A friend of mine recently asked if I could detail his dad's car as a birthday present so we set a date and he had me coordinate with his mom regarding the details. Unfortunately, I only had the car for less than a day and while he's more interested in paint correction, it was obvious Mom wanted more attention paid to the interior. So I had about 8 hours into this car, and would have really liked more time but it wasn't meant to be. As such, it's not my best work but they seemed pleased with it nonetheless. I just hate that feeling of knowing how and where I could improve it given the chance, but not having that opportunity. Stupid OCD kills me sometimes. Anyway, his Dad has close to 90k miles on this 2006 VW Jetta. Not sure what they call this paint but it's essentially flat black, and was fairly swirled up, dull and water-spotted all over. I didn't bother with any 50/50s or closeups because it wasn't a correction and my POS camera can't handle it anyway. Trust me when I say that correction was in the < 50% range, so I'm not bragging by any means. The paint was pretty hard, at least from my limited experience. The interior was fairly rough too. He lives in this car and it showed. I remember weekendwarrior telling me once that VW carpet is like velcro. Well, he wasn't kidding. Brush, vac, brush, vac, lint roller, vac. Repeat. I even tried pulling some of the bigger bits of debris out by hand without much luck. :complain: Enough talk, here's some pics. Early morning, sun isn't out yet. Not a great before pic, but the only one that came out at all. Man, I hate my camera. Grubby wheels, probably never been cleaned. And yet still has less brake dust than my BMW wheels do after only a week. Interior was a bit rough. Process Wash Foamed with CG CWG, then ONR wash Wheels and tires cleaned with Brown Royal wheel cleaner Clayed with Griots clay, Megs Last Touch 1:1 as lube Megs APC+ 4:1 on front wells, brush and heavy spray on carpeted rear wells Polished with M205/LC orange pads on Flex 3401 and G110v2, 6.5" and 4" respectively. Tried D151 and it kept gumming up immediately. Tried M105 and it left considerable haze. Went with 205, left a good finish but didn't correct much on this paint. LSP was DG105 Interior vinyl and leather seats wiped down with Opt Protectant Plus. Interior glass got Surf City Garage Clearly Better. Pedals cleaned with APC+ 10:1, and yes I missed a couple of spots. :doh: Exhaust I tried cleaning with 0000 steel wool and NXT Metal Polish, M105 and DG501. No matter what I used, it didn't get any better than this. Very disappointed here. Would love any suggestions. Tires were dressed with Stoners MSLT tire spray, front wheel wells with CG Bare Bones. After pics Brown Royal continues to impress. In the end, I ended up with a clean, shiny, swirly Jetta. Lesson here I guess would be that you can't expect to one-step a black VW. Oh well, gotta learn some how. Thanks for looking.
I don't know what you are talking about because that car looks damn good! Maybe you did not remove 100% of the swirls but I think from the pictures that they are greatly minimized at least which is all that you can really expect from a good single step polishing session.
Figuring the condition of the car and the time you had with it, I'd say you did a phenomenal job! :thumb:
You made a significant improvement as already stated that is all you can ask for a onestep with limited time.You have to remember everyone is not like us. Unless educated they can't see what we do. Good job
Thanks for the kind words guys. I'm finding it hard to transition from that mindset of perfection each time to just meeting and exceeding the customers expectations. But the positive feedback so far has helped with that, since I see I don't have to always be ultra-critical of my own work. Much appreciated.
You should try Menzerna PO203 (Power Finish) as your 1 step. You could also use Meg's Ultimate Compound. Great job by the way, car turned out better than you described in the title!
Thanks Richard, I've been meaning to give 203 a shot eventually. Unfortunately, my camera does a poor job with closeups, or at least I haven't been able to master them, but the car was still noticeably swirled from up close. I really believe it was less than 50% correction. But it just goes to show that most people only want a shiny car, because the dad was floored when he saw it. Thanks Phil. I'm loving my Flex which I bought from you recently, so thanks again for all your numerous sales because it makes things that much easier to justify to the wife! And I appreciate all the kind words from everyone, too. I almost decided not to post this because it wasn't a correction, but I'm glad I did. :thumb:
First off, great job. Now, how you did all that in about 8 hours is pretty damn good, after doing a V-Dub similar like that, i know about the velcro like material used, very annoying to get fine pieces out. Keep up the good work.
I played around with the exhaust tips the night before, but the real work started at 7:30 in the morning and finished up a bit after 4. I was expecting 10-12 hours with the car but when it got dropped off, Andrew's mom asked if there was any way I could get it back to them by 3 or 4! I pretty much skipped lunch, drank tons of water and sweated through 2 shirts in the process. Oh, and I forgot but my wife vac'ed the trunk. Which had normal carpet, so she got it easy. Again, thanks for taking the time to look, everyone.:thumb:
Great job! I have a soft spot for VW's And yeah, VW carpet is pretty much like Velcro. I try to keep the interior of my GTI pretty clean, just so I don't have to vacuum a ton of stuff out of the carpet.
Good work. You did good with what you had to work with. Continue to read and learn because that's a great result!
looks pretty decent from here. don't beat yourself up over the results achieved, so long as you did yoru best for the money provided. They didn't pay for a 2 or 3 step polish, so you won't get the results. it's just how it is...
