First Detail!!

[Ali]

Man was today a long day! Today was my very first detail, let alone the first time i've ever really washed a car believe it or not! I have always paid for these services and as i mentioned in my previous thread it was time for me to start taking pride in my car and how it looks and not rely on paying someone to do it. I think purchasing a new Cadillac CTS a few weeks ago is what sparked this fire :)

Well i don't have pics due to the weather being kind of crappy today so i didn't take any but i plan on taking some tomorrow.

Just to let everyone know the process i went through this is what i did.

1.) Dawn wash
2.) Zaino Clay bar with Z6/water solution as lubricant
3.) Washed the car again and fully dried it
4.) 2 coats of Z5 polish with Z6 Between each coat
5.) One final coat of Z2 with Z6 applied right after it

The polishes were applied with ZFX which accelerates the curing time and allows one to put on multiple coats without having to wait hours for it to cure. This entire prociess took me 4 hours which.

I do have a few questions.

1.) I know this product is recommended to be applied very thin, but when applying it does not look like the car was caked in the product, so some areas had that hazed look where i could see the polish on the car waiting to dry and other areas did not, almost as if it wasn't put on all areas, but i made sure i went over every spot. Is this normal or should the entire car have obviously been covered in product.


2.) I'm new to this so i am a little unsure as to what to be looking for. I know that sounds silly, but my car of course looked great but with me not having much experience what am i looking for to know if the job was well done? I can see great reflections in the paint, the clouds and trees from above are seen through the paint and i poured a little water on the car and it shot right off it. Also the 3D look of the paint was pretty cool, its like certain areas of the paint looked all crazy like one of those mirrors you see in haunted houses if that makes any sense lol..it was pretty cool.


3.) I tried the towel test where a towel should slide right off your car, i was unable to make this happen. Not sure if this is a valid test or not but threw the towel on the hood and it did not move. But when feeling the car with finger tips it is obviously smooth as butter and feels great.


4.) Anyone that has a Cadillac CTS or has detailed one can you help me out with this, the front grill has the graphite peices in them, well i thinmk they are graphite or plastic. They were dirty and i tried to touch them up with a towel but it looks as if they are stained since no product i had would cover it up. What can be done with this? Its the grey peices inside the front grill of the new CTS body style.


Overall it was a great day and I have definitely been bit by the detailing bug and am excited to learn more and continue improving! I will never pay anyone to do this again, i loved it and my car has never looked this nice! I have yet to do the interior, pretty tired after all that lol.

I would like to thank Matt and RohnRamirez for alll their help. They were very patient with my questions and really took the time to explain things for me. I apologize for the "rookie" questions...You guys were great!

[rohnramirez]

Great to hear of your experience but, as most members here would say :postpics:

1 - You don't really need to see the product when you initially apply it. And when it dries, you will see a slight haze. If it appears caked, it would mean you applied too much. A waste of product. It is always better to apply thin multiple coats than one thick coat.

2 - sounds good to me :dblthumb2: but i would keep water away from the finish until it has fully cured. But since you used ZFX, i think it was fine. But i'm a bit OC with it, so i always want to avoid water always, except when washing of course..lol

3 - Hahahha..i used to do this too, but was not meant for testing. It actually depends on the car's shape and the MF used. If it's flat it most likely won't slide off. The plush MFs slide quite easily on my hood after UPP and DPMW.

4 - Try cleaning it first, then use 303. 303 took care of my flat black trims.

You're welcome! Anyone on the site would be happy to share their knowledge.

[Ali]

I know i know, i will try to post pics tomorrow morning before i leave the house and get the car dirty lol. Funny thing is all that work and attention to detail and it takes one drive to get it dirty...man i can see how one with OCD would literally have to carry a MF towel witht hem for touch ups if they hit a puddle lol.

Thanks for the reassurance, i feel like i did everyhting right but since the weather was cloudy today and all the work was done in my garage i can't wait to see the final product out in the sun tomorrow. This will help see any places where i did not buff out all product or any streaks.

One thing i did notice and this is a rookie mistake i'm sure, is i just got into my car and i rolled the windows down and they got all wed on both side of the window lol. Looks like i should of did that during the cleaning process to get the wwater down betwen the windwo and door.


One question, it looks as if i scartched my drivers side mirror. Not sure if it was like that before but i was just looking at it and there is a section with a fair amount of scratches. I was thinking maybe it was the towel, but i look at the other mirror on the passenger side and that one was fine. Maybe its always been there. Is theree a way to remove these scratches, its weird its all in the left hand corners in one sqaure.

[rohnramirez]

I hope you had bright lights on your garage for better vision when you went through your car. Are you talking about the mirror or the plastic surrounding the mirror? Glass is kinda hard to scratch, so i doubt the MF would do that, even on the plastic finish, it couldn't be towel unless you were using something else. Anyway, you can use a polish first to remove the scratches, if that doesn't work, you can move up to a compound. Do you have a polisher..a DA or a RP maybe?

[Ali]

I hope you had bright lights on your garage for better vision when you went through your car. Are you talking about the mirror or the plastic surrounding the mirror? Glass is kinda hard to scratch, so i doubt the MF would do that, even on the plastic finish, it couldn't be towel unless you were using something else. Anyway, you can use a polish first to remove the scratches, if that doesn't work, you can move up to a compound. Do you have a polisher..a DA or a RP maybe?


It wasn't dark out side when doing the work so the garage was fairly lit, we brought it out side for a final buff and it i didn't see anything that caught my eye or my friend who was there with me. I think it came out pretty good for first attempt..we will see!

I am talking about the glass itself, like i said i think it may have been there but i never noticed it. Definitely not the towels since i would of seen this on both mirrors.

And just to show you how much i know..have no idea what a DA or RP is lol Maybe i do just don't know the lingo yet.

[rohnramirez]

That's okay Ali. Sorry to bombard you with the acronyms.

DA = Dual Action Polsiher or ROP = Random Orbital Polisher
RP = Rotary Polisher

I've had good results by hand before i jumped into using machines. So you might want to give it a try since it's just a small area your going to work on. Just a word of caution, glass is really hard to work on by machine, let alone by hand. You'll need the Lake country Euro Foam Pads for that and a compound and a lot of elbow grease. :)