Today I did some detailing...

micks_address

i need to pluck up some courage to take pictures of the car outside of the house

Some new supplies last week so washed the car Friday evening.

1) Snowfoam with Bilt Hamber Auto Wash
2) Handwash with Meguiars Luxurious Lambs Wool Wash Mitt - bucket with grit guard - 5ml autowash in bucket
3) Rinse down with nilfisk
4) Dry with Micro madness dry me crazy (best thing ever)
5) Hoover inside
6) Leather wiped with Dr Leather Advanced leather wipes..

Happy with the results.. car looks great still apart from a some bird attack on the back windsceen..

Next time I'll take pictures..

Thanks to curran for the supplies

I have this dustbuster over a year now and its the first one I've had that does a reasonable job on the carpets

http://www.amazon.co.uk/BLACK-DECKER-Lithium-Compact-Titanium/dp/B00IUK800O/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1434439069&sr=8-1&keywords=black+and+decker+dust+buster+18v

Easily as good as breaking out the house hoover..

I've yet to venture into the world of waxing or claying or polishing but I'm sure I'll get there!


Cheers,
Mick

JAMES VTI S

Liquid elements

Noccy_Mondy

No sooner has it been nice and polished, and someone does this to it....

What path do I take here boys? I know the pictures aren't the clearest, but does it appear too deep to polish out? It's on the front passenger door.



http://i.imgur.com/qfdEl0I.jpg

Curran

I'd try machine polish it, it might take the nasty look off it, but if it's deep, it will need paint

vectra

Touch it up with a couple of light coats of paint.
Wet sand off excess
Fill with a couple of coats of Lacquer,
Wety sand again and machine polish

charcosull

Finally a bit of rain to check out the beading.

Cass

Not a big job, but one of those jobs that makes a serious difference when done. A few months ago i noticed the headlights on the Vectra were looking, well, crap. They were faded, dirty looking and really took from the look of the car.



I made an attempt, a poor one at that, to clean them up before, but they did not turn out as good as i would have liked. Not having the right stuff i stopped with the intention of doing them again.

Roll on today and i had had enough so decided to finally tackle them. I bought 800, 1500 and 2000 grit sand paper. Got a basin of lukewarm water with plenty of fairy liquid in it. I had bought the Meguiars headlight restoration kit so got it ready along with some cloths. I taped off the body work around the side panels, bumper, etc.



I kept the sandpaper/headlight well soaked and worked each grade of sand paper in vertical then horizontal and back to vertical strokes. I continued sanding until i felt little to no resistance then moved onto the next, finer, grade. When i had it all sanded i dried the headlight extremely well. Then moved onto the Meguiars. I used a cordless drill for this, and gave it two coats/going overs. Then polished with a clean terry cloth.



Have to say i'm delighted with the results. Was not a big job at all and makes the front of the car much cleaner and fresher looking. total time from start to finish was about 45 minutes.

adrianshanahan

I NEED you to do my car, she is not as new and shiny as that Audi but my E Class would love some of that attention to detail. I doubt I could even buy that kind of service in a vallet center.

JAMES VTI S wrote: »

Boy OH Boy this car pops!
Daytona grey on these diamond cut rims reaches legend status :eek:




















Thanks for looking.

Pov06

Cass wrote: »

Not a big job, but one of those jobs that makes a serious difference when done. A few months ago i noticed the headlights on the Vectra were looking, well, crap. They were faded, dirty looking and really took from the look of the car.

I made an attempt, a poor one at that, to clean them up before, but they did not turn out as good as i would have liked. Not having the right stuff i stopped with the intention of doing them again.

Roll on today and i had had enough so decided to finally tackle them. I bought 800, 1500 and 2000 grit sand paper. Got a basin of lukewarm water with plenty of fairy liquid in it. I had bought the Meguiars headlight restoration kit so got it ready along with some cloths. I taped off the body work around the side panels, bumper, etc.

I kept the sandpaper/headlight well soaked and worked each grade of sand paper in vertical then horizontal and back to vertical strokes. I continued sanding until i felt little to no resistance then moved onto the next, finer, grade. When i had it all sanded i dried the headlight extremely well. Then moved onto the Meguiars. I used a cordless drill for this, and gave it two coats/going overs. Then polished with a clean terry cloth.

Have to say i'm delighted with the results. Was not a big job at all and makes the front of the car much cleaner and fresher looking. total time from start to finish was about 45 minutes.

The result is nice but the problem is the haziness is caused by a bad UV protection coat that has been burned over the years.

When you sanded these lights you have basically removed anything that was left from the UV protection coat and now these lights will become even more hazed after a while.

What I recommend is to clean the lights, give them a wet sand, coat the headlight in about 4 coats of clear acrylic lacquer, wet sand with 2000 grit LIGHTLY (to remove the bumpy lacquer coat) and then polish the headlight with normal car polish or using a kit like you have used there.

I made a guide a while back: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=95626812

Cass

Cheers for that link.

I kinda guessed that cleaning them as i did would remove any protection, but my God they were bad. If nothing else the look of them alone made me cringe. Looking at them today and they look far better but i reckon they could do with another going over. I doubt the sandpaper will be needed just the polishing treatment. As the little bit left is so subtle only i would notice it.

As for laquering i'll be honest that it never really crossed my mind until you mentioned it to re-apply some sort of prrotection. I have the products you mentioned so might just give it a bash today.

Quick question for ya. Would you suggest i just use your method in the link or would it be okay/recommended to give them another going over with the Meguiars before applyying the coating/protection/laquering?

Pov06

Cass wrote: »

Quick question for ya. Would you suggest i just use your method in the link or would it be okay/recommended to give them another going over with the Meguiars before applyying the coating/protection/laquering?

When I wet-sanded mine I didn't even bother polishing them. I went straight for the lacquer and then sanded it down a tiny bit to smooth the lacquer and then I polished it.

If you polish it with Meguiars the lacquer may not stick properly.

Basically just wetsand with 2000, the lights will look horrible, spray 4 coats of lacquer leaving the paint to dry for 15 minutes before a new coat and after the 4th coat let the lacquer dry (it said 2 hours on my can).

Then do the wetsanding again with the 2000, your goal is to make the lacquer coatings smooth because the surface will be rough after lacquer and it you don't put enough coats of lacquer you could sand the lacquer off.

After all that polish the lights and job done.

vectra

Well.
Had to do a trip to Dublin on Friday. Basically up, Have a bite to eat and return.

Not sure if it was the protection of Fusso on my car.
OR
Is it the effectiveness of the Bilt Hamber Snow foam. But There was a fair amount of flies on the front and the tailgate was black from road spray in the rain.
As you will see in the before pics it was pretty manky.
Basically foamed.
Let dwell for 3 or 4 minutes
Brushed the fly's with a detailing brush.
Foamed the front again while I brushed the remaining door gaps/badges etc.

Rinsed with pressure washer.
Washed with Kristal Klean Shampoo

Was very pleased at how easy the flys were removed even prior to washing.

Pics will explain.

BEFORE
















AFTER Foam Rinse.

vectra

After wash ~ Dry.

Mc Love

The bloody motorway (literally) - heading to the big smoke myself on Tuesday! Plan to wash the car tomorrow (if its dry) and then it will probably resemble your before pics by the time I come home

JAMES VTI S

Looking good, Eugene.

SBPhoto

Shine up last weekend.

vectra

Lovely car ^^
What spec is she?

Curran

vectra wrote: »

Lovely car ^^
What spec is she?

Felt spec


Only kidding....cracking looking motor!! She cleaned up well!

SBPhoto

vectra wrote: »

Lovely car ^^
What spec is she?

Thanks Vectra, Curran.
141 Sline TDI Just put a new set of tyres on last week after returning 40.000k on the originals.

cena

The Audi is sweet.

Mc Love

what tyres on the original, 40k is good

SBPhoto

Continentals 225/40/R18. Put on Bridgestone this time

vectra

SBPhoto wrote: »

Continentals 225/40/R18. Put on Bridgestone this time

Same as on my car.
Friend of mine got 40k from a set on a vRS combi as well.
Mind you he did drive like he was driving on ice.

Noccy_Mondy

Was asked by a family relation to give a lift to this car, a surprise gift for her elderly cousin. The man that owns it has it since new, and I very much doubt it's seen many cleanings! Was up there with one of the harder jobs I have done. There is plenty of scrapes and dings on it, but I couldn't do much about them. I can't be arsed going to the effort of blurring the reg, but yer man is in his 80's so doubt he'll care.

He was in his element with the results, thought it was a new car, parking it out the front of the house for the neighbours to see. It was nothing much, but meant so much to him. Threw in a new air freshener for good measure.


I Love doing black cars, as they have the potential, no matter how bad they are, to come up like a gem!

A Few befores, seem to have lost my interior befores





And afters











The door shuts were gone over after the interior pics, for the pedantic beings amongst us!

Hal1

Those pics are huge Noccy_Mondy. 3,264px × 2,448px :eek:.

Noccy_Mondy

Hal1 wrote: »

Those pics are huge Noccy_Mondy. 3,264px × 2,448px :eek:.

Are they? Woops. I just uploaded them to imgur straight off my camera roll on my phone. My laptop is broken, so I'm fairly limited with my IT resources. If they are too obtrusive on the desktop site (looks alright on the mobile) then mods, feel free to resize them on my behalf

Hal1

Ok, I just tried another browser and their fine. I use firefox mainly as chrome doesn't like me for some reason .

Foxhole Norman

Gave the E39 it's first proper "Detail" in my ownership. Wheels were treated with Korrosol and washed again afterwards with AutoGlym's Wheel cleaner and the tyres shined with 50Cal's tyre dressing. The body was washed with AutoGlym's Shampoo, clayed with Meguiars clay and quick detailer, washed again, dried, polished with AutoGlym Super Resin and finally sealed with C2V3, courtesy of MM Interior was treated to a simple Vacuum and quick clean and febreezed.



















Next job on the list is sort the headlights, I have the Meguiars kit for it just need to get the lend of a drill. Then get the bonnet resprayed as the stone chips are killing it and also grab a towing eye cover from BMW.

Happy with my few hours work though

JAMES VTI S

I carried out an enhancement detail on this Mini‬ ‪John Cooper Works‬, I also applied a 12 month paint sealant to lock in the fresh shine. Being a typical mini it had very dull and faded trim which I restored back to like new.. Check it out !! :cool:

No in detail pictures as the day was too long.












Products/tools:

• Nilfisk E140
• Autosmart Duet
• Autosmart Smart wheels
• Tar Remover
• Liquid Elements Clay Towel
• Autosmart Fallout Remover
• Optimum Hyper Polish Spray
• Optimum Microfiber Polishing Pads 5 & 3 inch
• Shinemate EP801 Machine Operated Polisher (MOP)
• 3M soft 5 inch backing plate
• Flexipads 3 inch medium/hard backing plate
• Kestrel DAS6
• Polish Angel Escalate Lotion
• Polish Angel Master Sealant
• Hexlogic Black Pad 5 & 3 inch
• Autosmart Highstyle
• Autosmart Finish
• Solution Finish
• Autoglym Car Glass Polish

Time: 7 hours/4 hours travel

Thanks for looking

vectra

You are a hard grafter James.
Great looking result.

A Bottle of the Solution Finish is coming high up on my "Must get" list.

JAMES VTI S

It's all great when a product is good at what it does but when it's fun to use it makes the job much easier.

XsApollo

JAMES VTI S wrote: »

It's all great when a product is good at what it does but when it's fun to use it makes the job much easier.

Did you do that work at the owners house James?
In the front garden?
Or do you need a garage to work in?

vectra

XsApollo wrote: »

Did you do that work at the owners house James?
In the front garden?
Or do you need a garage to work in?

Weather permitting James can work outdoors.

JAMES VTI S

XsApollo wrote: »

Did you do that work at the owners house James?
In the front garden?
Or do you need a garage to work in?

That was a friend from up the country, it started to rain just as I left thank god :-D

Curran

Got a chance to pop out and give it a quick clean. Was absolutely bogging; perfect for some product testing!
Wheels cleaned / de-iron
Snowfoam
Wash
De-iron
Wash
Dry
Once over with a cream wax
Treat plastics and tyres
Windscreen sealant
Quick vacuum

Looks a bit respectable now. Needs a light machining to make it pop...and some dread rust spots in the arches need attention!

vectra

^^ Wasn't before time ^^ :P

Looking good now.

68 lost souls

Looks good! Quick question on the rust spots. How would you go about that? Assuming it needs to be ground off or do those anti rust chemicals work?

Relative has a rust spot from the contact points of roof bars and want to treat it before it gets too bad.

Curran

Depends...my rust is bubbling and will need grinding or perhaps a new bit of metal.
Surface rust could just be treated and painted. I'm guessing the roof bar damage is just surface?

68 lost souls

Curran wrote: »

Depends...my rust is bubbling and will need grinding or perhaps a new bit of metal.
Surface rust could just be treated and painted. I'm guessing the roof bar damage is just surface?

Ill try get a snap and post it up.

micks_address

micks_address wrote: »

i need to pluck up some courage to take pictures of the car outside of the house

Some new supplies last week so washed the car Friday evening.

1) Snowfoam with Bilt Hamber Auto Wash
2) Handwash with Meguiars Luxurious Lambs Wool Wash Mitt - bucket with grit guard - 5ml autowash in bucket
3) Rinse down with nilfisk
4) Dry with Micro madness dry me crazy (best thing ever)
5) Hoover inside
6) Leather wiped with Dr Leather Advanced leather wipes..

Happy with the results.. car looks great still apart from a some bird attack on the back windsceen..

Next time I'll take pictures..

Thanks to curran for the supplies

I have this dustbuster over a year now and its the first one I've had that does a reasonable job on the carpets

http://www.amazon.co.uk/BLACK-DECKER-Lithium-Compact-Titanium/dp/B00IUK800O/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1434439069&sr=8-1&keywords=black+and+decker+dust+buster+18v

Easily as good as breaking out the house hoover..

I've yet to venture into the world of waxing or claying or polishing but I'm sure I'll get there!


Cheers,
Mick

Same again today between the showers

Curran

Good man Mick - you've got your wash technique sorted....shortly it will be time to venture into the unknown; would recommend you get some sort of protection on the car, definitely before the winter...should be aiming to have it on the car by late Sept if you are leaving it until then!!

micks_address

Curran wrote: »

Good man Mick - you've got your wash technique sorted....shortly it will be time to venture into the unknown; would recommend you get some sort of protection on the car, definitely before the winter...should be aiming to have it on the car by late Sept if you are leaving it until then!!

Protection yikes!

What's the recommended process?

Cheers
Mick

Curran

Ideally, a de-tar and claying minimum, as you want the car decontaminated to ensure you dont inflict swirls during application.

If you wanted something really easy and risk free - CarPro HydrO2 would be worth looking at.

Wash the car, spray onto a panel, power wash off (the force of the water causes the product to activate), move to next panel and repeat, do the whole car, then dry it. Job done!

See it in action here...
Watch how differently the water reacts from before application (sits on the bonnet) and after (beads and runs away) - its THAT easy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbK8unWBrwg

Curran

Forgot to mention - without doing a full decontamination of the paintwork, the HydrO2 wont perform to its full ability, but since its that easy to apply, you could do it every few washes and the car would be protected easily.
Gives the paintwork a really nice shine too!

mb1725

That Hydro2 looks good, is it fairly durable as well? Wouldn't be popular with the Done Deal boyos who throw a bucket of water over the car before photographing it for the ad. :pac:

Curran

Given how easy it is to use, its actually not too bad. CarPro say 3 months, but from my testing earlier in the year, during poor weather, and no washing of the car, it was about 2 months, but I reckon it would perform quite well if it had another coat after a month.

Noccy_Mondy

My interior could do with a shampoo (focus). What I'd like done is the seats, roof and floor carpet/mats. I never let the ground get too dirty, always does be vacuumed regularly, so no matter who gets the task, they wont have to do alot to earn their money. I went into a valeting place last week and enquired, saying all I want done is the inside, as I can manage the outside myself. They basically said that they won't/don't do carpets, all they do is the seats and roof, for 60 euro. An extra 20 to do the exterior. I thought this was odd, I'm nearly sure the mondeo carpets were done last year. So those of you in the know, is it common practice to do the floor carpets as part of a standard valet?

Curran

Every valet will have their own set of pre-defined tasks for a given price.
To be honest, it's a job that shouldn't be turned down...a price should be worked out. The roof is harder to do than the carpets.

*Kol*

Curran wrote: »

Given how easy it is to use, its actually not too bad. CarPro say 3 months, but from my testing earlier in the year, during poor weather, and no washing of the car, it was about 2 months, but I reckon it would perform quite well if it had another coat after a month.

I see the instructions mentions that it can be applied and rubbed over with a microfibre cloth to activate. Did you ever try that?

Curran

No, havent tried it that way - if I was going for a microfiber application, I think Id go for a different product in the CarPro range; Reload.
It does a really nice job of filling defects while giving very good protection too.