Rasky's Auto Detailing: Black CTS-V paint correction (Lots of pics)

RaskyR1

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2005 Cadillac CTS-V, exterior correction only.


The owner recently purchased this car used and wanted to give her a new lease on life. He had contacted me via email about my services and mentioned he was getting the hood painted under warranty, and that he would then bring the car over for me to inspect. Upon inspection the car really didn’t look too bad; especially considering it was black and 4 years old. We had decided that a 2-step correction was they way to go for this daily driver, and I was confident it would remove 90-95% of the defects…. HOWEVER, the body shop somehow happened to get overspray all over the ENTIRE car when they painted the hood!!! The owner brought the car back to the dealership/body shop to have them remove the overspray via clay bar prior having me do the work. I had also done a test spot with some OTC Meguiars clay, and the overspray came off with very little effort…


The car was dropped off late on Friday night in the rain so I really had no idea what I was in for until after I washed the car and pulled out the Brinkmann…

Before pics

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P21S Gel dwelling
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After an ONR bath the damage was sadly revealed with the Brinkmann and Halogens lamps. You can clearly see the deep marring and RIDS inflicted by the body shop, who apparently was using a very aggressive and dirty clay bar….so much for the 2-step process.
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Very deep scratch in the newly painted hood…apparently done during the claying at the dealer/body shop. This was definitely not coming out but I did try to make it less noticeable.
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The car also had those ugly door edge moldings that not only take away from the look of the car, but they also make buffing a PITA. I asked the owner what he though of them and he agreed that they should be removed if possible.
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Some glue left behind…
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3M adhesive remove to the rescue
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It was late Friday night after washing the car and I wanted to have my process dialed in for Saturday morning. My original plan of attack was M105 on the rotary with Solo wool pad, followed by M105 on the PCXP with an orange LC pad, finishing off with M205 on a black LC pad. It may be hard to see in the 50/50 shots but M205 left some very faint micro marring. Because of this I decided to finish with Menzerna 106ff instead as it finished down perfectly.


50/50 test spot (Note that these were taken after finishing with M205, not 106ff)
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The next morning I first wanted to address the scratch on the hood and the headlights which were in pretty bad shape.


Light sanding of the scratch….the body shop did a good job with the initial sanding and even though I got paint readings in the 170 micron range, I had no real idea of how much clear was left. The rest of the car had very healthy readings in the 130-140 micron range.
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It appeared that the UV coating on the tops of the lamps had deteriorated and they had a very weird texture to them. I normally would not sand them this aggressively as it will surely remove the UV coating, but at this point we had nothing to loose.
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The top portion of the lamps received 800, 1500, 3000 grit sanding, and the face of the lamps got 2000, 3000 as they were not that bad.
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Headlamps after polishing with M105/M205
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Rear lamps only had light marring.
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After M105/M205
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I also happened to notice some yellow road paint behind the left rear tire which I wanted to address.
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Removed with lacquer thinner
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I pulled the car out Sunday morning and got some sun shots after the final buffing step and an IPA wipe down. No LSP here yet. This time of the year it’s hard to get good sun shots by my shop as the sun is low in the sky and it gets blocked by the trees and my house. There was also very light overcast too, but you can still see how nice the finish came out.
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After shots! LSP was Blackfire Wet-Diamond
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Corsa exhaust sounds good. Tips cleaned with ZAIO.
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Sun was just about to go down behind the house when I pulled the car out.
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The money shot!
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About 17 hours were invested in this job.



Thanks for looking, :cheers:
Rasky
 
Gorgeous. Thank you for your posts - they are inspiring. :D

DLB
 
Super job Rasky. As I was reading your post and you said that you did a test spot with the overspray, I was wondering why you didn't do the job instead of the dealer since it came out easily. I guess the owner felt that it was the dealer's responsibility. Anyway, nice recovery.
 
Gorgeous. Thank you for your posts - they are inspiring. :D

DLB


Thanks Dalton!

Super job Rasky. As I was reading your post and you said that you did a test spot with the overspray, I was wondering why you didn't do the job instead of the dealer since it came out easily. I guess the owner felt that it was the dealer's responsibility. Anyway, nice recovery.

Thanks Surfer!

I actually offered to remove the overspray for $100 additional, but he wanted to see what the dealer said first...guess he just chose to have them do it for free.


VERY nice job that is a beautiful car

Thank you! :)
 
WOW. now thats how all V's should look!!! bad azz!!!
 
I didn't say it in my first post - but also thank you for taking the time to post this with all the notes. I know it takes a while to do - especially after editing pics, typing, formatting, etc.

So thanks for the awesome post.

DLB
 
It looks great! I hope when I do the paint correction on my V this winter, it slightly resembles your results....

Those headlights looked nasty, but its a common problem on the CTS headlights. I had the tops of my headlights painted black when they where tinted.

You should have done that guy a favor, and removed that trailer hitch for him....
 
Great job Rasky:xyxthumbs:
Thanks for the before and after photos.
 
Rasky, you keep posting about Wet Diamond as your LSP. Autogeek is going to shoot you.

Really fantastic turn-around as always. Looks like the body shop was under-paid to do the re-paint so they gave the poor owner's car a really bad respray job.


Rasky, I noticed the CTS-V was just chilling in your garage with the P21S Gel dwelling on the wheels. How did you remove the Gel Wheel Cleaner once the wheels were cleaned? Did you pull out and rinse, or did you just rinse it off in your garage?

Thanks,
Emile
 
ICEMAN said:
WOW. now thats how all V's should look!!! bad azz!!!

Thanks ICE!

sullysdetailing said:
Very nice job

Thanks Sully!

Dalton Blevins said:
I didn't say it in my first post - but also thank you for taking the time to post this with all the notes. I know it takes a while to do - especially after editing pics, typing, formatting, etc.

So thanks for the awesome post.

DLB

No problem man....hopefully it will help others out. :props:


CTS-Veo said:
It looks great! I hope when I do the paint correction on my V this winter, it slightly resembles your results....

Those headlights looked nasty, but its a common problem on the CTS headlights. I had the tops of my headlights painted black when they where tinted.

You should have done that guy a favor, and removed that trailer hitch for him....

LOL, I meant to ask him about that! I'm sure it was from the previou owner. :D

Thanks!

FASTFRED said:
Great job Rasky:xyxthumbs:
Thanks for the before and after photos.

Thank you Fred! ;)

Emile said:
Rasky, you keep posting about Wet Diamond as your LSP. Autogeek is going to shoot you.

Really fantastic turn-around as always. Looks like the body shop was under-paid to do the re-paint so they gave the poor owner's car a really bad respray job.


Rasky, I noticed the CTS-V was just chilling in your garage with the P21S Gel dwelling on the wheels. How did you remove the Gel Wheel Cleaner once the wheels were cleaned? Did you pull out and rinse, or did you just rinse it off in your garage?

Thanks,
Emile

LOL, thanks! I just like how easy it is too use and the slick feel it leaves....DGPS is very similar though and would recommend it as well. :props:

I have a 2 gal pump sprayer that I used to rinse them off. ;) (Really wish I had running water and a drain in my shop :( )

BILLY_BLING said:
looks great what did you charge to do this???

Thanks Billy!

Impressions said:
awesome job!

Thank you!
 
I have a 2 gal pump sprayer that I used to rinse them off. ;) (Really wish I had running water and a drain in my shop :( )
Thank you!

I know this isn't a life-saver but perhaps a Nomad H2O To Go is what you need. 75psi pressure, 2 gallon water tank, all you need is a converter so you can plug it into the wall (instead of plugging a vehicle outlet).

I believe a lot of people on autopia have been going crazy over this unit.
 
Awesome job, Rasky!!! Car looks sweet now! Great job!

Thanks John!

Emile said:
I know this isn't a life-saver but perhaps a Nomad H2O To Go is what you need. 75psi pressure, 2 gallon water tank, all you need is a converter so you can plug it into the wall (instead of plugging a vehicle outlet).

I believe a lot of people on autopia have been going crazy over this unit.

Wow! Thanks Emile! I may have to check that out! I like the 18v cordless one with 3.5gal tank. :props:

Would love to try one out before buying though. Would be great for the wheels and wheel well durring the winter!

I think I know what to ask the g/f for x-mas now! :D
 
Hey Chad another awesome turn around.Take a look at the the 3m double sided wool.Not sure if you ever used them they work alot better IMO the the Solo i've also heard that the solo's tend to fall apart faster.My solo hasn't but then again i don't do that much heavy wool work.
 
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