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  1. #1
    Super Member richy's Avatar
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    '17 370z & My Love/Hate Relationship with Essence

    I had this car booked for a while and the customer was gracious enough to let me bump his slot a few times, so I took care of him by doing his windshield for free with Forte. This is a brand new Nissan 370z Nismo edition. Glorious. Gorgeous. Pick whatever "G" word you want, it was breathtaking. To be honest, when I first looked at it I thought "How am I going to improve this?" as that's always my goal. You can decide whether I actually did or not. I'm not telling what the customer said, LOL.

    Anyway, here it is as it arrived. This was my 4th car directly in a row during my week off. My shoulder hurts, my knee hurts...this full time detailing is not easy!! Makes me seem like a wuss only doing it once a week!!




















    First up was the wheels. The faces and barrels were lightly shot with Zep Citrus and then washed with Megs HW. The tires were cleaned with Zep 505 and the wells with LATA. This was to be a wheels-off, Finest detail, so they would be more intensively cleaned upon being removed.


    Next up was decontamination. I could see little black dots on the rear surfaces so rather than the usual one stage of decon, I gave it two. I liberally sprayed IronX to the entire car and then even more where it was the worst. Here it is in action:








    The car was then washed with IronX paste and a wash mitt followed by a regular wash using Megs HW. It was then brought inside and clayed with a clay towel.


    Now it was time to pull the wheels. After finding the proper torque specs in the manual, it was safe to proceed. Each wheel was pulled and the barrel was intensively cleaned with DG Squeaky Clean as was the caliper. I'm telling you that you don't have it clean until you've used this product. Check out how gorgeous the caliper looks only after being cleaned with SC:





    Once chemically cleaned, the barrel, face and caliper were all double coated with CQF. The front wells were coated (at no cost-I throw it in if someone wants the wheels done) with Dlux. Once I re-installed the wheel and before lowering it to the ground, I shot the tire with Opti Bond from my small paint gun. Here is a wheel in progress:

















    All done:






    Now onto my love/hate relationship with Essence. I love it but it drives me crazy...wait...I should marry it!!!! LMAO!! I had such great luck with the last 3 cars using it with a yellow B/S pad and doing the double wipe. It would leave smudges in the paint that had to be gone over again to remove. Slow speed, fast speed, Slow Arm, Fast Arm, yellow pad, white pad...NOTHING WORKED! In the end, I ditched it and went over the hood with M205 and my cleaned yellow B/S pad + 3401 and got stellar results. The hood had a few very light marks so I hit those with black TB wool + M100 to quickly and effectively get rid of them. The rest of the car was done with M205. The chrome exhaust tips were hand polished with M205. I even polished the glass with M205.

    The customer was working midnights while I was doing this car, so it got delivered at night, so I left it in the garage for him to see with all the lighting.

    Check out the next 2 shots. Both are exactly the same except for focus. The first is on the flake and the 2nd on the LED light above:








    Here she is all done:
























































    Thanks for looking. Comments always appreciated.

  2. #2
    Super Member ScottH's Avatar
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    Re: '17 370z & My Love/Hate Relationship with Essence

    Wonderful job, and yes that car certainly now deserves all the 'g' words you mentioned and then some!

    ScottH

  3. #3
    Super Member LSNAutoDetailing's Avatar
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    Re: '17 370z & My Love/Hate Relationship with Essence

    Amazing Richy... If I lived near you I'd have you detail my cars.

  4. #4
    Super Member AZ Mike's Avatar
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    Re: '17 370z & My Love/Hate Relationship with Essence

    It looks really good(another G word). I like the picture of the flake. How many cigars for this one?
    AZ Mike aka "Repeat"

  5. #5
    Super Member VISITOR's Avatar
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    Re: '17 370z & My Love/Hate Relationship with Essence

    very nice rich, sick car. btw, have you ever had any issues with using ironx paste on the paint like you would normally use the spray version on?

  6. #6
    Super Member Paul A.'s Avatar
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    Re: '17 370z & My Love/Hate Relationship with Essence

    Absolutely stunning, Richy. That hood shot and the side shot just before it are unbelievable.

  7. #7
    Junior Member ShaneB's Avatar
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    Re: '17 370z & My Love/Hate Relationship with Essence

    Excellent work! Gorgeous car!

    You mentioned you washed it with iron x paste. I'm a little confused as to what you meant by that. How does that work? I have a bottle of it but wouldn't think to use it to "wash" a car

  8. #8
    Super Member fly07sti's Avatar
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    Re: '17 370z & My Love/Hate Relationship with Essence

    G** Damn! That Z looks wet. That's the first Nismo Z that I've seen without a large wing.

  9. #9
    Super Member richy's Avatar
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    Re: '17 370z & My Love/Hate Relationship with Essence

    Quote Originally Posted by ScottH View Post
    Wonderful job, and yes that car certainly now deserves all the 'g' words you mentioned and then some!

    ScottH
    Thanks very much Scott!

    Quote Originally Posted by paul_g View Post
    Amazing Richy... If I lived near you I'd have you detail my cars.
    Paul, thanks so much man! On here, with the company I keep, that's a very high compliment!!

    Quote Originally Posted by AZ Mike View Post
    It looks really good(another G word). I like the picture of the flake. How many cigars for this one?
    Mike, the flake was just amazing! I actually recommended to him that he get a clear bra for the front (even though I hate them) because you can't usually get touch up paint for that colour and I'd hate to see him get chips that couldn't be fixed well. And, I think only 3 cigars for this one.

    Quote Originally Posted by VISITOR View Post
    very nice rich, sick car. btw, have you ever had any issues with using ironx paste on the paint like you would normally use the spray version on?
    Thanks very much! No issues at all. I don't think it's as strong for contamination removal as the spray is, but it's WAY more economical.

    Quote Originally Posted by Puckman View Post
    Absolutely stunning, Richy. That hood shot and the side shot just before it are unbelievable.
    Thanks very much. I'm happy they came out as I was too lazy to use the tripod for most of them. <hangs his head in shame>

    Quote Originally Posted by ShaneB View Post
    Excellent work! Gorgeous car!

    You mentioned you washed it with iron x paste. I'm a little confused as to what you meant by that. How does that work? I have a bottle of it but wouldn't think to use it to "wash" a car
    Thanks very much Shane. It was Corey would originally suggested it that way. It's just like using the IX soap gel, but it's thicker and stronger. I immerse an Incredi Sponge in my wash water, wring it out and then squeeze a bead or 2 of the IX paste on the sponge and wash a section. I've usually washed the car first so I don't worry about picking up contamination on the sponge, but I still look at it after every panel regardless. I put another bead or 2 (depending on how big the panel is) and repeat. I don't think it gets nearly the contamination off that the spray does to be honest, but it sure gets rid of the wax and anything else on the surface. It has that IronX smell to it, so you know it's working, LOL.

    Quote Originally Posted by fly07sti View Post
    G** Damn! That Z looks wet. That's the first Nismo Z that I've seen without a large wing.
    Thanks kindly Don! I've not seen a Nismo Z yet, so it looked fine to me, LOL.

  10. #10
    Junior Member ShaneB's Avatar
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    Re: '17 370z & My Love/Hate Relationship with Essence

    Ah ok you had already washed the car. That was one big part of what I didn't understand. I wouldn't think to do something like that on a dirty car lol. Thanks for clarifying

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