emaxxman
07-08-2006, 07:54 PM
Well, I took my first shot at polishing an 8 year old dark green Accord today. The car was never polished or waxed ever but washed carefully regulary. I have a fair number of light swirls all over with ALOT of minor scratches on the hood and roof (would really like to know how the roof got them). The car is a daily driver on the interstate here in NJ - which means it takes a beating.
Steps were:
Wash with foam gun, Megs Gold Class, rinse bucket, Megs chenille sponge
Clay with Clay Magic clay and lube
Wash again to remove all lube residue
Polished car with DACP and orange pad (from autogeek.net)
Washed car again to get rid of streaks from polish and polish dust :-(
NXT wax with grey finishing pad from autogeek.net
I will say that the results are somewhat mixed and more disappointing than anything. I read Meguiars Online forum's guide to removing swirls with the PC and did follow them.
Clay yielded great results. The clay did a great job of pulling contaminants off the paint. I could easily feel the difference on the paint with my bare hands.
DACP - It was about 10:30 to 11 am by the time I started this...the paint was starting to get very warm but not scalding hot. The DACP seem to remove just enough of the surface blemishes to create an even appearance. However, it did dust up very fast and I had to apply more to the pad. I think this caused the polish to leave a heavy layer on the car.
I tried Megs QD with a mf towel to removed the DACP. It was taking forever for the QD to penetrate the DACP. I finally decided that the best thing to do was a thorough soak in Gold Class soap and rewash the car. This got rid of of 99% of polish and polish dust. I buffed the rest by hand.
At this point, I was starting to get worried...even though I only worked 1 sq ft at a time and applied even pressure, it only removed the lightest of swirls and none of the scratches. In fact, the scratches and paint chips were amplified by the dry polish in them.
I tried to buff them out by hand the best that I can. I gave up after about an hour.
I then applied liquid NXT with a grey finishing pad. This was the easiest part...the PC was on 3 and the NXT was very easy to spread around. I let it dry for about 10 minutes and did the swipe test. The NXT came off very easily and the shine is quite nice; good slickness too...the mf towels used to grab on to the rough paint surface before.
So, what did I do wrong?
What should I do differently...I know doing this in full sun affected the results but I don't have a choice...not trees or garage. What are my alternatives?
Should I have kept going with the DACP?
I have #80 speed glaze but didn't use it since the DACP didn't seem to do much.
Steps were:
Wash with foam gun, Megs Gold Class, rinse bucket, Megs chenille sponge
Clay with Clay Magic clay and lube
Wash again to remove all lube residue
Polished car with DACP and orange pad (from autogeek.net)
Washed car again to get rid of streaks from polish and polish dust :-(
NXT wax with grey finishing pad from autogeek.net
I will say that the results are somewhat mixed and more disappointing than anything. I read Meguiars Online forum's guide to removing swirls with the PC and did follow them.
Clay yielded great results. The clay did a great job of pulling contaminants off the paint. I could easily feel the difference on the paint with my bare hands.
DACP - It was about 10:30 to 11 am by the time I started this...the paint was starting to get very warm but not scalding hot. The DACP seem to remove just enough of the surface blemishes to create an even appearance. However, it did dust up very fast and I had to apply more to the pad. I think this caused the polish to leave a heavy layer on the car.
I tried Megs QD with a mf towel to removed the DACP. It was taking forever for the QD to penetrate the DACP. I finally decided that the best thing to do was a thorough soak in Gold Class soap and rewash the car. This got rid of of 99% of polish and polish dust. I buffed the rest by hand.
At this point, I was starting to get worried...even though I only worked 1 sq ft at a time and applied even pressure, it only removed the lightest of swirls and none of the scratches. In fact, the scratches and paint chips were amplified by the dry polish in them.
I tried to buff them out by hand the best that I can. I gave up after about an hour.
I then applied liquid NXT with a grey finishing pad. This was the easiest part...the PC was on 3 and the NXT was very easy to spread around. I let it dry for about 10 minutes and did the swipe test. The NXT came off very easily and the shine is quite nice; good slickness too...the mf towels used to grab on to the rough paint surface before.
So, what did I do wrong?
What should I do differently...I know doing this in full sun affected the results but I don't have a choice...not trees or garage. What are my alternatives?
Should I have kept going with the DACP?
I have #80 speed glaze but didn't use it since the DACP didn't seem to do much.