1957 Chevrolet Bel Air - Remove Swirls - Modeled by Kristin

Mike Phillips · 11-10-2011, 04:07 PM

1957 Chevrolet Bel Air - Remove Swirls - Modeled by Kristin

Here's our project car for this week's "Autogeek's Car of the Week", it's a 1957 Chevy Bel Air that's a restorod in very nice condition except the paint is completely thrashed.

In the video and pictures below I document the true and accurate condition of the paint before me, PJ from Dodo Juice and a team of "Car Guys" attack it to remove the swirls and restore a show car finish.

1957 Chevrolet Bel Air - Completely filled with Swirls & Scratches

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B31shno2TnU&hd=1]1957 Chevy Bel Air Remove Swirls by Machine - YouTube[/video]

This is going to be a challenge to get this done by 9:30 as that's when Kristin our new Swirl Girl arrives to inspect our work with the Brinkmann Swirl Finder Light.

Stay tuned...

Mike Phillips · 11-10-2011, 04:08 PM

Getting Started...

First thing we did was to wipe the car clean using Detailer's Pro Series Waterless Auto Wash.

Note: Anytime you're working on an antique, classic or rare special interest car it's a good best practice to avoid washing the car using a normal car wash as you will introduce water to places you cannot reach and dry and this can promote rust. Instead use a Waterless Wash to carefully wipe the paint and exterior clean.

After we wiped the car clean next up we inspected the paint to see if it needed to be clayed. We did this with our sense of touch and also by using The Baggie Test

The paint felt as rough as 80 grit sandpaper so claying was in order... for this we used Pinnacle Ultra Poly Clay with Pinnacle Clay Lubricant.

Here's a piece of clay formed into a wafer or patty about 4 to 5 inches in diameter to fit across the width of my 4 fingers...

Like this...

The contaminants you see on the clay came from just a small section of paint on the hood. If you look closely you can see a tint of red on the clay and this is overspray paint...

Test Spot
After claying next we wanted to test and see what ti would take to remove the majority of the swirls, scratches and water spots. For this we used the Pinnacle Advanced Swirl Remover with a Lake Country 6.5" CCS Orange Cutting Pad on a Flex 3401. The tape-line is to make it easy to judge the results between before and after.

Before I start, here's the swirls as captured by the flash of my camera...

Here's the swirls as captured by the Brinkmann Swirl Finder Light...

At the time I started the test spot we didn't know the paint was single stage, it can be hard to tell between single stage and basecoat/clearcoat just by looking at the car, the best way it to do a test like I outline on page 10 and 11 of my how-to book, either the print version or the e-book version.

Another way to test for a single stage or basecoat/clearcoat is to do a test spot... start buffing on the paint and then turn your buffing pad over and inspect...

Yep... we're working on red single stage paint as you can see by the red pigment transferring to the face of the buffing pad.

After working the Test Spot for about 6-8 Section Passes here's the results... about 95% correction... there were some deeper RIDS everywhere in the paint throughout the car but we don't focus on removing each and every single scratch because we don't know the history of the paint job. Too much risk.

I removed the painter's tape and used the flash of my camera to light up the paint...

The hundreds of thousands of scratches in the paint dulls the appearance by giving the finish a hazy appearance. By removing the swirls, scratches and oxidation will restore the full richness of color with a high gloss shine...

When I did the Test Spot, I was making the mistake of assuming the paint was a basecoat/clearcoat finish so I started with a foam cutting pad. Once we discovered we were working on a single stage paint I asked PJ to re-test using a the same product but using a less aggressive pad like a 6.5 foam polishing pad. This was just to check and see if we could remove the defects using a less aggressive approach.

Here you can see red pigment coming off onto a white polishing pad....

What we found out was that the white polishing pad just didn't offer enough cutting ability to match the speed of defect removal we were getting with the orange cutting pad. Se we all put orange cutting pads on our polishers and went to work.

When you get 5 polishers all buzzing on the car it doesn't take long to get the correction step finished.

Here's Adam using the Flex 3401 with a 4" backing plate and a 4" Orange CCS Spot Repair pad.

Here's Kyle tackling the roof and back clip of car...

We don't have a lift at this time so if you can't bring the car up to you.... you have to lower yourself to the car... (Thanks PJ)

Pinnacle Advanced Swirl Remover, Lake Country Orange Foam Cutting Pads and Flex 3401 Forced Rotation Dual Action Polishers make quick work of removing the defects and creating a clear, smooth surface perfect for final polishing.

Mike Phillips · 11-10-2011, 04:08 PM

Continued...

Pad Cleaning
When you're working on a single stage paint it's very easy to see that you have "removed paint" building up on the face of the pads.

This same thing happens when you're polishing a basecoat/clearcoat paint job it just that you can't see the residue build because the paint is clear instead of pigmented.

Here's Adam with a dirty pad on a Flex PE 14 with an extension on the spindle to make cleaning pad easier.

We used DP Polishing Pad Rejuvenator inside the Grit Guard Universal Pad Washer to help us get the pads clean.

I had Adam spin around so the car would be in the background instead of a garage door...

Here you can see the pad is back to it's orange color as the majority of the pigmented paint and polishing residue has been removed.

Here's Adam sharing his secret technique for cleaning pads if you don't have a pad washer.

Sling most of the cleaning solution out of the pads using the rotary buffer by bringing up the RPM's while the pad is still inside the bucket. Then to get the pad a little dryer you can squeeze the pad inside an absorbent terry cloth towel like you see Adam doing here.

Again, if we were working on a clear coat finish there would be paint transfer to the towel it's just that you can't see it. That's why anytime your abrading paint you need to clean your pads. See this article,

Why it's important to clean your pads often...

The Polishing Step

After we removed the major defects using Pinnacle Advanced Swirl Remover and a Flex 3401, we moved on to the finish polishing step using Porter Cable 7424XP's and the Griot's Garage DA Polisher using Lake Country 5.5" white foam polishing pads to maximize the gloss and clarity of the paint.

Here's Kyle working on the front driver's side fender using a Porter Cable 7424XP

Here's Rene using a Porter Cable 7424XP to polish the hood...

DA Polishers like this PC are compact in size, lightweight and easy to use especially if you're new to machine polishing.

5.5" pads fit nicely between body lines and raised curves.

Here's PJ machine polishing with a Griot's Garage 6" Random Orbital Polisher...

Here's Kyle working his way down the car and tackling the rear fender...

Here's PJ polishing the roof which was also a single stage paint...

Here's Rene working around the passenger side mirror...

Here's Adam machine polishing the inside of the driver's side fin...

Now the outside of the fin...

After polishing the passenger's side of the roof PJ moves to the other side and polishes the driver's side of the roof...

Kyle finishing the fender where the fender skirts attatch...

We placed the fender skirts on the workbench on towels and then two people held them securely while I machine polished them...

Pinnacle Advanced Finishing Polish worked excellent to maximize gloss and clarity and perfectly prepare the paint for application of wax.

Mike Phillips · 11-10-2011, 04:09 PM

The Protection Step...

Now comes the fun part! Since we have PJ, one of the founders of Dodo Juice in the house, he's going to show us one option for hand applying a soft paste wax, in this case we're going to use Orange Crush as it's for warm colors like the red/orange on this 1957 Chevy Bel Air.

Here' PJ breaks open the seal guaranteeing a never before opened jar of wax...

Then he rubs his clean fingers over the top of the wax...

Now he's ready to start waxing the paint...

PJ shows us his technique of working the wax over the paint with a gentle touch...

As he applies the wax he works around the car... in a few seconds the rest of the team is going to join him and with 4 to 5 people hand waxing the paint it's only going to take minutes even to cover a car as large as this!

Here's a thin coating of Orange Crush...

Flying his colors...

Super Star!

Mike Phillips · 11-10-2011, 04:09 PM

Metal Polishing

Adam tends to take on the responsibility for making sure all the brightwork is polished and protected and he does a great job. Thank you Adam!

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

After Shots - Lots of chrome on these classic Shoebox Chevys...

Here's some after shots of the paint after polishing with Pinnacle and then waxing with Dodo Juice Orange Crush...

Mike Phillips · 11-10-2011, 04:11 PM

Products Used

All the products and techniques we used to restore a show car finish to this beautiful 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air can be found on Autogeek.net, I've included links to each product below.

All we did as far as techniques go are the basics that are covered in my how-too book both the print version and the e-book version and also in my DVD on machine polishing.

If after looking at the before and after pictures you think you want to tackle your own car detailing project then I encourage you to take the first step and that's gather your supplies and then read-up on the different procedures you'll be doing and then go out into your garage and have some fun.

If you get stuck on anything or for any reason, simply post to our forum what's going or any issues you're having and myself and the rest of the members of this forum will do our best to see you through to success...

On Autogeek.net

Tools
Flex PE 14
Flex 3401
Porter Cable 7424XP
Griot's Garage 6" ROP
Meguiar's G110v2

Buffing Pads
6.5" Lake Country CCS Pads
6.5" Lake Country Flat Pads
5.5" Lake Country CCS Pads
5.5" Lake Country Flat Pads
4" Lake Country CCS Spot Repair Pads

Medium Cut Polish
Pinnacle Advanced Swirl Remover

Fine Cut Polish

Pinnacle Advanced Finishing Polish

Wax
Dodo Juice Orange Crush Soft Wax 250 ml

Metal Polish
Wolfgang MetallWerk™ Concours Aluminum Polish

Microfiber Towels
Super Soft Deluxe Green Microfiber Towels with Rolled Edges

Miscellaneous Items
Gold Wax Finger Pocket
Microfiber Gloves
Brinkmann Swirl Finder Light
Kreepstool Rolling Utility Seat

Resources

E-book
(Displayed on iPad - iPad not included)

Paperback

Mike Phillips' Principles of Machine Polishing