With an extended break from detailing under my belt, I decided this past long weekend was the perfect opportunity to dust off my pads and get cracking again! The weekends subject was a rosso red Alfa 145 with a tad over 219k km on the ODO! The owner, a regular client of mine, tasked me with attend to everything from top to bottom. The initial plan of attack was as follows: Spend Friday afternoon removing the wheels for cleaning and sealing along with the arches. Saturday morning for cleaning the engine bay and exterior in preparation for the 2 to 3 stage paint correction which would follow. Sunday to complete the correction work, and hopefully attend to the interior incl roof lining, before finishing everything off on Monday. As usual however, these things seldom go exactly according to plan and I ended up doing the following instead... The car on arrival... A quick shot of the wheels and arches (I planned on taking more with the wheels off) And some paint defects clearly visible before cleaning Having gotten all my gear out I was confronted with the 1st snag...I couldn't find the vehicles jack (I later learn't it was hidden below all the audio equipment installed in the boot) and my old mans trolley jack which I usually use was locked away at his place. No problem I thought, perfect excuse to buy my own trolley jack so off I went. After visiting 2 of the local hardware's as well as the local Checkers Hyper, I couldn't find a single one so I settled on a 4 ton bottle jack instead. Low and behold this didn't fit under the car so I was back to square with 2 hours lost! At this point in time I decided it would be best to simply clean the wheels and arches on the car. First up a liberal dousing of Sonax Extreme rim cleaner on the wheels with 5:1 APC on the tires and in the arches. Having gotten the majority of the dirt off the wheels and arches, I called it quits for Friday. Due to the lost time hunting for a jack I didn't bother taking any further pics. Needless to say it was clearly evident that the wheels and arches would require some further treatment come Saturday... Saturday morning started with the wheels and arches again... Once again Sonax was liberally applied and left to work while I prepared fresh wash solution and the brushes. Despite a solid cleaning the evening before there was clearly more dirt and muck that could be removed from the rims... 1st up the Polished Bliss wheel back brushes which did a terrific job of cleaning behind the spokes and between the calipers, hubs, etc Next up the Raceglaze XL wheel brush whose short, stiff bristles removed almost all of the remaining deposits. Finally the Ez-Detail brush was used to give the wheels a final once over... With the inners of the wheels virtually spotless I turned my attention to the lug nut recesses... These were cleaned with a small detail brush... That's better And all done With the wheels completed I cleaned up the exhaust and tailpiece...For reasons unknown I neglected to take any befores! The tailpipe came up pretty well except for some welding splatter and burnt plastic which I couldn't remove Next up was the engine bay which was in pretty good shape considering the vehicles age! (After to follow near the end of the thread) With the engine cleaned and dried it was time for the wash and prep stages... 1st up was a good foaming with CG's CWC and APC to remove as much grime from the paintwork as possible. After leaving the foam to dwell the car was rinsed before being re-foamed to attend to all the small details including... Plastic trim and emblems Rubber trim Panel gaps and mouldings Unseen and overlooked areas After cleaning all the odds and ends the car was washed using the 2BM, CG's CWC and my Raceglaze lambswool mitt prior to a final rinse in preparation for claying. Clay used was Smartwax Smartclay along with Clay Magic's medium grade clay on the more stubborn areas. Sonax liquid tar remover was used on the lower doors and sills to remove some final tar spots. With the paintwork now completely clean and dried I decided to get cracking and find a suitable correction process to follow. The paint thickness readings all averaged in the 200 to 300um mark with very few thinner areas, leaving me with plenty of scope for correction. As usual I started with the bonnet and taped up a line down the center for some 50/50's Even in the natural light the dullness of the pant was clearly evident Some defects under the LED's Left side of tape Right side of tape 50/50 in natural light after a 3 stage polish Corrected side in the late afternoon sunlight And under the LED (pic taken a while later) 50/50's Happy with the process I finished off the bonnet before the light ran out... Bonnet fully corrected Almost out of light and eager to test the sample of Raceglaze's latest Black Label Concours paste wax I decided to wipe down the bonnet and apply a layer to see how it looked and beaded. A departure from the norm but I figured what the hell! Lovely wet finish Beading was great as well...The droplets wouldn't stay put on the more curved surfaces and kept running straight off With there still being a bit of light, I started on the drivers side fender Befores And after 2 stages of polishing At this point and with the daylight almost completely gone I called it a day! Sunday morning I slept in late (didn't want to disturb the neighbours with the machines too early) and got started around 9am. First up I rechecked the bonnet and fender I corrected the evening before. Overall the correction levels were well within the 95-98% range. There were a few random scratches and deeper defects which I didn't chase, electing to rather leave some scope for future correction work that may be required. Seeing alot of closed curtains and windows I decided to polish up and seal the wheels by hand before starting to make a noise with the buffer... Wheels freshly Rimwax'd Correction work then continued throughout the day... Before And after 50/50's on the side sills Before's And afters Passenger side fender before under the LED 50/50 in natural light 50/50 under the LED Un-corrected side And corrected side After completed A few random shots near the end of the day Once again time caught up with me and I had to call it a day with only the rear bumper and hatch still requiring correction. It was becoming clear that the interior would more than likely not be attended to, but considering it's almost pristine condition I felt it was a worthwhile sacrifice considering the state of the paintwork. Monday started with me getting stuck into correcting the last remaining bits before finishing off. The tailgate and rear bumper in the sun After correction work on the bumper Before under the LED again After Tail lights before And after with around 90% correction achieved. I didn't want to risk damaging the old plastics! Part of the bootlid before And after With the rear end completed that brought the paint correction to a close. The majority of the paintwork received a 2 step correction of SIP on a green 3M pad followed by 85RE5 on a yellow 3M pad. Some of the worse affected areas got S100 on green, followed by P203S on yellow and finished with 85RE5 on yellow. 2 problem areas with soft, sticky paint (repaired panels I suspect) were corrected with a mix of P203S and M205, followed by 85RE5. For whatever reason the M205 seemed to work alot more smoothly than the Menz on the sticky panels. The M205 on it's own wasn't delivering quite the same correction as the P203S, so I decided to try mixing a drop of 203 with the M205, which worked really well. With the paintwork completed it was time for a final wash to remove the accumulated polishing dust and oils before finishing off. LSP of choice was the remaining Raceglaze Black Label sample that Mark had sent me. As with the other Raceglaze waxes the Black Label is soft and goes on easily. Leave it on for too long however and it can be a bit stubborn in coming off. I followed Mark's advice of applying and removing panel for panel and didn't experience any other issues. Tires got Wheelwax Extreme Black dressing, plastic and rubber trim got Satin prot while the engine bay was dressed with 303 and CG's Fade2Black on the hard to reach areas. Finally the glass was cleaned with Sonax glass cleaner and the car was given a final buff and dust. The finished shots back at the owners place Engine bay. The black plastic rain tray was too badly faded to be completely restored despite 4 layers of Satin Prot! Wheel and tires Some final shots in the fading light. The owner said he will snap some daylight pics for me as we ran out of light. Nice and neat for a 219k km, 10 year old car! As always thanks for looking :thumb:
Indeed amazing shape she's in for being that old and having covered that many miles. Dare I say mint?
great work Carn. The writeup was very well put together as well. That wheel brush you used looks sweet! I need a good brush for tighter areas and i think i just found it. Might be ordering some soon.
Phenomenal work and write up. I thoroughly enjoyed every bit of this one. Car looks amazing and when you consider it's age and mileage it's even more impressive.
fantastic work. It looks like it just rolled out the showroom and not 10 yrs old. Thanks for sharing.
