Review: RUPES BigFoot LHR 19E Rotary Polisher by Mike Phillips at Autogeek

[Mike Phillips]

Mike, what is your take on the new Rupes wool pads?

The wool pads for the new RUPES rotary polisher that I saw at SEMA looked very good to me. I'm a fan of longer fibers than shorter fibers when it comes to wool pads. I talked to Jason Rose about this when we held our Roadshow Detailing Class at RUPES in Colorado.

I have not used any of their new pads but the fiber length looks to be about 1 1/4" long possible longer and to me that's a positive. I'm NOT a fan of fiber or pile lengths shorter than one inch.

At first I was thinking they were more aggressive than microfiber pads, but after watching some Rupes produced videos I understand the wool pads remove less paint than a microfiber pad.

I would have to see these videos to see the CONTEXT.

In order to COMPARE one type of pad to another type of pad all other controls must be kept the same. Thus you would have to test microfiber pads and wool pads on rotary buffers and then check results or test microfiber pads and wool pads on orbital polishers and then check results.

Using different tools with different pads would not be an accurate comparison.

I would put money on a competition where if two people were to wetsand AN ENTIRE CAR and the competition was to see who could remove 100% of the sanding marks the fastest - I would choose a wool pad on a rotary buffer every time.

In fact, at the Roadshow Class at RUPES one of the students had repainted doors on his truck. I didn't see the paint before the owner and some of the students machine sanded the doors so I don't know what it looked like. I do know that after they sanded both doors, they TRIED to remove the sanding marks using orbital polishers and microfiber and foam pads. After they tried for 15 or 20 minutes, in an effort to wrap up that project I took over and removed 100% of the sanding marks using the RUPES rotary with a WOOL pad. Then I polished out to a perfect finish using the RUPES BigFoot 21 with the Diamond Ultra Fine Cut polish and a RUPES white foam finishing pad.

After doing the above, everyone came over with swirl finder lights and inspected my work. I can guarantee you - all the could find was perfect paint. (black paint).


The reason I'm not a microfiber pads is because if I need to cut hard and cut fast I already know how to use a rotary buffer. Also - free spinning orbital with any pad simply won't remove sanding marks anytime you get into curved panels or tight areas. This is why a rotary with a wool pad is king of removing sanding marks - you can literally PUSH the edge of a wool pad into any place - know what the hell you're doing - and you can remove all the sanding marks.


I'm pretty sure the video below is the first time the process from start to finish to wetsand a car and finish it out to the waxing step was ever caught on camera.



How to wet sand a car in 8 minutes




Note I'm using a wool pad on a rotary to knock this project out.

I know from following you for years that you are not a big microfiber pad guy, but what do you think of the new pads and what is the cut difference between the blue and the yellow?

Information like this is hard to come by.

Like I said, I have not used the new RUPES wool pads yet. Jason Rose helped or was in charge of designing the SOLO wool pads back when he worked at Meguiar's and I really like the SOLO wool cutting and polishing pads. My initial impressions from the RUPES wool pads is they seem to follow the design of the SOLO pads and that would make sense.

I know you can increase or decrease the aggressiveness of a wool pad by the characteristics of the fibers, i.e. what they are made of, the length of the fiber and other factors - but the BIG PICTURE is something I've been teaching, saying and typing for decades now and that is,

Fibers are form of abrasive

And be it a wool cutting pad or a wool polishing pad - the pad when attached to a rotary buffer and used with a compound is going to CUT.


I'm looking forward to getting the new RUPES wool pads and testing them out.

[Mike Phillips]

Also just to note...


My prediction, made on 02-16-2018 is coming true.... the RUPES pads are smaller diameter than the traditional size pads for full size rotary buffers and LC and B&S are also introducing smaller diameter wool pads.


My Pad Prediction - Smaller Wool Cutting Pads for smaller rotary polishers



Moving into the future there will be or in my opinion SHOULD BE more smaller pads for the new generation lightweight compact rotary polishers.

At Mobile Tech Expo a few weeks ago I spoke with Reps from Lake Country, Buff & Shine and DCR1000 and my recommendation is to make 5" and 6" wool cutting pads, not the soft fuzzy pads but just like traditional wool cutting pads just smaller. This is what is NEEDED for the new compact, lightweight rotary buffers and especially the new cordless tools.


Until pad manufactures catch up with the tools, here's what's available on Autogeek.com

These are in the 6" and 7" range and will work but we really need smaller wool pads.


6.5 inch Hook & Loop DuroWool 100% Twisted Wool Cutting Pad

Meguiars Solo Wool Heavy Cutting Pad 7 inch, wool compounding pad, wool leveling pad, meguiars wool pad, swirl remover pad

6.5 inch 50/50 Wool Acrylic Polishing Pad



Pictured here is a prototype wool cutting pad given to me by Dave Patterson at Lake Country Buffing Pads. This pad is approximately 6" in diameter and I found it to work very well on the new FLEX Cordless PE14
















FWIW

[rlmccarty2000]

Mike I purchased the Rupes 19e and now have a few questions. Do you know if the spindle is the same size as the Flex rotary (5/8)? Which one of your books will help me the most to learn the rotary style? What pad is recommended for jeweling with the rotary? I’ve been googling and can’t come up with the answers. Thanks.

[JustJesus]

The Lake Country Gold pads for jeweling. Haven't tried that myself, but have some pads in hand for when the time does come.

I have the older Hybrid Gold ones. For the newer Force pads, the red ones are softest (Well, yeah. They have them listed for AIOs or cleaner wax; black is listed as denser and for finishing)

Or, from the Originals side, the Black will finish best

This all taken from Lake Country charts and diagrams