Why aggressive pads?

[Surfer]

Some cars need stronger cut pads, an Edge blue with OC wouldn't do squat to one of our cars with hard clear. OC and yellow Edge cutting pad got maybe half the swirls out. My trucks is fairly easy to correct, yellow or green Edge pad and OC and I can get it to finish down like a polish with no marring, it's all in the technique.

[budman3]

Originally Posted by scottgt

im gonna do a test wen i get my new pads

Me too... now all I have to do is find the right canidate for a car...

[scottgt]

haha...i got my other door to do an it will be great...

[P1et]

The short answer is that people want to get instant gratification. Aggressive pads with an aggressive polish will get the scratches out. Level it off with an SSR1 on a white pad or something to that effect and you're done.

[richy]

I use the pad/polish combo based on the paint condition. I tend not to change pads with a single product, I will change to a lesser cut or polish along with the pad change.

[INMY01TA]

I try not to use my LC orange pad for this reason.

[Nimble]

Meh, I've done lots of cars where a LC white and OC or SSR 2.5, etc didn't do enough. The aggressive pads are made for, well, aggressive defect removal, and surprise, that's what I use them for. This isn't rocket science fellas.

[David Fermani]

I'd rather reach for a medium polish with a wool pad instead of a heavy polish on a cutting foam pad any day of the week. I personally think that wool is for removing the defect and foam is to create depth. Defects *can* be worked out with foam, but I prefer the easier and faster route with wool.

[orngez]

Originally Posted by David Fermani

I'd rather reach for a medium polish with a wool pad instead of a heavy polish on a cutting foam pad any day of the week. I personally think that wool is for removing the defect and foam is to create depth. Defects *can* be worked out with foam, but I prefer the easier and faster route with wool.

i prefer to go the foam route...yes wool does an amazing job of removing defects...but it also removes a ton of clear in the process...just for example (the numbers are just hypothetically speaking)....if you had a scratch that was 5 microns deep...foam can finesse the paint enough so that it removes 5-7 microns...wool wood remove 8-10 microns in the same process..in both scenarios the defect is removed but one was overkill...not the case in every situation but i prefer the minimalist route ...basically the minimun clear coat a foam pad can remove is less than the wool pad...and if the foam pad is enough to remove the defect why risk removing more?

[David Fermani]

Originally Posted by orngez

i prefer to go the foam route...yes wool does an amazing job of removing defects...but it also removes a ton of clear in the process...just for example (the numbers are just hypothetically speaking)....if you had a scratch that was 5 microns deep...foam can finesse the paint enough so that it removes 5-7 microns...wool wood remove 8-10 microns in the same process..in both scenarios the defect is removed but one was overkill...not the case in every situation but i prefer the minimalist route ...basically the minimun clear coat a foam pad can remove is less than the wool pad...and if the foam pad is enough to remove the defect why risk removing more?

I don't think this is accurate. Wool will cut cleaner, faster and cooler where foam is the opposite. It heats the paint up more, melting more of the surface around it while you remove the scratch. The best way to remove a scratch and trying to preserve paint at the same time is to just wet sand the scratched area. That way, removing too much paint isn't a concern. Each pad has it's place, but for cutting, wool (I think) is the most effective pad unless there's a special issue with paint harness/softness. I try to avoid using wool on black Mercedes unless I'm removing wet sand scratches(3000 grit and coarser). If I was removing 4000 grit sand scratches on that car, I'd use a cutting foam (yellow EDGE). For a black Corvette, I'd have no problem using a wool for heavy defect removal. Everyone has their own procedures I guess.