Seen as its Christmas I was in the giving mood this year. I decided that instead of getting my brother a great Christmas present I would give him a superb one and give his car a full detail. To do this would be a mammoth task. I quickly jumped on the phone and enlisted the help of a good friend of mine, Gordon (Caledonia). SO here it begins now. This was the car on arrival. 8:30 am in the morning with subzero temperatures. We set upon washing and getting the car prepped up for the machine polishing stage. Wash carried out as follows: • Wheels cleaned with Chemical Guys Diablo Wheel Cleaner • Wheel arches cleaned with megs apc • All crevices, grills, badges cleaned with envy detail brushes & apc • Car was then rinsed down with a hot wash @ 60 oC • Foamed using AS HD foam left to dwell for 5 mins • Paint, wheels and arches where rinsed • Washed using 2bm with Chemical Guys glossworkz shampoo • Car was rolled inside and dried using New Chemical Guys blow dryer Car was now clayed using Chemical Guys White medium clay bar with Chemical Guys Clay Luber & Megs last touch. There was a fair bit of crap over the car. We now inspected the paint using Brinkman torches, halide lights and my Paint depth gauge. The car showed up reading of between 140 and 170 over the car. There were 2 regions of paint around the 100um mark. Bonnet Befores A deeper RDS on the bonnet Near side door Near side rear wing Offside Door off side wing off side rear wing Gordon and I set about testing the paint to see what polish and pad combination would work to safely remove the defects. We both settled on a 3m yellow waffle pad with menzerna 106fa. Due to the lack of swirls and again as the car was a daily driver, consideration was taken to enhance the finish and not go for full correcting. The paint on the car was sticky in regions so this was the best option for correction due to slightly less drag created with these pads on this paint. Some deeper RDS had to be corrected using localized correction. i.e. correcting the area where the deeper rds was instead of using the aggressive combo over the whole panel. This was only on really noticeable areas where these rds really stood out. The idea of this detail was to remove swirls and some of the rds on the paint. We could have spent another few hours and achieved full correction but the car is a daily driver and will probably be machined in a years time to remove what ever swirls it will have picked up at that point. The correction process was carried out using technique I learned at Dave Kg`s rotary polishing class. • Spread at 600rpm • Begin working at 1200rpm • Work at 1500rpm until residue clear • Refine at 1200rpm Localized RDS removed using 3M spot pad with po 85rd 3.02 and deeper marks removed using FC+ and ultrafina on a 3M Green spot pad. • Spread at 600rpm • Begin working at 1200rpm • Work at 1500rpm until residue clear • Refine at 1200rpm FC+ • Spread at 600rpm • Begin working at 1200rpm • Worked at 1800rpm till defect was removed Bonnet After Near side door after Near side rear wing after Offside wing Offside door Offside rear wing The lsp of choice for the car today would be my new Chemical Guys E-zyme natura Paste wax and G Techniq G3 and G4 max repellency kit for the glass (thanks for the ultra fast delivery Rob). Trim and tyres dressed using Chemical Guys new look trim gel. Wheels sealed using Chemical Guys Jetseal 109. Exhaust polished using Brilliant metal polish. Finally some reflection shots. Interior was also given a quick tidy up. Mats were steam cleaned using Megs apc. All leather seats cleaned using gliptone leather cleaner and dressed using Poorboys natural look dressing. Glass was cleaned using Chemical Guys Glass Cleaner. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Gordon (Caledonia) for helping out with this detail. David Graham of Chemical Guys for the use of his unit. All the best for 2010.
looks great. not feeling checked flag at all. i think they belong to MINI and not ford. should have just made it black. good job none the less
its funny you say that the checked flag is probably going to be taken of in the summer and it will be sprayed the same gloss black as the handles etc. also the front bumpers etc will be getting the same. its checked flag because its a limited edition one. the last of that shape of fiesta
First off, GREAT write up, and nice work! I actually kind of like the checkers, and love the color. Not sure why, the checks just seem to work on this one. I do have one small complaint though. Seriously, this is the type of write up that keeps me coming back to Detailing Bliss. It was thorough, informative, and full of great pics. But, as a noob who's trying to familiarize himself with every type of product and process under the sun, the following example drives me up a wall. "FC+" What is FC+?? I loved reading every part of your detailed write up, but then I come to an abbreviation I'm unfamiliar with, and suddenly the music stops, and I'm left searching for several minutes as to what it stands for. I'm pretty familiar with most of the abbreviations by now, but every now and then one stumps me. And after everything else is typed out, I guess it's just one of those things that frustrates the heck out of me. Sorry about that, I guess just had to vent. As I said, I LOVED your write up, and thank you very much for the effort. Perhaps my rant is focused to everyone in general. If you're gonna take the tremendous amount of time to type everything out and post a ton of pics, take a couple seconds extra to help those of us who are still trying to catch on and learn. I'm sure I speak for many lurkers out there. Again though, very nice work. :thumb:
sorry thats another habit picked up on forums. FC+ = 3m Fast Cut Plus. its a polish made by 3m used for removing rds and heavy swirls etc. it was used to remove rds on the bonnet that were catching the eye and ruining the finish.
Amazing work! Love how the paintwork glows. What dillution ratio did you use diablo at? I usually do 3:1 (water to gel), and it works well...
for this detail it was 4:1 for general cleaning, ive used it up to 10:1 for day to day used. its a fantastic product.
Thanks for clearing that one up. Call it a brain fart. I've heard of Fast Cut Plus, just went brain dead when I saw FC+. Also, this is another report that confirms I'll be buying some Diablo soon. There's a bunch of you guys from across the pond that do terrific work, followed by great instructional write-ups. Please, keep 'em coming.....they're appreciated! :applause2:
yeah. the diablo gel is fantastic. you can dilute it, it sticks to the wheel so theres next to no run off and its a really good cleaner.
yeah at 10:1 i use it for day to day cleaning. My car usually gets washed 3 times a week in the summer so at 10:1 for those washes its good then every second week ill use it at 4:1 to give them a good cleaning i.e. fronts, backs and back of spokes
