help with meguiars 105

[ceracer33]

i am in need of some help or suggestions. i am trying to use m105 to polish out 2000 grit wet sanding marks and im not having much luck. i can get a fantastic shine, but when i look closely the sanding scratches are still there. this is a vehicle that was repainted about a year ago with a bc/cc, no idea what brands were used. had a ton of orange peel and trash. i wet sanded the entire vehilce with 2000 by hand. im using a makita rotary buffer set to about 2300 rpms with a wool pad. its taking forever. i even tried going over some areas with some 3m 3000 grit trizac on a da and then buffing, while this is much faster, i still see faint sand scratches. its driving me crazy. am i doing something wrong? i purchased the m105 after reading online that its suppose to be very good stuff, so far its not working for me. i have some s&n products cutting compound that was MUCH cheaper and im getting much better results with it, neither one is getting the job done very quickly though. i spent about 4 hours today compounding on the roof of a single cab truck( finished in 3000 trizac) and it is still not to the point that i can polish it yet. can anyone give me some advice? this is a show quality truck and i dont want to send it out of my shop until its perfect. the scratches are very small, but still there.

[richy]

I can only surmise its your technique. It should easily knock them out with rotary and wool. Now, having said that, I really believe that 3G grit should always be your last step when et sanding. Check out a video I did for using M105:

Richy's M105 video (no dusting technique)

[tuscarora dave]

Try applying a 1/8" bead of 105 to the wool pad itself, about one inch in from the outer edge of the wool pad. Like a ring of compound around the pad, then rub it into the wool with a back and forth motion using your fingers so that it primes the pad deep into the wool fibers.

Using the lowest speed setting, spread the product in a 12" x 12" section and immediately bump the speed up to about 1800 to 2000 RPM and with the pad slightly tilted, work a slow arm speed in overlapping passes in one direction and then in the opposite direction. After the compound goes dry on the paint, lay your pad completely flat and go over your work section twice like that. I find that if you are just picking up the bead of 105 off of the paint and working it, it doesn't work as well for removing heavy scratches as spreading it around into the fibers first.

If you must lay a bead on the paint and pick it up with the wool pad, then shrink your work section down to about a 8" x 8" section at a time.

Look for a thread by me in a few days of a Corvette that I'm working on now with 105. The thing was hammered with deep scratches all over it and 105, used the way I just described with a purple foamed wool pad has removed all but the few scratches that are too deep to safely remove. It cuts and finishes better than anything I've used. There are compounds that cut faster but they don't finish anywhere near as nice as 105.

[ceracer33]

i previously used 3m extra cut in the same manor as im trying with the 105 and had great results with it, i was hoping to get something a little cheaper than the 3m that would work just as well. what are some products that are more aggressive than the 105? while i will admit that the 105 does leave a very glossy, low swirl finish, it still must be polished to remove all the swirls.

richy- thanks for the vid. i watched it, however i dont really feel like it applies to my problem. im not having issues with dusting, or bringing back a shine from a dull, oxidized finish, it works great for me at that, where my problem comes in is removing wetsanding scratches. im getting an amazing gloss with it, but upon close inspection the sanding scratches are still there. almost as if its trying to fill them in rather than cut them out. i know this isnt the case, thats just how it looks.

dave- i will give this method a shot in just a minute and post back with my results. i really hate to give up on this product as i can see some nice advantages to it, and i hear nothing but good things about it. i just need to figure out how to make it work for me. as of right now im better off with the s&n brite cut im getting for $25/gal. it cuts the scratches very nicely but leaves a ton of swirls. i may need to start with the brite cut and move to the 105 before polishing maybe? would really like to eliminate having to use 3 products all the time though.

[tuscarora dave]

Originally Posted by ceracer33

dave- i will give this method a shot in just a minute and post back with my results. i really hate to give up on this product as i can see some nice advantages to it, and i hear nothing but good things about it. i just need to figure out how to make it work for me. as of right now im better off with the s&n brite cut im getting for $25/gal. it cuts the scratches very nicely but leaves a ton of swirls. i may need to start with the brite cut and move to the 105 before polishing maybe? would really like to eliminate having to use 3 products all the time though.

I hear you on the 3M products. Before anyone says it, I know 3M owns Meguiars. Sometimes you just need to use something more abrasive than 105 to get the job done, I have used "rocks in a bottle" compounds then followed that with 105 the remove sanding marks in really hard paints. I think for the extra step involved in doing so, it's better for me to just work a little longer with 105.

For what it's worth, it took me over a year of periodic trials to perfect the use of 105. It all came together for me after reading Kevin Brown's "Supplemental Wetting Agents" PDF.

[Mike.Phillips@Autogeek]

Buff using a slower RPM

At high RPMs your pad is basically skimming over the surface, I don't hardly ever go over 1500 RPM's when compounding with a rotary buffer, wool pad and M105

Hold the pad flat when you can, move to buffing at an angle for curves or tight areas

Clean your pad often
You need to remove the caked-up product off the pad. You really want to use a steel spur if you have one.

Don't buff out an area any larger than 2' by 2' and buff a smaller area for harder paints and/or deeper defects.


Some tips in here,

Video: Tips for using a Rotary Buffer and the Flex 3401 on vertical panels

[Mike.Phillips@Autogeek]

I'm not finished with this yet but there are some tips here too...

How to use a rotary buffer

[ceracer33]

dave- well after trying your method i got MUCH better results. not sure why it makes such a big difference but man did it. i was able to compound out the entire roof with no trace of sand scratches in about 40 minutes. i spent a few hours on it yesterday in a 2'x2' area and still had sand scratches, so this is a major improvement. thanks a lot for the advice. i was about ready to throw this stuff in the trash, i kept trying different ways of using it and nothing was working for me. i'll continue to use it until this bottle is gone and then decide if i'll buy more of it or try something else.

my only complaint is i try to keep a neat shop and im making a huge mess with the compound. after the initial bead on the pad and started using less and less compound on it to find the sweet spot for what got the job done with the least amount of compound being thrown everywhere. i found that just dabbing about 4 dots on the pad and working an 18"x18" or so section at a time worked best for me. if i used a small enough amount to not throw any i wasnt cutting enough, i guess i'll have to live with a little mess for now.

thanks again.

mike- i tried using the 105 at several different speeds from the lowest setting on my makita up to about 2500 rpms to try and find its sweet spot. i generally buff with it set around 1000 and keeping the pad flat, however i couldnt not get good results with the 105 using this method. it may have been because i dont usually put the compound directly on the pad but rather on the panel iteslf. i normally like to squirt out a bead and use my hand to smooth it out evenly in the area i intend to buff, i then turn the buffer all the way down and spread the compound a little more before turning the speed up. i could not get this method to work for me using 105. i'll try applying directly to the pad and using a little lower speed and see if that still cuts the scratches while keeping the splatter down some.

[Mike.Phillips@Autogeek]

What is the truck?

Pictures?

[tuscarora dave]

Originally Posted by ceracer33

dave- well after trying your method i got MUCH better results. not sure why it makes such a big difference but man did it. i was able to compound out the entire roof with no trace of sand scratches in about 40 minutes. i spent a few hours on it yesterday in a 2'x2' area and still had sand scratches, so this is a major improvement. thanks a lot for the advice. i was about ready to throw this stuff in the trash, i kept trying different ways of using it and nothing was working for me. i'll continue to use it until this bottle is gone and then decide if i'll buy more of it or try something else.

my only complaint is i try to keep a neat shop and im making a huge mess with the compound. after the initial bead on the pad and started using less and less compound on it to find the sweet spot for what got the job done with the least amount of compound being thrown everywhere. i found that just dabbing about 4 dots on the pad and working an 18"x18" or so section at a time worked best for me. if i used a small enough amount to not throw any i wasnt cutting enough, i guess i'll have to live with a little mess for now.

thanks again.

You're welcome!! I'm glad you got it to work better.

I find that rubbing in the product to the wool pad allows more of the fibers to bite into what it is that you're trying to remove. It's somewhat of a pain doing it this way but it works a lot faster for me (and uses less product). Work on rubbing the product into the wool so that the wool fibers are just damp with product. Spread it around your work area and immediately bump up the speed and work it. Once you get a controlled enough amount of product in the pad as to not splatter it everywhere but you're still working somewhat wet on the panel, you'll have dialed it in.

Smaller sections seem counter productive but it shaves hours off a heavy paint correction in total.