Aston Martin Detail By Barry Theal

[Barry Theal]

Good day all. Its been a while since I have posted any of my work. Things here have been extremely busy. I can truthfully say I’m living the dream that I always wanted to. As many of you know, the expansion of Presidential Details has grown a tremendous amount over the last year. Presidential Details has grown from a part-time business out of my house to now a rather large company with 8 employees other then myself and we have moved from the house to one shop, to now the present location. A lot of my daytime work consist of Logistics that caters to 40 to 60 cars a week. At any given time you can stop in and see us providing Detailing, headlight repair, dent repair, interior repair and wheel repair. Along with some other services. I personally have decided to only work on the so called special cars. I personally only do about 2 - 4 cars a month. Mostly rather large projects such as the one I present today. With the ongoing growth there are some really big plans coming up in the next few months that hopefully will be rewarding to not only myself, but the entire detailing community. To the many of you who have inspired and encouraged me to chase my dream, I thank you kindly. My success would not be possible without you.
Today, I present to you an Aston Martin Vantage. This car is a recent purchase of the owner and his first experience into the luxury car seen. During the conversation with him, he had mentioned that the car had several repainted area’s that he wanted to be addressed.
This detail consisted over 5 days. The majority of the time was spent sanding and polishing. The cad had some severe marring, holograms, swirls, and its not easy fixing a bad repaint on top of it all. The interior was wasn’t hateful, but still need some work. There was compound or polish build up and splatter in some area’s as well. Then there was the normal build up of dust, dirt, and debris in other area’s. The car really was in need of a good solid reconditioning.
Here are several shots of how the car arrived.
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This had to be my favorite before picture out of them all. The laziness of some body shops who left painters masking tape in the hood jam. Some people just don’t get it.
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[Barry Theal]

First I removed the hood vents and the engine cover. The main reason I opted to remove the engine cover is because of the badge place on it by Aston Martin. I didn’t want nothing to damage this particular badge. It was later cleaned by steam.

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As you can tell from the photo’s the ride down made for a dirty ride. I first started with a high presure foam bath using soap designed to breakdown dirt, grime, filth and debris. The foam sat on the car for about 3-5 minutes allowing suds to do the work. I find this a very crucial step, the breakdown process during the decontamination stage is pretty vital in preventing wash induced marring.

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I followed with a high pressure rinse of reverse osmosis water to blast off as much loose debris as possible. Paying attention to the heavy build up area’s.

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Following this step the car was foamed again maintaining the same principles yet this time it was to to mechanical cleanse the paint. First I started with a small boars hair brush to massage the area’s around the badges, all the seems, and inside tight spots a normal wash mitt could not reach.

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Once this task was completed, The car was clayed to remove any embedded particles left on the paint surface. I clayed the glass. Metal trim and any painted surface. For the third time the car was foamed to remove any last and final debris then rinsed off. I pulled the car out in the sun to inspect the damage to all surfaces and this is what I found.

This photo shows some general paint marring cuased over time from improper washing. The paint really lack its luster to shine at this point.

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In this close up photo you can see the holograms induced by the body shop who did the previous repaint.

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IN the above photo it really shows the holograms and swirls. This caused the paint to refrect light as opposed to reflecting it.

After doing some paint meter readings. I knew from experience and the logically numbers that I had plenty of room to remove some clear. One panel at a time was masked. This allowed me to turn my focus to one panel instead of the entire car.

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I did some inspection under various lighting to try and bring out more of the defect shown. As a professional detailer I find that the best light for true correctionis that natural sun, but when working indoors I have on hand about 5 to 10 different lights to provide me results.

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Here is a close up of the paint fully cleaned and decontaminated. Notice how deep the swirls are under the halogens.

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The entire car was color sanded “ for the new guys in the business that’s wet sanding” I first started with 1000 grit blocked by hand then 2000 grit, also blocked by hand.

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Here you can see me using the interface as a squeegee.

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Following the actual hand sanding by block. I choose to use my snap on sander to further fine the sanding marks with 300o grit.

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Tighter area’s where my 6 inch da wouldn’t fit, I used a 3 inch da to fit.

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I also did some final 3000 grit sanding with my hand for the really tight spots.

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Here is after the entire car was sanded with 4000 grit to futher refine the 3000 grit marks. All major sanding was finished.. This was a rather quick step, but made all the difference in the final polishing.

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Here is a picture after it was wiped down with solvent.

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During the course of the actual sanding the entire car had some fish eyes that got removed and many area’s were nibbed for dirt.

One of about 4 area’s had some paint shrinkage from the body work. IN the first photo you can see how the paint looks like it was pulled together. This is what need sanded out. This exact area I went as low as 600 and work my way up the sanding ladder. In the words of a good friend. Kids don’t try this at home. Lol

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I my dent light to show the defects. It really brought out the contours in the marks. This is actually a very tough thing to do, but I got about 90 to 95% of it out with out jeopardizing the clear

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Here you can see the final photo of the paint smoothed out.

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The entire car was masked off to prevet compound build up in areas and such. I really wanted to remove all the badges as I normally would during a sanding project, but giving the piss poor paint job. I was worried about removing the badges and paint as they were pulled off. Sometimes you just have to humble yourself and play it safe.


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Sometimes you just have to go at it vertical. I had about an in the needed compounded out between the bodyline and the vent edge. Nothing like spinning a wheel at 2300 rpms vertical. LOL I say this again “ kids don’t try that one at home.


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Here is a 50/50 of the sanding marks removed from the hood. This is after wool pad and heavy compounding.

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Here under the halogens I made my way to the fender and you can see the left side is sanded and the right side the marks are removed. The paint was still a little hazed from the wool pad.

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Quick pause for an action shot. Had my game face on here .

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Here is a photo I took after working my way around the the lower half.

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Once the wool pad and heavier compounding was done. I did a wipedown with foaming glass cleaner to remove all the polishing oils and dust.


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UP next was some M105 and foam compounding to remove all the haze left behind from the wool. This was done with a Makita rotory.

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A 50/50 of the hood after under halogens. Nice reflective finish for a heavy compound.

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Following the entire compound stage I choose to do another foaming of the car to completely strip all oils by chemical.

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[Barry Theal]

[SIZE="3"]At this point I also did some wheel cleaning as well. They were dirty!!! Here you can see the chemical doing its job after a good massaging to break everything down,

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During the interior process all area’s clean, conditioned. There was no dressing at all used. I prefer a nice natural look. Just how it came from a factory. I used compressed air, a shop vac, some interior apc. All the leather was hand conditioned upon the cleansing. Several brushes were used to get back in the tight area’s.

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Once cleaned all the floor mats and rear cardo area were covered in plastic.

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Massaging the leather by hands is nice. It also is a great way to soften your on skin while in the process!

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Once the interior was wrapped up except for a few small final touches. I followed with polishing steps on the rotory to really bring out the black paint.

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Here I was laying down one of three coats of Migliore Presidenziale

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Here is the only photo that I had taken outside. I had a photographer come over and take a few finished shots prior to an early morning pick up.

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Here are the pictures that Brett West a local photographer took. Brett is a great guy who is getting into shooting cars. This was the first time we had worked together and will not be the last. For more about Brett please feel free to check out his site.

BW Digital Photography (http://www.bwdig.com/)

Here some of the favorites of mine that Brett took of the interior.

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Some of the final photo’s that Brett had taken from the exterior.

Due to the cloudy day and incoming rain, Brett was challenged. But he did a great job.

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As always my favorite one was saved for last!

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I would like to thank the owner for allowing me to post my work and also would like to thank Brett West for al his hard work! Total time billed out was 46 hours. Have a great day!

Barry Theal :xyxthumbs:SIZE]

[James K]

Thank you for saving such a beautiful car. Excellent work.

[Barry Theal]

Thank you sir!

[Ted S.]

:wow:

[MTR]

OMG , this is something , great car and excellent work

[Mike Phillips]

Awesome work Barry, incredible detail paid to each step and you did a really nice job of photographing the process as well.




This car is a recent purchase of the owner and his first experience into the luxury car seen. During the conversation with him, he had mentioned that the car had several repainted area’s that he wanted to be addressed.



Let's hope the owner understands that a finish like you've created must be taken care of very carefully or it can end up like it did before you performed your magic.


Thanks for sharing!


:dblthumb2:

[Barry Theal]

:wow:

Thank you Sir.


OMG , this is something , great car and excellent work

Thanks alot for the compliments. This car was pretty.


Awesome work Barry, incredible detail paid to each step and you did a really nice job of photographing the process as well.





Let's hope the owner understands that a finish like you've created must be taken care of very carefully or it can end up like it did before you performed your magic.


Thanks for sharing!


:dblthumb2:

Thanks Mike, I need to post here more. Just not as much time as I would like to have these days. I wll be maintaining this car now. So hopefully I don't mar that flat finish. Thanks again. I look foward to meeting you at Detail Fest.

Barry:buffing:

[LuxuryMobile]

Incredible car and if course another display of incredible work by you. Thanks for sharing.

[C. Charles Hahn]

Awesome work, Barry! :props:

Funny, I have those same polo shirts with the checkered flag collar with my logo on them :laughing:

[SeaJay's]

Great job. The write was awesome and very in depth. Always love seeing a beautiful car saved!

[A.P.A.D.]

Nice work! nice photography as well.

love the step by step. keep up the great work!:props:

[Rsurfer]

Love your work and write up Barry:dblthumb2:

[slimnib]

Wonderful.