Today I did some detailing...

challengemaster

I'd be of the assumption that you're only as good as the weakest link in the chain. IF 476 is more durable than EGP (actual proof) then I can't see the advantage of using both.

Curran

What is said above is true!!

Some people like the look a wax gives, and the peace of mind knowing that they've also got a good sealant underneath. The Collinite wont last as long as if it were to be used alone.

EGP is very nice on lighter coloured cars, and if used alone, without SRP underneath, its actually very, very durable, once applied in thin layers, with 3 coats!

stimpson

I think I'll go with SRP and Colly so. It will be a bit easier on the arms anyway

Curran

stimpson wrote: »

I think I'll go with SRP and Colly so. It will be a bit easier on the arms anyway

Not exactly sure how that will work out for you....if it were me, Id definitely stick in a coat of EGP, especially if you have it there!!

Alternatively, if you arent too majorly concerned about hiding swirls, and will be satisfied with returning the depth and gloss...then use SRP to give you the shine back, but then wash it out with APC, dry the car and then use Collinite on its own. It will hide a certain amount of swirls anyways. This means your coats of Collinite will be very durable, and should see maybe 4 months!

MetzgerMeister

stimpson wrote: »

I think I'll go with SRP and Colly so. It will be a bit easier on the arms anyway

Pussy!!!!










Just use collinite 845 which is a liquid rather than a paste like 476S...

stimpson

MetzgerMeister wrote: »

Pussy!!!!

Not sure the missus will go for that. I'll just use my arms.

It might be interesting to test it - polish with SRP and do one side in EGP and one side in 476. I might pick up some masking tape and have a go next week.

west cork lad

stimpson wrote: »

Not sure the missus will go for that. I'll just use my arms.


I thought I was in you laugh you lose there for a sec. Especially when I lost and fell off chair.

Folks, I've just gotten one side of my back bumper, and the front nudge bar, on the Rav sprayed (nudge bar was a grey, so i got it done black, and the rear bumper took a small bit of damage when, I'm guessing, someone tried to park too close and clipped it - i wasn't actually present at the time).

So I was wondering, they were sprayed yesterday afternoon - Is there anything, from a detailing standpoint, I should or shouldn't do with them for the moment? I'm thinking a coat or two of wax over them may do no harm to try and protect the fresh paint? But then I'm not sure if interfering with it so soon is asking for trouble?

toastedpickles

Deleted User wrote: »

Folks, I've just gotten one side of my back bumper, and the front nudge bar, on the Rav sprayed (nudge bar was a grey, so i got it done black, and the rear bumper took a small bit of damage when, I'm guessing, someone tried to park too close and clipped it - i wasn't actually present at the time).

So I was wondering, they were sprayed yesterday afternoon - Is there anything, from a detailing standpoint, I should or shouldn't do with them for the moment? I'm thinking a coat or two of wax over them may do no harm to try and protect the fresh paint? But then I'm not sure if interfering with it so soon is asking for trouble?

Back away not today disco layday!

Let it dry for about 2 weeks, it may be dry to the touch but it's not fully set, when i refurbed my front bumper i couldnt wash it for about a month so just be wary about it, it needs to cure and so on, so if i were you id leave it for about 2 weeks, 3 to be safe

Curran

As above, the paint needs to cure. Recommended time is approx 30 days before applying any sort of protection to the painted areas.

Sidewayslarry

Deleted User wrote: »

Folks, I've just gotten one side of my back bumper, and the front nudge bar, on the Rav sprayed (nudge bar was a grey, so i got it done black, and the rear bumper took a small bit of damage when, I'm guessing, someone tried to park too close and clipped it - i wasn't actually present at the time).

So I was wondering, they were sprayed yesterday afternoon - Is there anything, from a detailing standpoint, I should or shouldn't do with them for the moment? I'm thinking a coat or two of wax over them may do no harm to try and protect the fresh paint? But then I'm not sure if interfering with it so soon is asking for trouble?

You will hear all sorts of answers on how long to leave fresh paint before putting some protection over it, and as I write this reply there are already two completely different answers.

The answer here is simple; nobody on this forum can possibly give you a proper answer without knowing the type of paint used (two-pack, water-based, etc) the brand of paint used as different brands are mixed in different ways with different quantities of harnder, and also the length of time the car was in the booth. The only person who can answer this question properly for you is the person who sprayed the car for you.

I would suggest giving him a call and asking his advise on the time needed for the paint to 'Gas Out' , the time needed for the solvents to fully evaporate from the paint.

Well the panel beater himself was saying leave it a couple of days (as in 3-4 days) then a bit of polish wouldn't do any harm (I think he meant wax, though) to add a coat of protection to it.

But that seemed very soon. So I wasn't 100% sure.

I think I'll let it sit for 2 weeks. That way everyone's safe, I suppose. I've no plan to really do anything with it anytime soon anyway, but I just didn't know if it would be at all advantageous to slap a coat of wax on immediately or not (obviously not) to protect the paint from stones belting off it and leaving marks, etc.

Also, never took a 'beading' photo before. And I've no idea how to judge what's good or bad, but this is today (18/01/14). Car was waxed on the 13/12/13 during my detailing frenzy. Waxed it using Chemical Guys Pete's 53 (after polishing with Chemical Guys Pro Polish 3N).




I also got a few other bits fixed up and sprayed on it yesterday. Not directly related to detailing, but I've mentioned them on this thread a rake of times, so I just thought I'd put a last mention in now that they're done (cos I know you all stay up at night wondering how I'm getting on with the Rav, and I don't want to be causing ye guys any needless sleepless nights :P )


http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=88528307&postcount=58

Curran

Beading looks good to me!! They're round & raised...not irregular shaped. Beading isnt the hard and fast rule to good protection, but its nice to see it!

Not so good beading



Average beading



Epic beading

Ded_Zebra

This morning I started a 2 day job on the Levin. I can't remember the last time it was even washed, Maybe early November!

Here are the before photos. It was the second dirtiest it has been since I got it, doesn't really come across how manky it was in the pics!

Ded_Zebra

As it was pissing rain and the car was so bad I just ran over it with the pressure washer before snow foam to knock the majority of the dirt off. I usually don't wet the car before the foam as the foam dwells longer on a dry car I find.
Here's a quick 50/50 of just washing the dirt off



Snow foam on



Then I washed it in the normal 2BM way but with washing up liquid instead to strip as much of whatever protection was left.



Then onto the door, bonnet and boot shoots. Not forgetting the fuel cap



Then it was onto tar. I picked up Tar Cleanse, wheel cleanse and iron cleanse yesterday. I don't know why I ever messed around with another tar remover, this stuff really is the sh!t! even with the rain washing it off the car it still managed to dissolve the tar and I could just pressure wash it off :cool:
Tar cleanse in action



Clay after finishing the car yuck :eek:



Problem……



Problem solved :D



It was still lashing at that stage so I dried the car as much as possible in the rain then drive it in and then re dried it in the garage.
At this stage I looked like this



Time for a cuppa and a change of clothes! About 2.5 hours in at this stage. Once I had deforested I headed back out and broke out the DA. I'll have befores and afters of that tomorrow because I didn't get anywhere near finished because I left at 2pm to visit my granny and didn't get back until 7.30-8.
The plan for tomorrow is to finishing the polishing, take the wheels off and clean and seal them. Clean the wheel arches. Then the interior. I have a busy day ahead of me!

MetzgerMeister

Great work DZ! I especially like the foam

vectra

MetzgerMeister wrote: »

Great work DZ! I especially like the foam

Serious foam
I am still only getting skimmed milk

JAMES VTI S

Ded_Zebra wrote: »

Problem solved :D

You're luck you're not banned for kicking a porky out of it garage :pac:

MetzgerMeister

vectra wrote: »

Serious foam
I am still only getting skimmed milk

Amateur.....:rolleyes:

vectra

MetzgerMeister wrote: »

Amateur.....:rolleyes:

Yup LOL

Ded_Zebra

The saga continues…

Unfortunatly I'm still not finished but all the polishing is done There was a point at about 3pm today when I was tempted to drop the standard and get it done but I decided to stick it out It's very hard to show on the white how good it is in photos but I did my best!





In this one you can still just about see the remnants of a heavier scratch, I probably could go after it more (and many others on the car) but I decided not to because I didn't want to run out of paint :P Also didn't want to spend much more time.



I then did the the headlights, tail lights and front fogs. The lights don't look bad in the before pic but they are much better now. I didn't take a pic of the fog lights or the tail lights though

Before


After


So the plan for tomorrow and the next day it is:
- Take the wheels off and clean, de-iron, de-tar, clay and seal them
- Wash the wheel wells
- Wash the body with APC to get all the oils from the polish off
- Dry it and put it back in the garage
- 3 coats of EGP
- Polish all the metal parts (sill strips, key holes, badges, door latches etc)
- Hover and clean the interior (including washing the seats, carpets etc)

JAMES VTI S

Curran

Looking good Sean!! Keep up the good work!

Ded_Zebra

Curran wrote: »

Looking good Sean!! Keep up the good work!

You should warn people when you sell them stuff that every muscle will be aching!!!

Join a gym or start detailing :p

Curran

Ded_Zebra wrote: »

Join a gym or start detailing :p

Gyms are expensive. ...so is detailing!! But least your car will look amazing....detailing wins!

JAMES VTI S

Save the money from the gym for a lift

toastedpickles

The car or the lift? Or both?

Ded_Zebra

Curran wrote: »

Gyms are expensive. ...so is detailing!! But least your car will look amazing....detailing wins!

Exactly, would much rather have a clean car and be in a sweaty mess rather than just in a sweaty mess

Well as you probably guessed from looking at me I'm not exactly the gym going type but it is good to get inadvertent exercise

JAMES VTI S

Lift

MetzgerMeister

JAMES VTI S wrote: »

RX8 on a lift? Yep, seems legit!

TheBigGreen

Car was fair dirty! 3 weeks without a wash. Alot of tar on the car now, must sort it out!

stimpson

In preparation for my wax/selant test, I did some work yesterday.

Here's the before pic:



First up was ValetPro snow foam used 10:1 as TFR. I find it lifts much more grime than used as snow foam (well it would at 10:1). Then It got a 2 bucket with Megs Hyperwash and some Tesco APC (mmm...lemony) for good measure. This left it pretty clean, so I dried it off with my MF towel:



Next was Tar Cleanse. I hadn't used this before and wasn't sure about dilution. As it was my first time detailing the car I decided to put it on neat. 10 mins dwell time and I powerwashed it off. After the first application there was still about 20% of the tar sports left, so I hit it again and pretty much all of the tar was gone. Another application showed that what was left wasn't tar - mostly chips and other marks. To use a line from Anchorrman - it smells like pure gasoline, but it certainly does the job. Hadn't much left from the bottle, but I guess if I used it regularly I wouldn't use quite so much of it.



Now here's where it gets weird. I followed up with Iron Cleanse. In Anchorman terms, this smells like Bigfoots dick.This was mixed 3:1, and I had previously used it on the Verso with great success, but this did nothing - no colour change, nada. I even went off and sprayed down the Verso with the remains of the TFR and left the Iron Cleanse to work, but no joy. I think KKV had a similar issue with it before. This is how it looked after 10 - 15 mins:



Oh well. I was getting tired at this stage, so I rinsed it off and dried with the MF towel. This is how it looks now - much shinier (not sure the pics do it justice):




Next weekend (weather permitting) I'll be claying and laying down a coat of SRP.


After the Volvo was done I power washed the TFR off the Verso. This is why I love the Colly so much. Applied over 3 months ago and it now takes 5 minutes work for this:

MetzgerMeister

The reason there was no colour change in the Iron Cleanse is because there was no iron/fallout in the paint for it to react with.

stimpson

MetzgerMeister wrote: »

The reason there was no colour change in the Iron Cleanse is because there was no iron/fallout in the paint for it to react with.

That's unpossible surely? There was absolutely no colour change and I sprayed the entire lower half of the car. Would the tar cleanse have removed any iron?

MetzgerMeister

Tar cleanse can do that but not to the extent of IC. Did you clay the car recently?

Spray Iron Cleanse on your alloys and I guarantee it'll turn purple.

Ded_Zebra

stimpson wrote: »

That's unpossible surely? There was absolutely no colour change and I sprayed the entire lower half of the car. Would the tar cleanse have removed any iron?

When did you last clay the car? When I used iron cleanse on my car that is clayed regularly there is almost no colour change in the iron cleanse (white car so very noticeable if there is any). On cars that have never been clayed I have got a lot of colour change though!

stimpson

MetzgerMeister wrote: »

Tar cleanse can do that but not to the extent of IC. Did you clay the car recently?

Spray Iron Cleanse on your alloys and I guarantee it'll turn purple.

Car hasn't been clayed ever I would think. I only have it since before Christmas, but I don't think it ever got more than a rub of a dirty brush at a garage. I did the alloy's too - no colour change.

MetzgerMeister

That's strange! Is it the new version Iron Cleanse? Is it possible that you diluted it a bit too much?

stimpson

MetzgerMeister wrote: »

That's strange! Is it the new version Iron Cleanse? Is it possible that you diluted it a bit too much?

Yep - it's the new formula. I used it before on the Verso's alloys and it looked like something from a slasher movie, so I know what to expect.

I'll try it again next week at 2:1 and see how I get on.

Ded_Zebra

I have diluted it as much as 5:1 just to see what would happen and still got a colour change however it is much less effective and changes colour for 2-3 more applications. When it is cold it takes longer to react, how long did you let it dwell for?

stimpson

Any time I used it before it was left for 5 minutes. This time I left it for 5, and when nothing was happening, I went off to spray the other car with TFR, so it definitely got 10 minutes plus.

MetzgerMeister

The proper ratio is 1:1 so half and half. I haven't used the new one yet but have some on its way to me. I kept the bottle after finishing up the IC so I'm going to use that. It's said to be 80% as effective when mixed 1:1 compared to the original. If you use it neat, it's twice as strong.

Ded_Zebra

MetzgerMeister wrote: »

The proper ratio is 1:1 so half and half. I haven't used the new one yet but have some on its way to me. I kept the bottle after finishing up the IC so I'm going to use that. It's said to be 80% as effective when mixed 1:1 compared to the original. If you use it neat, it's twice as strong.

It says on the bottle that it can be used at a dilution of up to 1:5

Yeah, I used Iron Cleanse without any dilution ('neat') on my Rav4 wheels. Gave it 25-30 minutes to sit and it gave me a small dribble of purple.



I took it as a compliment...

JAMES VTI S

half an hour for tar remover ............. !!

MetzgerMeister

Ded_Zebra wrote: »

It says on the bottle that it can be used at a dilution of up to 1:5

Yeah but the least dilution is 1:1 so if you get no purple at that, you ain't gonna get any from 1:5.

JAMES VTI S

JAMES VTI S wrote: »

half an hour for tar remover ............. !!

What?

Iron cleanse, I'm referring to, not tar..?

I was told that I should leave it for a while and the general consensus on here at the time (from what i recall) is that I wasn't leaving it on for long enough. So I took a break from detailing for a half an hour to get something to eat, etc. and did the iron cleanse before i went. Came back about 30 minutes later and all I got was this lousy t-shirt

Curran

For the paintwork, the weakest I'd use Iron Cleanse is diluted 1:1...especially if its being used for the first time in quite a while.
Can be diluted down further but would be more for keeping on top of wheels on a weekly wash so they dont get bad.

JAMES VTI S wrote: »

half an hour for tar remover ............. !!

What? 30 mins dwell time?

What are you using?
10 mins at a push for most tar removers...they'll have done most of their work that it will do in about 3 mins, leave for 5 mins is usually enough.

MetzgerMeister

Tar remover left on for half an hour will become part of the car!!