2 - Day Cadillac Escalade ESV Buff, Touch up & an odd discovery

[heckhole]

Had a Cadillac Escalade ESV in the shop for a full buff. It was in really rough shape but I was able to save her. I had some touch-up to do on the front bumper and a few spots on the lower half of the doors. On my 2nd night of working, it was near 2am and I was getting too tired to focus on a perfect touch-up. I decided to try something that has been mentioned to me by a friend who owns a body shop. I took out the touch-up paint, dropped some onto a small rubber applicator/squeegee - let it sit for about 30 seconds and proceeded to wipe it onto the area requiring touch-up. The paint was a touch thick and it allowed me to fill the scratches flush, with excess paint around the area, albeit very thin. I then quickly took lacquer thinner and wiped around to remove the excess while staying away from the scratch repaired areas. I let it set up for about 30 minutes under halogens while I cleaned up my buffing mess on the rest of the vehicle. I then went over the area with my PC, White pad & M205. Took a matter of seconds before the excess paint was removed & the scratch area was now flush & was now a 1 foot repair.

I decided to try this method on a large amount of rock ships behind the front tire on the driver side. I was a little nervous but went for it, I had plenty of thinner with me to correct my experiment if I failed miserably. I prepped the area, set a fair amount of paint on my applicator, let it set up for about 30 seconds and gave a quick swipe across the needed area. Good results again, put my halogens a bit closer, let it dry and used the same PC/White/M205 combo and removed the excess & now had an almost perfectly flush touch up again. I didn't take any pictures of my finished touch-up repairs, it was after 3am and I had enough!

I've attached a few shots of the vehicle just for fun.
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[TTQ B4U]

That's a LOT of surface to buff out. Like an F150 or minivan, these big SUV's seem to go on forever compared to the typical sedan.

Nice work! Beat-down black is a real PIA but you made it look easy.

[heckhole]

Did a few bad areas with my DeWalt Rotary & the rest with my PC. About 13 hours total! I wish I got a few better inspection photos, I finished this vehicle to perfection. It went extremely, extremely smooth! I've never had a black vehicle finish so easily.

[heckhole]

Forgot to mention, the finished photos have NO glaze/wax. I didn't do that until the morning before delivery!!

[heckhole]

Here's a in-progress before & after.

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[MikeC78]

Nice save! That is in horrible shape, looks like the owner used a Brillo pad. I have a regular sized escalade and I feel your pain. I just use HD speed, but mine is not nearly in that shape. What a time saver that product is.

[heckhole]

I should have taken some photos of the rear quarters. Awful. The vehicle was basically Gray under decent lighting, nevermind in the sun.

[MikeC78]

I sure hope you're getting compensated well for your time. I'm not sure anyone would tackle that for under 1k.

[heckhole]

$600 was my price not including materials. I used 12 Hex Logic pads and a full 32oz bottle of compound. Didn't use much finishing polish, she finished out unbelievable with minimal effort, I have never run into that before. I was so shocked I chem stripped it just to verify.

Every inch of this vehicle, from front to back, top to bottom was polished. I only used my DeWalt in a few places where my PC struggled to have power. I used Hex Yellow & a combination of M105 & 205. I didn't do a badge removal, I cut 2 of my old Hex pads into small blocks and used those for hand polishing pads for in/around the badges. It was definitely one of the most tedious cuts I've done just because of the sheer SF of vehicle lol. But, roughly 13 hours with a few breaks over 2 nights, I think I far exceeded my time expectations. I figured roughly 20hrs.

[umana2482]

From looking at the pictures that Cadillac was awful. Good work.

[heckhole]

From looking at the pictures that Cadillac was awful. Good work.

Unfortunately the vast majority of my work is major correction like this. Don't get me wrong, I prefer to have work like this so I can correct these cars to my standards. Any time a customer requests a 'shine' when the car looks this bad, I cringe that my name is on it...but...money is money. But, my shop runs as a interior detailing/exterior detailing shop by day, and I do corrections at night, these huge projects keep me from being home and often running on 2-3hrs of sleep in a 72hr period.