Time taken to polish a vehicle

[RalfJ]

Greetings,

I'm more of a weekend warrior as per detailing terms here, our company imports vehicles and they often need to be thorougly washed and detailed. Most of them are Mercedes Benz models with black paint, usually Obsidian Black 197U. I'll briefly describe my method and equipment below.

Firstly the wheels are decontaminated and thorougly washed with conjuction to wheel arches, after that the engine bay is degreased and dressed with Meguiar's Hyper Dressing, boot crevices and all panel gaps are cleaned. After that the car is rinsed, decontaminated and hand washed with microfiber mitt and two-bucket method. The vehicle is then driven into garage and dried with compressed air for the gaps and towels for all the other areas. Then commences the claying process after which I usually IPA wipe the whole vehicle, tape it and then starts the most time-consuming process which seems to take too long.

Pads and polishes used:
Compounding pads: Meguiar's microfiber pads and kamikaze wool pad
Compounds: Kamikaze cutting compound, Meguiars compound, Menzerna 400.

Polishing/finishing pads: Rupes yellow pad and Kamikaze polishing and finishing pads.
Polishing/finishing liquids: Sonax perfect finish and Kamikaze products.

At start of the polishing process I check the whole car with a paint depth gauge and have a look-over with Scangrip hand held light to see if there are any problematic spots or previously painted panels.

Polishers: Rupes iBrid nano for all edges and smaller areas, Rupes 75E for mid-sized sections and spots which need precision, LHR15 for bigger areas.

Usually when polishing I've done 2-3 both horizontally and vertically so in total 4-6 passes. The microfiber pads have to be blown clean after each time I stop the polisher after one section, they get clogged up especially on the iBrid. Speed used mostly is 4-5 for compounding and 3,5-4 for finishing.

Most often I've tried to get all the scratches out and strived for perfection but it seems to take 3-5 tries with compound. Last car I did was a Mercedes Benz CL coupe from early 2000's, it took me in total about 50-70 hours to both compound and finish which seems to be quite a lot after reading that people here can get their car polished in 3-5 hours - am I doing something wrong or should I invest in more pads/compounds for different paint types? Which ones would be suggested for black Mercedes paint since that's the usual culprit for me?

The results I'm happy with, after coating the vehicle with Miyabi and ISM it looked fantastic but most cars take me 30-80 hours to polish to perfection and it seems like it shouldn't take that long and there may be a flaw in my equipment or technique. Washing, claying, interior etc in total usually takes me 10 hours including leather care/coating and so on but compounding/finishing as close to perfection as my limited skillset can provide seems to be taking ages.

I will include a few pictures of the previous state and results below so the paint state that I'm usually working with should be clear.

I'm very happy with the finished results and love looking at the car but should a polishing process take that long when the vehicle is in such condition as stated above? It seems like a "no" answer I predict and I'd very happily accept suggestions.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Bruno Soares]

If you don’t do it all the time it’s normal for it to take a while, especially if you have hard paint which Mercedes is known for.

Last time I did my car (exterior only) took me 40 hours spread over 5 days. I wasn’t rushing. That included polishing the paint, glass, wheel faces, and coating everything with 3 layers. It was easy to do without rushing as Covid kept me home anyways.

 

[TMQ]

Humm....

You have a lot written down and it's gonna take time to break things down.

First of all--you are doing the whole nine yards. Exterior, Interior and engine bay. That takes a ton of time to do.
It take about 45 minutes just to do wheels and tires.

Prolly 45 min to wash/prep car. Here you can cut time off from your usual wash.

1. Skip the 2 bucket method---you're gonna cut the paint anyway. One for wheels, another for wash and third for clay towel.
2. Chem decontaminate on dirty car.
3. Wash dirt and chem decontaminates off.
4. While still wet---get fresh soapy water and use clay towel to clay. Takes bout 20 if hustle a bit.
5. Dry and get to cutting. I almost never bother with taping---Buzz over painted trim any ways. Learn to make your polisher dance!
6. Rupes has complete system. Use those. They are designed to do everything needed to get the job done. Master those before playing with other stuff. I have microfiber
pads and I rather use foam pads. Rupes has cutting foam pads and they work well. If need to be more aggressive, Invest in Rupes UHS polish and gray pads. They
always got me out of trouble!

I just completed a Honda accord detail last Thursday. It took me 6 hours to perform the full Monty. Engine, interior and 2 step exterior correction and seal.
When I first started out---To do the same thing as above, took me around 15 - 17 hours!

The more time behind the buffer, the faster you will be and also begin to see how you can streamline things as time goes on.

Longest time ever---18 hours just on exterior alone. Now it's around 6 to 10 hours and decreasing with experience.

Hope this helps some. I'm sure others will chime in on other thoughts.

Tom

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

I've taken the liberty to quote you but then use only select portoins of your information to make it easier for me to answer you.

Polishers:

Rupes iBrid nano for all edges and smaller areas
Rupes 75E for mid-sized sections and spots which need precision
LHR15 for bigger areas.

Text book example of what RUPES intended. I would say most people don't understand the RUPES marketing "idea" and business model and that's because most people just want to purchase ONE TOOL. That's NOT the RUPES way. The RUPES way is you buy all their tools and pads and THEN you can use the tool that uses a PAD SIZE that fits the panel you're buffing. You don't buy just one tool and then try to buff every panel size and shape with one tool or more specifically - you don't try to buff every panel size and shape with ONE PAD SIZE.

So you did it right as far as using multiple tools to buff out the entire car. :cheers:

but most cars take me 30-80 hours to polish to perfection and it seems like it shouldn't take that long and there may be a flaw in my equipment or technique.

Washing, claying, interior etc in total usually takes me 10 hours including leather care/coating and so on but compounding/finishing as close to perfection as my limited skill set can provide seems to be taking ages.

30 to 80 hours is a tick on the tool long end of the spectrum to me.

Question

but should a polishing process take that long when the vehicle is in such condition as stated above?

It seems like a "no" answer

I predict and I'd very happily accept suggestions.

I'll give you my norms.

Washing

2 hours to wash a neglected car that includes,

1 hour to do all 4 wheels and tires assuming they are not to neglected.
1 hour to wash the outside of the car top to bottom after wheels and tires


Paint correction and coating

Compounding
Polishing
Chemically stripping
Installing ONE application of any brand of ceramic coating

10 to 12 hours - but I would have used a gear-drive orbital and plowed through the compounding and polishing step.


Interior

3 hours


Total time

So a total of 17 hours for inside and outside and I would have broken this up into 2 days.

A far cry from 30 to 80 hours.


Recommendation

If you ever have a chance to take any of my car detailing classes, be it a class here in Stuart, Florida or a roadshow class - take it.

50% of the people that take my boat and car detailing classes are NOT professionals doing this for money - they are car owners that simply love to do the work themselves.


Yep - at least half the people that take my classes spend the money and learn a TON.

 

[Larry A]

When I detailed cars for a car dealer in 1964-1965 they expected a car to done in 4 hrs average and that included inside outside and interior.

 

[WillSports3]

Pads and polishes used:
Compounding pads: Meguiar's microfiber pads and kamikaze wool pad
Compounds: Kamikaze cutting compound, Meguiars compound, Menzerna 400.

Both are good pads that you have. Have a lot of those pads, they can both get loaded down quick. I like Menzerna, but I like Sonax CutMax even more. Easier to clean off, and cuts great. After you think it's done if you need to work it more, you can spray the panel down with some distilled water and go back to it. It can give you a more aggressive cut.

Polishing/finishing pads: Rupes yellow pad and Kamikaze polishing and finishing pads.
Polishing/finishing liquids: Sonax perfect finish and Kamikaze products.

Kamikaze polishes are not gonna do much to some of the older harder mercedes paints. Perfect Finish, or even cut & finish are good choices.

At start of the polishing process I check the whole car with a paint depth gauge and have a look-over with Scangrip hand held light to see if there are any problematic spots or previously painted panels.

Polishers: Rupes iBrid nano for all edges and smaller areas, Rupes 75E for mid-sized sections and spots which need precision, LHR15 for bigger areas.

Usually when polishing I've done 2-3 both horizontally and vertically so in total 4-6 passes. The microfiber pads have to be blown clean after each time I stop the polisher after one section, they get clogged up especially on the iBrid. Speed used mostly is 4-5 for compounding and 3,5-4 for finishing. <--- Way too much liquid here.

Have you considered one-stepping the cars instead of compounding and polishing? For example, the yellow Rupes pad and Cut & Finish combo on a Rupes polisher is an excellent one step. Work it in to 5 or 6 sectional passes per section you're buffing, might save alot of time that way. Also, how is your arm speed? I find that with a Rupes, no pressure at all but the weight of the machine will do the job. One of the biggest things is also how you do it. For example, use the iBrid and the 3 inch to polish out all the smaller spots first, then go nuts with the 15mm. In terms of polisher speed, 4 or 4.5 is more than enough. You don't want to get the panels too hot, that will reduce your cut. If you want to keep using 5, then spray the panel down with water before you polish, more liquid and will keep the panels cooler.

Does your job require you to chase perfection? Because a show car level detail on each one might be the issue here. The coating process for Kamikaze is also what will eat up more of your time. Are you being paid around the 1500 dollar mark per car? Because that's usually the pricing for what you're doing. Is a two step compound and polish and coating really what your boss is looking for?