Pictures from June 26th Open Garage at Autogeek's Show Car Garage!

[Mike Phillips]

Pictures from June 26th Open Garage at Autogeek's Show Car Garage!

Had a lot of fun here at Autogeek's casual "Open Garage" class today, everyone had a chance to work on their own car to remove swirls, scratches and water spots as well as a chance to test out all the different tools and a host of different pads and products...

Thank you to everyone who attended today!

Everyone had a chance to test out the Flex 3401

Everyone had a chance to test out the Cyclo Polisher...

Next up was the Griot's Garage 3" Mini Polisher...

After that the Meguiar's G110v2

After that the Griot's Garage 6" Random Orbital Polisher...

 

[Mike Phillips]

After that everyone had a chicane to try out Dampsanding and then removing sanding marks with different tools...

First we moved out the personal cars...

Then we pulled in our victim, err... I mean the rental car...

The finish on the rental car was completely filled with car wash scratches so the most we could do was make it look better...

A couple lessons on technique...

And then everyone had a chance to try out dampsanding...

After sanding down the hood we then buffed out the sanding marks to restore a high gloss shine...

 

[Mike Phillips]

After sanding, we used Pinnacle Advanced Swirl Remover to remove the sanding marks and then followed this with Advanced Finishing Polish to polish the paint to a high gloss. After that we sealed the paint using DP Poli-Coat.

 

[MaillotJaune]

I can't wait to get home and try out what I learned today. Using aggressive polishes or a rotary has always intimidated me. I’m ready to get home and come up with a plan to take remove the light scratches and water spot damage on my personal cars. I’ll make sure I post some pictures so you can see the results of your expert advice.

Thanks to Mike and all the staff at Autogeek for putting on a great event!

 

[Mike Phillips]

Everyone had a chance to work on their own car and learn anything specific as it related to the defects they were trying to remove...


Elvis uses the "Baggie Test" to check for above surface bonded contaminants on John's Honda Pilot.

John and Elvis remove scuffs and scratches using a 4" Spot Repair Pad and some Wolfgang Total Swirl Remover with the PC 7424XP

Plenty of room to pull 3 full size cars into the Show Car Garage Studio!

Rob goes after swirls and scratches using a Griot's Garage 6" ROB with some Wolfgang Total Swirl Remover.

Russ had some very deep etching spots that looked like some kind of industrial fallout... Russ wanted to learn how to use the rotary buffer so he tested out the Flex 3403 and the Makita 9227C

Russ let Dirk test out the Makita on his car also...

After we removed all the swirls, scratches and etchings out of the hood yours truly applied Pinnacle Souveran Paste Wax using a PC 7424XP to show how to apply a paste by machine.

Kind of hard to see but that's a Microfiber Glove on my left hand and I'm holding the Pinnacle Souveran Paste Wax in the glove...

Swirl free show car finish...

Thanks for letting us work on your car Russ!

Having fun at Autogeek's Show Car Garage!

:xyxthumbs:

 

[miamijd7]

WOW, what a great time today! Thanks Mike and Staff for the fun filled day. I probably bombarded Mike with a Zillion questions and as the professional that he is, everyone of them was answered without hesitation.
Many of the products were applied on different cars and all of the rotary/DA's with different pad combo's were used. It was a great experience to try each one and determine which is best fit for YOU. The day flew by quickly and the Garage is top notch!
I would recommend anyone interested in learning and gaining some experience to take advantage of these classes because I know I feel a lot more comfortable applying and using the tools/products that I own. Looking forward to the next class Mike ! :xyxthumbs:

 

[rdeluca]

Mike the class was great. It is very daunting to work on the paint of a car you treasure, however the knowledge you passed along to us left me with the confidence to continue on my own without so much fear. It was also refreshing to meet some other "geeks". My neighbors are always kidding me about how much work I put in on my cars, so the company was welcome. Thanks to the Autogeek staff for helping as well.

 

[Ohio Detailing]

Seems like it was a great and fun event! I can't believe someone would entrust the surface of their $50k+ Cobra to others just learning the ropes - especially black! That just goes to show how generous and cool the members at AGO are. I would love to learn these techniques hands on as well, especially from someone like Mike who I believe is simply tops in the entire industry

 

[miamijd7]

As being a newbie to all of this, I wanted to stress the importance of proper technique as Mike repeatedly reminded me of. Always put the power cord over your shoulder and do not let it drag or as you can see in the photo, the cord rubs against the car. After a couple of tries I think I finally got the hang of it. As you can see from my smile, I had a great time at AG !

 

[chost10]

Nice work guys:dblthumb2:

 

[DonMTV]

That black GT500 looks fantastic. Did you guys finish the entire car with getting rid of swirls, or just the hood? In the long photos it looks like the car was totally detailed...or does Russ have a lot more work to do?

 

[Meghan]

Glad to see everyone had a fun time in the Show Car Garage, that is a great place to spend a Saturday!

 

[Mike Phillips]

That black GT500 looks fantastic. Did you guys finish the entire car with getting rid of swirls, or just the hood? In the long photos it looks like the car was totally detailed...or does Russ have a lot more work to do?

We just did the hood.

"Open Garage" classes, at least the way I've always set them up historically, are about learning how to work on your car, not detailing the entire car. It's the old idea of,

"Feed a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime"



And just to note, the sign-up thread for all "Open Garage" classes states this idea...


Saturday "Open Garage" - June 26th

The goal of our "Open Garage" is to give people a chance to,

• Try out products they may have never used or even known about.
• Learn the correct technique for applying and removing specific products or using different tools.

These classes are not for bringing your car down to do a complete detail as in machine polishing and waxing the entire car. We will show you the products and techniques using a fender or the hood and letting you learn and practice on this one panel but after that you will need to finish the rest of the car at your garage. By doing this more people can get their car into the garage and learn in the limited amount of time that we have and that's what these events are about, people learning how to detail their car, not one or two people using the garage from 9:00am to 3:00pm to detail their entire car.

It's a good model that has proven itself to work well in my experience over the years.

 

[jayhkr]

Good job guys! Totally envious of you all being able to go down there, I just wish we could get something like that here in the midwest. Next year I'll plan my vacation in Florida and make it "just so happen" to fall on the weekend of one of these! My wife will love it!

 

[CEE DOG]

Looks like you guys had a great time! Thanks for sharing

 

[john F]

Hey, let's not forget who provided you guys with nourishment!:hungry: It was a pleasure meeting those of you who came down to get some one-on-one lessons with the man himself!!rops:

 

[Ohio Detailing]

Good job guys! Totally envious of you all being able to go down there, I just wish we could get something like that here in the midwest. Next year I'll plan my vacation in Florida and make it "just so happen" to fall on the weekend of one of these! My wife will love it!

X 1 million! Haha! You read my mind... as crazy as it sounds to seriously plan an entire vacation around this one event, I Emailed a condominium owner yesterday requesting availability

Does anyone know the exact date this will be held in 2011? Thanks a lot!

 

[Mike Phillips]

Hey, let's not forget who provided you guys with nourishment!:hungry:

Thanks for cooking John, meant to get a picture of you working the Barbeque while wearing your Autogeek's Show Car Garage apron but instead was gorging myself with the rest of the guys on your tasty gourmet burgers.

Also, thank you to Max for providing a Barbeque Lunch on Saturday!


:dblthumb2:

 

[rdeluca]

DonMTV--the top surfaces of the Mustang had the chemical residue, not the sides. Mike graciously showed us how to work out the stains on the hood. I have the trunk and spoiler left to do. There were some scratches that came out also. The swirl marks Mike referred to were from the rotary. Thanks for the compliments on the car.

 

[DonMTV]

Russ,
Thanks for the update. The hood looked amazing, and so did everything else so I thought that perhaps you guys kept going. I have a 2003 Mustang Cobra that is Redfire. I haven't been able to detail it after this winter. Regrettably I had to drive it this winter here in MA. It killed me to do that. Looks pretty good though.

The weather up here hasn't been good for me as my days off have been rainy or other things have come up to prevent me from tackling the job. Soon though. I have a new Flex and various goodies to throw at it.

Take care,
Don