Trashed 2001 Honda Civic Ex - Paint Correction & Americoat

[KMG]

This car belongs to a neighbor of mine and it was bought out of a junkyard for $800 with a bad transmission. The car has roughly 181k miles on it, and the exterior was quite rough. The interior is next to perfect in the car so he wanted to get the exterior up to par on it. The car is Nighthawk Black Pearl, however with all the paint defects it looked more dark gray/black and was hiding all the blue pearl and metallic.

Before Pictures

picture of the car just after being dropped off

lots of dirt build up residue after intalling a new windshiled gasket

more dirt build up behind the rear wheel



some bugs on the front bumper

some bird droppings and other dirt built up on the roof

you can see swirls along with buffer tails on the trunk lid

this picture shows the condition of the hood

Wash Process

first step of the cleaning process was cleaning the wheels and tires

the vehicle was then treated with a foam pre-soak prior to the 2-bucket wash

all set up for the 2 bucket wash

Post Wash Inspection

all washed and up looking good, pictures can be quite deceiving though

the true condition of the hood, which was also in very poor shape with lots of swirls and scratches

another picture of the same area

pretty much the entire car looked like this, this is the driver side door

behind the rear quarter window on the driver side

Paint Correction Process

the car was pulled inside and taped off to begin the compounding and polishing process. this is a picture of the passenger side fender covered in swirls

another picture of the passenger side rear quarter

taped off for my test spot on the passenger front fender

let the fun begin

50/50 shot after being compounded

the same area after being fully compounded

50/50 shot of the passenger side door

50/50 shot of the rear passenger quarter


hood taped off for a 50/50 shot

actual 50/50 shot of the hood after being compounded

this is a shot of the trunk lid, you can see the buffer tails and swirls on the area that has not been corrected


the car was then pulled outside and power washed off to remove some of the dust build up from compounding process

a lot more clarity on the hood after removing all the previous defects

Coating Process

the car was wiped down with Eraser to prep it for the coating application

Finished Product

finished product, the car now has lots of gloss and depth which it did not previously have







Thanks for looking!

[tylerlehmann6]

Awesome job on this !

[Zelfiris]

That made a really big difference.

What was your combo for compound and polish choices?

[KMG]

That made a really big difference.

What was your combo for compound and polish choices?

I used my Rupes 15 with megs MF cutting pads and Americana Car Cares IAT1500 for the compounding process. This is a new product that isn't on the market yet that I have been testing out and should be hitting the market soon. Its a great compound and I have been using it a lot lately. It works a lot like FG400.
This finished down pretty nicely, however I went over the car with Reflect on a blue Buff & Shine Pad just to clean it up a bit more. The owner was going crazy with how it came out. His dad told him he was wasting his time, that no one could fix that damage, LOL.

[Kyle_Elantra]

Looks great!

How much are they asking? I'm not too far away and I'm looking to get a car just for traveling back and forth to work.

[KMG]

Looks great!

How much are they asking? I'm not too far away and I'm looking to get a car just for traveling back and forth to work.

Lol He isn't going to be selling it. This is a car he picked up to use for running back and forth to work and stuff.

[kevincwelch]

Nice save! I have a special fondness for the 2001 Honda Civic couple as this was the first car I ever bought on my own. I basically had the same 2 door, only mine had a spoiler. Loved it.

[The Guz]

Nice job as usual.

[hollerstiltner]

Holy moly what a turn around, outstanding!

[Marc08EX]

Great job recovering that paint from the dead!