any chrome cleaner and some elbow grease, most paint compounds that "don't" use mechanical abrasives that don't break down are safe also, apply using some terry cloth folded over to make an applicator pad. Meguiar's makes a "dedicated" chrome polish that works really well and there's no ammonia smell.

It is a work vehicle, my daily driver but thought it would be nice to get it to look a little better. What do you think, any suggestions?

Sorry for the late reply... it's sometimes hard to stay 100% caught up with all the other offline projects.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Note...

If the graphics on the side of this Ford Expedition are painted over the clear, (likely), then buffing with any cleaner/wax or abrasive product is going to remove some of the pigmented paint/graphics.

As long as you buff lightly you won't remove that much paint and you'll need to do this no matter what as there's no way to restore a vibrant look to neglected paint without doing "something" to it.

Maybe use a polishing pad with the XMT 360

 

[scrib13]

Mike, thank you so much for the information and thanks for your class, it was great. Will let you know when we get done with this beast and post some pics, thanks again Scott
:dblthumb2:

 

[S2K]

scrib, how do those black panels on the B pillars and at the rear corners look? I have a '98 Expedition (which is just my tow vehicle) and those panels on mine look terrible but I don't know how to clean them, I can't even figure out what they are made of. Let us know how you clean those.