Ty Detailed 1998 Nissan 240SX -- No Weak Stomachs!

This car I've been dreading for a while. It belongs to a good friend of mine, and I've been trying to convince him to have this done while kicking myself at the same time. It's tax return time so here we go! There's a big Nissan meet tomorrow, and he had a dyno/tuning appointment 8hrs after I had the car. This was going to be interesting. :applause2:

I knew the car was bad -- it sat for 2 years while he was trying to figure out which engine swap he wanted to go with. And it was neglected. Apparently, someone tried to polish it before me, as the evidence will show.

I left my washmitt at home :shead:... so I had to use a EuroW towel for the wash. It worked quite well but wasn't exactly what I wanted. Oh well. I didn't need worry about scratches too much.

Products Used:

Wash
Gilmour Foam Gun (Loaded with Maxi-Suds II)
2 Bucket Wash Method with Optimum Car Soap
EuroW Wash "mitt"
APC
SwissVax Detail Brush

Wheels/Tires
AutoGlym Custom Wheel Cleaner
Raceglaze XL
SwissVax Wheel Brush
Two (2) coats of White Pearls Tire Dressing
Protected with Werkstat Prime: Acrylic

Clay
"Ebay" Gray clay (This feels identical to the CG White)
Optimum No Rinse (old formula) at clay lube strength

Polish
Uber Yellow
LC Flat Green
Uber Blue
LC CCS Black
Menzerna Power Finish PO203S
Menzerna Power Gloss
Menzerna 85RD

Protection
Two (2) coats of Menzerna PowerLock
One (1) coat of RBOE (Rubbish Boy's Original Edition)

Glass
Chemical Guys Window Clean
DI Glass ww towels

Metal
CG Metal Shine

Microfiber
Drying -- DetailedImage WW Drying (my favorite drying towel)
Doorjambs + dirty stuff -- "throwaway" towels from Roger
Polish Removal -- EuroW plush towels



Onto the writeup!

Upon delivery I knew I had my work cut for me for 8hrs.

Umm.....Crap:thud:

Pretty standard here -- nothing too terrible



Foamed with Maxi Suds II


WHAT?!!?


Scrubbing the mold/pollen/crap/pine needles out of all the nooks and crannies


Wash buckets (No grit guard in the rinse bucket -- not worried about scratching with this job)


Washing with my ultra rare EuroW Wash "mitt" :drinking2:


Onto claying. I knew this was going to be mighty "fun" so I grabbed my most aggressive and cheapest clay. I still needed 3 chunks. 1 208oz bar I cut into 6ths... so half a HUGE claybar on this car.

After 2 panels


All clayed and dried! Not much of a crisp reflection


Front bumper was spraypainted with no CC. I washed it (kinda) and left it alone at owner's request.



Now the inspection I was really dreading. IF YOU HAVE A WEAK STOMACH CLOSE THIS THREAD NOW

Burn through, on the C Pillar

What?


Carbon Fiber hood is very faded and dull, not sure what I'll be able to do with this


Um....:thud: I avoided this area like the Plague.


Hm.. odd scuff


Another scuff


Fairly deep scratches


Under the halogens, the entire car looked like this



Alrighty, now we're onto polishing.

Fender before


The fender on the left was hit with 1 pass of PO203 on an LC Flat Green pad and the door on the right is the control. Not quite enough correction for what I was after


New weapon.... the uber yellow!


Much better!




For some reason I used an LC Flat Green pad with 85rd (I was on drugs I guess) and went to finish.. by the time I was halfway through my pass I realized I had on the green pad! The results were great though!


50/50 action? Okay!


Still some RIDS, but not worth chasing after seeing the previous "detailer" burned through a few spots



I knew my arsenal for the paint, so it was onto the hood while I was in "experimentation mode" so I grabbed the LC Flat Green pad and some power finish and I thought I could get some more. I stepped up to Power gloss and got another Flat Green pad and here's the results from my test area! this was hard to photograph





From here I had to stop taking pictures and get to work. I snapped a few during, but not much.

50/50 of the taillights


After I was all done polishing and wiping down with IPA... It was on to 2 coats of PowerLock! I love this sealant. Put two TINY dots on your pad and you can do two panels. Once the pad was soaked a bit I didn't even need anymore. Fantastic spreading action!

An hour after the Powerlock cured it was on with the RBOE!






45 minute cure time on the RBOE while Acrylic: Priming the wheels, dressing the tires, wiping the door jambs and other misc things.... and it was time to get it outside for sexy pictures! Unfortunately there wasn't much for sun at this point



Not a hologram in sight! Much better reflection (minus the orange peel)




10000% improvement


Oh yes




Carbon Fiber was a major milestone, the owner was floored at my work on the hood!


Is that a sexy Subaru in the background. Oh, the 240 is nice looking too.


A little rboe residue by the Nissan emblem (this damned thing wouldn't get clean) :sorry: but he had me debadge it... no fading after having badges on it for 12 years! Nice!




It was a fun marathon and a lot of work! The owner was ecstatic and rushed off to his dyno/tuning appointment!

Thanks for looking! :gidiup:

 

Great job dude. Dang, take off that ring the next time you clay. oke:

 

I clay with my right hand. I just hold it for the picture in my left!

 

Lol! Ok, still risky though when you detail. Dang, the wifey must have you by the balls that she won't let you take it off even when you detail. :giggle:

 

Great work Ty!

 

Nice work Ty.

My favvorite body style 240.

and I wear my ring while detailing!!

 

Pictures look great man! I love the z wheels on those cars!

That car had to feel like a 5 o'clock shadow before claying lol.

 

Nice job

 

The Naked Detailer (cheers JamieO)

No I'm not suggesting you detail your vehicle without any clothes on (although what you do in the privacy of your own garage...) But just be aware that jewellery, watches, rings, clothing with metal buttons, rivets or exposed zippers, or belt buckles can very easily be rubbed against the vehicle surface causing deep paint surface scratches

 

How could she have him by the balls? I hear she keeps them locked up in the house somewhere! Great job Ty! Too bad there was so much damage to the car before you got it. 50/50s looked great.

 

Great job Ty....looks as good as it is going to get w/o re-paint. Nice work.

 

Awesome work! The hood was like night and day

 

Nice job Ty the 240 looks great, its a shame the paint on a car like that was neglected so much.

 

nice work ty! that thing was HAMMERED.

 

I don't even wear mine...no watches, no necklaces, no rings...
Great work on Nissan, Ty!

 

Quite the improvement! Great job!

 

Thanks guys! It was a ton of work.

 

Nice work!

 

good work

 

some nice results you got out of that job. The car was pretty hash to say the least but looks excellent now.