Hi Everyone, I posted my collection of detailing goodies a few days ago, and was able to put everything to work last Friday. Sadly I'm not the best photo taker of before and after pictures, so you'll have to bare with me there. I started off with the wheels tires and whell wells. Adam's APC to the tires and wheel wells, sonax rims, and let marinade. I tried to embed the pictures as I went so I could talk about each, but I couldn't manage to figure it out :sorry: Maybe somebody could help me out there. After the wheels/tires/wheel wells, I cleaned the engine with adam's apc and various brushes plus soap and water, then rinsed. Looked 10 times better. Then I washed with dawn via TBM with grit guards, and dried. Those uber ww towel's phil sells are legit. Then I clayed and put the wife to work helping me. Used uber blue and ONR at clay lube dilution. Lots of crap came out of the paint at this step. After that it was IPA wipe down then on to polishing. My first combo was PCXP with uber green pad and Menz 203. The hood had horrible water spots etched in the paint that I could not get out with any OTC cleaner/wax/hand applied method. The car also had various RIDS from her old dog hanging her claws out of the passenger window and slipping along the paint :yikes: Anyways, the water spots laughed at that combo. So I moved on to PCXP with M105 and surbuf pads applied via this method: 1. Do not prime the surbuf pad. 2. Apply 4 "larger then pea sized" dots of M105 to the pad. 3. Work the polish into an 12x12" area without turning on your PC. 4. Spritz the surface with water. 5. As in step 3, again work the polish around without turning on your PC, you are looking for a milky consistency. 6. Turn on PC and work the polish till it appears to dry. 7. Spritz more water onto the suface and continue to polish. What this does is bring the polish out of the pad and back to the surface. 8. I have found that you will need IPA sprayed onto your MF to remove the M105 from the surface. 9. Inspect and repeat if needed. This corrected the majority of the water spots. I didn't have a paint gauge so didn't want to risk strike through with repeated 105 applications. I did this on the roof, hood, and bootlide. The vertical surfaces cleaned up nicely with just uber green and Menz 203 power finish. Once I had gone all around the car with PF, I went around the whole car again wtih uber blue and Menz 85RD. IPA wipe downs after each step, then finally Menz Power Lock x 1. I wanted to put another layer on but ran out of time. Then I dressed the tires with prima nero, wheel armoured the wheels, and dressed the engine. Adam's In and Out spray that phil sold me had a malfunctioning mixing ball in the can and didn't work like it should. It just created a giant cloud of VOC's in my garage. Nasty. I spent 13 hours just on the exterior of the car, wheel/tire dressing, engine cleaning and dressing. 7 hours of this was polishing alone. Why didn't you guys tell me what I was getting myself in to Honestly though, it was allot of fun for being my first go at it. A few observations/questions : 1. M105 is nasty stuff to work with, at least for me my first time using it. It's working time is relatively short, but with distilled water spritzing you can get it to work longer. Removing it after it dries is a $#%$^ to do though. Without IPA to aid in taking it off, I would have been screwed :shakehead: 2. The M105 on the majority of the surface defects worked very well, but for the deeper RIDS I was afraid to re-apply for fear of strike through. i would say I got the really bad areas 80-90% corrected based on the before and after look. There are still some RIDS left but these I could run my fingernail through and figured I wouldn't be able to get them out. I attached a pic of some remaining RIDS. 3. I would be curious to know how you guys get all the wax residue out of the crevices of the car. 4. How do you keep the work area free of dusting and little dust balls while using the 203, cause that stuff dusts like crazy! 5. Any help with how to spruce up, treat, restore, the interior dash would be greatly appreciated. See picture below. 6. Can you put Collinite 915 over Menz PL? I thinks that's it. All in all I think it turned out really well. Any comments or advice would be appreciated. Thanks so much.
i think it came out fantastic..... Here is what I do for residue in cracks and crevices. Spray it down with Spray detailer and use a rubber detailing tool, that seems to work. everyone has thier own methods. Ive never used M105, i have some, the distilled water is a good tip....... thanks
Thanks kilo! It was allot of work but turned out reasonably. The m105 technique came from someone over on the autopia forum, not from me it worked pretty well but man that stuff is hard to work with and buff off. I have a feeling I was using too much pplush though. Let me know if u ever use the 105 and how u liked it. Take care.
I have a bottle of it, i ususally use Menz powergloss..... if its really bad. But i want to try megs 105, phil recomended it for hard to correct issues. BTW, you can get the rubber detailers tool at any auto parts store, or even use a ridgid cotton swab.
When I polished my black Mustang GT I used orange 5.5" CCS pads which I dont like much but it work great. I did however prime the pad and then did not spread out the polish on the panel or worked it in at a lower speed or wet the pad or the panel with distilled water. I just primed the pad and then added 2 dime sized drop to the pad and the worked it at speed 6. I didnt get any slinging or spatter this way it worked fine and I used heavy pressure since my clear is hard. I would just clean the pad after each section with a microfiber and would switch pads every so often. It did dust quite a bit though but I was working in 105+ dry weather in my garage in the middle of the summer. Yet it still worked great I only had about 1 to 2 minutes of working time until it would flash on me. But you might want to try out the method I said but with the Surbufs you have that way is not so nasty to work with. The method you posted seems like a pita to do. Also use a soft brush like the SV detail brush with IPA and agitate the area to remove excess polish residue and wipe away with a low nap microfiber. I think this excess poilish residue happened to you because of the technique you used for M105. If it was me I would not do it that way next time. You can get a photobucket account and load them up their and then copy and paste the link and it will come out like everyone elses pics its free to sign up and you can upload alot of pics. Edited: I was able to see the pics now looks good man just make sure you clean up that residue on the base of the antenna and anywhere else.
I haven't tried Menz power gloss yet, but I hear it's good stuff. The 105 worked well and correcting allot of the imperfections it was just a bear to use, but then again I'm a newbie I actually bought a rubber detailer thing, but forgot to use it because I was so beat from working on the thing for 13 hours. No I used 1Z cockpit on the interior and it did nothing for the dash. I was thinking of using some Adam's VRT or maybe some Nero like you mentioned above. Maybe I'll try that out. Danny, thanks so much for the info. I did quite a bit of reading on M105 and KBM prior to my detail. I actually have 2 pads of each color: 2 surbuf, 2 yellow, 2 orange, 2 green, 2 blue, and two black. I chose to go with the surbuf pads for no good reason. If I had used an orange or yellow uber pad, I would have absolutely used the technique you described. The next detail I do on my dad's truck that's what I'm going to do. And thanks for the photobucket info!!!! I'm all over it!!! You guys have been great, I'm glad I found this forum. :thumb:
105 will dry fast, use it sparingly and try not to spread it to thin either, the warmer the weather the faster it will haze. Three small dots on a damp pad is the way to go. If the paint is soft maybe just stick to 205 on a more aggressive pad. My Audi has hard clear and the 105 is great it cuts well and breaks down appropriately, on my Ford the clear is soft and the 105 chews up the clear and dusts like crazy. The first time I used 105 was by hand and that was a nightmare, after that I used my PC and it seemed like cake. Personally I use small amounts of 105 over smaller than usual areas I watch and if it starts to flash quickly I don't spread it any further. Hope that helps.
That looks great man! Are you on ClubLexus? I'm "97-SC300" on there...I'm most often in the SC or 2GS forums!
This is great! Thanks. I read that my dad's F150 had medium hardness clear coat so I was going to try m105 on an orange pad, but I may just try the M205 on an orange or yellow pad to start and see what I get, then maybe finish with 85RD on a blue pad. It'll take a little playing around Sunday when I do it. I may even try some power finish on an orange pad and see what I get too. I'll post pictures when I get done in a separate thread. Thanks! I'm not on clublexus as this is my wife's car. I drive a 2005 M3 so I'm over on the m3forum more often.
I think this excess poilish residue happened to you because of the technique you used for M105. If it was me I would not do it that way next time. I agree with Danny, although it wasnt with the 105, this problem that you faced with excess polish residue happened to me when I tried spraying a mist of distilled water while working with Scholl's S17. Those residue were so hard to get off the paint , I ended up marring it. A similar problem also happened when I tried to replace distilled water with a qd. Since then , I have never tried to extend the working time of my polish by spraying any liquid neither to the pad nor the panel. But that's just my experience, and it was not with Megs 105, so YMMV
You're probably right. That stuff would dry/flash so fast then it was a $#%% to buff/get off. I'm going to use a foam pad next time instead of the surbuf pads and see what I get. I'm hoping on my dad's f150 this weekend that I don't even have to use the 105, and can do it with M205 on an orange or yellow pad or Menz 203 on an orange or yellow pad and see what I get. We'll see... Kilo! Glad you liked it. It's pretty cool, and smells good too! Matt
