Hi I am new to detailing and have just bought a rotary to have a go at my car.
I've watched enough to know polishing edges is bad practice but how do you get around it when you polish the top corners of your bonnet/hood?
Feel free to add any extra advice you may have to a beginner armed with a rotary. Thanks
Like mentioned, tape these areas off with some protective tape.
How to tape-off a car before machine polishing
Inspect the paint first
Before buffing out a car first inspect the paint for issues that are already present. Things like burn-through on edges and corners. This is especially important on muscle cars, streetrods and classics and basically anything built before the mid-1970's. The reason why is because cars built back then don't have the luxury of being designed and assembled like modern cars and where body panels come together they won't be perfectly aligned. This means the edge of the hood may sit higher than the edge of the fender and it's this high side you want to inspect to see if anyone that has buffed the car out BEFORE you wasn't careful and burned through the paint on the sharp edges.
Take note of pre-existing damage
If you find any places where the paint has pre-existing damage, be sure to point it out to the owner of the car and if you're using an inspection form like my VIF then mark it down on the form.
Tape-off after performing the normal 7 steps
After you do the 7 normal steps before buffing out a car, nows the time to tape off any raised body lines, edges, trim, emblems and especially and plastic surfaces that could be stained by compound or polish. It's also a good idea to tape-off and cover any fresh air intakes in front of the windshield as well as wiper arms to avoid spatter dots while machine buffing.
This Nova has single stage urethane paint which will tend to be softer than a urethane clearcoat. This Nova also has a LOT of raised body lines creating the design of the body panels hard edges forming the shape of the body panels.
Soft paint and raised body lines mean we have to be carefully when machine compounding or we could burn through. To avoid any mistakes, we taped-off all the raised body lines and edges of body panels using 3M Blue Vinyle Tape.
Technique Tip
When taping off a car,
start by anchoring the end of the tape to the area you want to protect and then pull out 2-3 feet of tape in your other hand.
Use the hand that's holding the roll of tape to steer the tape as you use your other hand to press the tape firmly against the paint. This is how
steer tape follow curves and also straight areas.
Classic cars like this 1966 Nova have what are called fresh air grills right in front of the windshield. You CANNOT get into these to remove splatter from compound or polish so carefully tape these ares off before buffing. It's also a good idea to cover up wiper-arms so you don't have to come back and use a toothbrush to remove splatter dots of these components.
Here' you an see the edges of the body and the trunk lid are all protected using 1/4" 3M Blue Vinyl Tape.
De-Taping
After compounding we de-taped the car. Here's why....
1. Machine polishing is less aggressive than compounding so there's less risk of burning through the paint.
2. By removing the tape and then polishing we will remove the tape-line plus polish the paint under the tape to even out the gloss and clarity of the paint that was not compounded.
De-taping the Nova...
Mark, (from Canada) and Frank carefully removing 3M Blue Vinyl Tape....
Sherman removing tape...
Craig removing tape off the hood....
