A co worker contacted asking me if I was interested on detail his truck, like I would ever say no to detailing :cheerl: I was to concentrate on interior and a single stage polish, just enough to remove a bunch of surface rust and bring life back to the paint. The truck is a: 2007 (?) Toyota Tacoma (Sorry can’t remember exactly what year this truck is ) Here is the vehicle as it was delivered to me: Door jams were going to need some attention. Due to the color it was a bit tough to capture most of it’s defects with the camera but I managed to get reasonable pictures. Nice bird bomb. The truck has a lift and some meaty tires…best part, I shouldn’t have any issues reaching inside the wheel wells :giggle: Lots of tar on this truck: Not that I was worried about tar The engine bay was going to need some extra attention though, as clearly it has never been maintained :shrug: The worse they are the better the results :thumb: Well now that I knew what I was up against, time to get the tools out. I began by removing all floor mats and personal belongings..which weren’t much because they were already removed by my co worker :thumb: Before I started vacuuming the misses was kind enough to refill the steamer with RO water: Flicked the switch on and I’m hoping that by the time I’m done vacuuming the black needle will have reached the red needle, as you can see steamer can reach some high, high temperatures all the better for steaming. Well let the vacuuming process begin: I take my time vacuuming vehicles and do my best to pick up as much debris as possible, but just in case I always give the vehicles a second vacuum after everything is said and done. You know just in case all that steaming and dressing loosens any kind of debris off the plastic trims on to the carpet. Well several minutes passed and I was hoping to start the steaming process, took a look at the gauge on the steamer: Not enough power captain! :giggle: Steamer not quite ready, no worries I decided to spray the carpets with some diluted Meg’s APC: Came back to the steamer and appropriate temperature had been reached and I’m set to steam :woo: Oh this never gets old, steam goes in passenger vent and steam comes out of all the other vents :woo: :woo: good times I tell you, good times... what can I say I amuse easy :shrug: Steaming continues: All vinyl trim is steamed as such, and given a wipe down. Same went for the seats. Last but not least the carpet is also steamed. Lately I’ve been steaming door jams, not sure why, I could easily do it during the washing process but I figured why not…just gives me an excuse to continue steaming :flirt: Well that about takes care of the interior, steamer makes quick work of interiors, so quick that if I don’t pay attention I’ll forget I’m done and stand there with the steamer on one hand and looking around the interior seeing if I’ve missed anything…kinda like this :shead: Moving along, it was time to dress the interior, for this 303 was used: I also sprayed the 303 Fabric Guard in the interior, just to give it a little extra protection. Windows will be done at a later time by the misses, she just loves windows hahahahaha NOT! But she does them anyways. Well time to give this truck a nice bath, I started off with the engine bay. First gave it a good rinse followed up with a healthy coat of P21S Total Auto Wash: With various brushes I scrubbed the engine bay. Followed with a rinse. Once engine bay was done time to concentrate on the shoes (rims). P21S Total Auto Wash was sprayed inside the wheel wells, Menzerna Gel was used for the rims and ARO was sprayed on the tires. The wheel wells were scrubbed with my long handle brush..which in this case was not really needed as I could literally fit my entire head in the wheel wells :thumb:. The tires were scrubbed with my Meg’s brush. To reach inside the rims I used my EZ brush and to finish the rims off I used my Zymol brush to agitate the surface of the rims. All this scrubbing looked like this: This process was done to all the rims, wheel wells and tires. It always amasses me how long it takes me doing all four tires, rims and wheel wells Good thing I’m in no rush. Next, the rest of the truck was washed with the two bucket method (which really wasn’t required as I would be giving a quick polish but force of having now). The paint was in really poor conditions, lots and lots of contamination and lots of surface rust. So I knew yellow or blue Riccardo clay would not cut it on this truck. So stepped up to the heavy hitter, before claying though I sprayed the entire truck with Tardis, all tar was removed but the surface still felt quite rough: Claying this truck took me several hours and I had to use the entire bar :what: I don’t recall ever having to use one whole bar in one vehicle :shakehead: The surface rust was every where. Well once the washing process was done it was time to take some paint gauge readings, first up Positector 6000: Considering this is a Toyota the clear coat was quite reasonable, some low spots and as expected on lower panels some very, very high readings. But all in all good readings. Next I took readings on all plastic panels with the help of my PosiTector 200: Now this is the point where I drown my write ups with pictures of the paint correction process and the difference I make to the paint…regrettably this time around I wasn’t able to because I forgot to charge my camera :wall: :wall: I manage to get just a few pictures but nothing near what I’m used to taking. Oh not to mention the color made it almost impossible to get good quality pictures :doh: Any who, here is what the vehicles paint looked like: If you look closely you’ll see lots of micro marring, this is due to the aggressiveness of the clay bar, Red Clay Magic has a serous bite to it, no matter how much lubrication you use it always induces micro marring. Well seeing as the truck was to receive a single pass, I decided to go with: Menzerna Intensive Polish partnered up with a Black 3M UK Polishing pad. It was such a nice day too that I opened the garage door all the way, something I never do either: Well after several hours of polishing my co-worker was kind enough to leave me a touch up pen: To touch up a few stone chips, like these: After spending a bit of time touching up a few chips it was time to get some food in my belly and the wife wanted to go to church, so though it would be a good point to take a break and let the touch up paint cure a bit. After stuffing my face and coming back with a hallow and wings I got back to the garage to apply the final protection, first up: :nod: another vehicle that got my favorite sealant combo DG#601 followed up with DG#105. The timing worked out perfect, as I finished applying the sealant my co-worker phoned me wondering how I was making out. I told him I’d have it done in a few hours, he informed me that he was just a few blocks way from me, visiting some friends in my neck of the woods. You see my co-worker lives across town so it’s a bit of hassle to drive across the city to come back on Sunday and pick up his truck. So I rounded up the crew (wife and princess) and we got the truck done. Misses, took care of all the windows and applied Black WOW on all exterior plastic trims, my princess applied DG#601/105 to all rims and door jams. I dressed the engine bay with 303. Floor mats which were take care of by my little princess were put back in the truck. The misses and I buffed off the sealant and just in time as my co-worker pulled up in my drive way. Here is the final results: Door jams looking much, much better. Oh tires were dressed with Optimum Tire, boy were these tires a pain to dress. Regrettably no sun pictures as it was about 9PM when the truck was picked up. Well that concludes this detail. I’m happy to report my co-worker was pleased with the end results and gave him some tips on maintaining his trucks as removing all that surface rust was not fun at all :shakehead: Hopefully next time I see this truck it will be in much, much better condition. I’ll bee keeping my eyes on this truck in the parking lot at work :whistle:
Looks great! I envy that steamer. What type of Optimum did you use? It looked somewhat dull for Optibond, unless you diluted it. When doing those big tires with deep tread, I find it helpful to use a small detail brush, like a paint brush, to get in the cracks. I put the tire product on the brush and go from there, makes those tight spots easy.
Thank you doc, I agree the truck looks good with it's big meaty tires and rims...not to mention the lift :thumb: I used Optimum Tyre, I normaly just spray one of the yellow Costco micro fiber towels and apply the tire dressing. I've tried the brush idea as you mentioned but I always tend to apply too much but that's just me, I always seem to go a bit overboard :crazy: :nod: I'm enjoying the steamer, I'm sure it shows :giggle:
:shead: Clay Magic Huh, Do tou think Clay Magic is Better then Riccardo? Those Wheels & Tires looked Awesome, so did the whole Truck 4 that matter :applause: opcorn: That Steamer..... I gotta get Me 1 of those, I could have loads of Fun with that thing opcorn:
Great job, boy that engine was dusty. Is your garage floor sloped to drain water out or do you have to use something to push the water out of the garage?
Great job Nica, if you need to know the year of the vehicle look in the driver's door jamb and it will tell you the build month and year.
:nod: I haven't found a clay with a bigger bite then Red Clay Magic. If you compare Yellow Riccardo with Red Clay Magic, as far as bite goes, Red Clay Magic beats Yellow or Blue Riccardo. It's very aggressive and it leaves lots of micro marring in some cases it seems like holograms what Red Clay Magic leaves behind...but it does an incredible job to remove contamination off the paint. Yes, garage is sloped so water just slides out of my garage but I always wash the floor and push the water out. So far floor has held up quite well against all sorts of chemicals I throw at it :shrug:
I normally do but on this truck I forgot to look :doh: I'm sure my co-worker will let me know on Monday. Glad you enjoyed it.
That nice cloud of steam coming out of the vents looks awesome. Just wondering if it leaves moisture in the vents? I guess I'm wondering if this would make it more likely to collect dirt?
Well I'm sure the steam leaves moisture behind, but I always follow up with my air compressor to blow of as much moisture out...I sometimes forget to mention that :sorry: As for collecting dust, I doubt it. You see the vehicle sits in my garage with out moving for the whole time I'm detailing it, this is for at least two days most of the time is for three days so by then if there is any moisture left I suspect it's gone...but that's me "assuming". Haven't had any issues so far :shrug: Glad you enjoyed super eace:
I've always liked Tacomas. That was a really good idea to keep on steaming the door jams. You can tell how much work you did. It came out looking great...:thumb:
Very nice work Carlos. I like Tacoma and you made this (even white) looked its best. Thanks for the share. :thumb:
Superb job as usual Carlos. Very few things look better on white than DG 105. You know I think if I had a steamer I would like doing interiors a lot more. That almost looks like a must have!
