2010 772 HP BLACK Camaro SS...Swirl City

[Wills.WindowsAndWheels]

Welcome to Swirl City!

My sis and I had the pleasure of polishing out a 2010 customized Camaro SS. And yes...it had 772 HP....insane right? It shook the neighborhood every time he fired it up. Let me give you a little history on this job.

The owner contacted me after reading some posts i had made on another site and his first inquiry was what products/machines do i use. The reason he wanted to know was because after he had this beauty sanded down...custom painted and recleared....he got the infamous PAINTERS BUFF. Which means basically they took a rotary to it and did a quick and sloppy job.

So he was very unsatisfied and had them REDO the buffing...it was better he said but still not up to par. So thats 2 polish jobs....then he hired someone to buff it out for him privately....this someone used a rotary and apparently didn't know what they were doing...at all...and left quite a few holograms on the sides.

THAT being said...this car had already been cut 3 times...with rotaries...with poor results...so he was very cautious about having someone touch it with a rotary again AND was conscious of how much clear had already been taken off.

Thankfully it was a RE CLEAR so we had more to work with that we normally would have. AND since so far we just use our DA's and/or flex...there would be no rotary being used on this baby by us.

Let me note that Im POSITIVE someone with proper knowledge of using a rotary could have done excellent work on this car...but I'm not at that point...and plus id rather do extra work with a DA and have the owner comfortable rather than have him sweating bullets because he's going through another round of someone using a rotary on his baby.

Take a look at what the first guys left...right after the re-clear!



At first glance it looks like old wax right? Thats what we thought it was...but when we mentioned it to him he said no...it was actually where they had gone too deep sanding/buffing it and actually burned the edge right above the windshield....Are you freakin kidding me! *sigh* so...needless to say i understood completely his hesitation with rotaries.

They also left this little accident. He had never noticed it before lol...but since we inspected every inch...we found this



See that little orange speck... no it isn't on top of the paint...it's under the clear coat. It was on the bottom side of the passenger door. Looks like whoever did the orange striping dripped a little dot and didnt notice it before they started re-clearing it. He was totally surprised lol....but nevertheless the car was bad ass...look below



This is what the complete car looked like...please...have a cloth ready to wipe your keyboard with after you finish drooling...



So we drove out...met him...an very nice guy and also very understanding of what it is we do as detailers..so that made it very easy for us to talk to him. We set a price and a date because he wanted to have it fresh for when he had it transported out to Cali for a car show. So we booked it for a little over a month from that day. When he pulled the car out in the sun....well....heres an idea of what we saw



Along with a little of this




And plenty of this (cringes)




Like i said...Swirl City!

Then he popped the hood...remember i told you 772 HP?




He wasn't joking...



Needless to say....he didn't need an engine detail lol!

So after putting my eyes back in my head...i came to this conclusion. This was a very bitter sweet situation.

Bitter because...well...obviously the car was swirled all to hell and it me kinda sad...BUT

Sweet for the same exact reason because FINALLY a full 3 step detail on a VERY nice BLACK car. Also it was sweet because this was not a careless owner...this was someone who loved his car (look at the engine...can you say 'clean enough to eat off of' ) and had just had the misfortune of having a couple bad 'detailers' and on top of that had a few wipe downs done during car shows with spray wax...andddd that just doesn't always go well ya know? But hey...live and learn.

So...the morning of August 6th finally came...over a month after we had first seen and bid the car...and we were very excited to get to work on this baby.

After conversing with the owner through emails over the past month....we decided to go with Meguiars Microfiber Pads and Compound for cutting....followed by 205 (D301 is nice stuff but we wanted to use a designated polish...not a polish/wax mix) and then topped with Pinnacle Souveran Paste Wax....this would also be our first time using a $100 wax lol.

Now of course we brought back ups...since Meguiars will not officially say that the MF set up will work well on a re-clear (due to the many variables of re-cleared cars)...but others have posted good results with it. Just in case however...we brought 105...ultimate compound...Pinnacle Advanced Swirl Remover and Pinnacle XMT #1 and #3.

Heres a quick look at most of our goodies that ended up being used:



My old PC was also brought out...and set up with a 5.5" LC Hydro-Tech Tangerine Pad to be used with 205. My sis took care of the polishing part with the PC set up....while I was working with the Griots and the 5" MF cutting pad and D300 compound.

Since my sis is the taping expert (i just get frustrated with it and throw it across the room....ok not really but thats what i WANT to do) she went on ahead and started on that....while i had a spot tapped off on the hood to test out and see just how well this set up would work.

So i primed my pad and then added a couple dots of compound to it and did the test spot. This is what it looked like before anything was done...



Quite swirly just like the rest of the car...no surprise i know.

So i did a pass with the set up listed above. Wiped the compound off...and was very impressed with the ease of how it wiped off. I'm in Arizona...and that day it was 109 degrees outside...so even in the garage you're talking 100 degrees or so...but the compound wiped off as easy as a good wax on a cool day.

So i went to check the results and what i found was very pleasing. The swirls had been completely removed from what i could tell...but there was a noticeable haze left. I figured no problem...205 will clear that up and we'll be ready to move on.

This is after compounding...haze is hard to see but trust me it's there




So next i brought out the PC with the 5.5" HT tangerine pad...primed with 205 and did a pass over the section. Wiped it clean and took a look. Well i was right...the haze was GONE.....but the RIDS were not. The haze being cleared up revealed a few deeper scratches....quite a few actually that the single pass with the MF pad and D300 didn't knock out.

Take a look, this is right in between the pieces of tape (sorry tape isn't in photo):



Yes yes i know...I was splitting hairs...but i couldn't live with it even though they were pretty small. I'd had excellent luck with Pinnacle XMP #2 before...but was out..and this car was in worse shape than what i used #2 on so i tried some #3.....and let me say that stuff is HARSH. It left an even worse haze and took 2 passes of 205 to clear up...and still the RIDS were left.....so i crossed Pinnacle #3 off my list of possibilities for this car.

I went back to my MF pad and compound...decided to turn up the speed to 4.5 rather than 4 and to add a little extra pressure. Then followed with another pass of 205 polish and finally breathed a sigh of relief....because i was a little nervous lol. This was my first RE CLEARED car...and i wasn't sure what to expect..but this was much better...

Because i want to be totally HONEST...there were 2 very very small RIDS left...if you look in this next photo very closely you will see them...they were a bit deeper...




You can see them right around where my hand is. But I'm not just being honest on here, but wanted to let the owner know too...it is after all..HIS car.

So as if he knew I was going to need to talk to him...he came out just as i had finished with the picture above. I showed him the before side...and then the after and 'WHOA!' is what came out of his mouth lol. At that point i was feeling good. He couldn't believe the difference and how great it looked. But then i had him look closer to see the couple of RIDS left over...but as i said...he has done reading and knows a decent amount about what we do...so he understood what they were.

Now since no wet sanding was to be done on this car...and we were trying to save as much clear as possible especially considering the history of poor buff jobs on this thing...I told him i didn't think it would make sense for me to keep compounding away, taking away more clear just to get a couple small scratches. He totally agreed and from that point on i knew we were set .

Heres the funny part...the freakin spot i picked for my 'test spot' ended up being the WORST SPOT on the whole damn car. I did have other spots that i had to do a second compounding pass on...but not because there were THAT many RIDS...just a couple here and there! So the one spot on the car that had the worst DEEP damage, I picked for my test spot! Oh well...at least it was all down hill from there

My sis was finishing up taping...so i did a few more pictures of the hood...boy was it nasty:

This is towards the middle:




Heres another:




These looked rather deep but came out with 2 passes of compound:




Same thing here...looked deep but 2 passes did the trick






So as you can see...it was a mess. My sis finished up taping...and the plan of attack we had was I'd compound and she'd follow behind with polish..and if she saw any RIDS left over she'd let me know and i could go back right then and there and re-do that spot.
BUT since compounding is a slower process that polishing...i needed a bit of a head start...so I set her up with a MF pad on the PC so she could help me do the rest of the hood so that way i'd have a big of a head start...and then she could start polishing with 205 while i moved along the rest of the car compounding.

So we did the whole hood and she started polishing while i worked the roof. Working top to bottom makes the most since seeings how you HAVE to lean on the car door some to reach the roof...and even though i had my new Megs Detailing Apron...which my sister thought was freaking HILARIOUS...I didn't want to lean on the door AFTER polishing it out and risk putting in new scratches....yes....i wore the apron...now shut up!

After finishing up the hood...we asked him to come out again and pull it into the drive way to look at it in the sun. We had started just before 8 a.m and by now it was about 10ish...and in Az that translates to 'High Noon' lol.

So he pulled it out (its a stick...i dont drive stick..but i really gotta learn!) and then the 3 of us circled the hood like a group of sharks. My sis and I of course have an eye for swirls....actually the new name i've been given is the Swirl Stalker! But the owner had a good eye for them too...and after he went around and couldn't stop talking about how awesome it looked and how impressed he was already with our work...we were REALLY feeling good...but I can't blame him....look at the sun shots:

Hood Passenger Side:



Hood Center (duh)




Full hood shot..this one was sweet...




And one of the best sun shots...it had such great reflection that the sun reflected back onto the hood in a few spots lol...looked like we had multiple suns shining on it...this is the drivers side...aka where the test spot was performed:



That silver sure does pop now doesn't it?



So we pulled it back in and continued to work out butts off.

I got a great shot of the roof...it turned out great because i was able to use the reflection of the light bulb on the ceiling as a marker to show exactly where i took the before picture...so i was able to get an exact duplicate of the after...




Heres after compounding and polishing



Gorgeous isn't it?


So..we worked...and worked and worked.


My thoughts on the MF compound and pads is..they are awesome. I love the thinness of the pads...really helps to control them and get them to hug edges and curves. I find it is true that compressed air is the best way to clean them on the fly...but i have a 26 gallon compressor at home and did NOT want to haul it on the job....so i used a nylon brush to fluff up the fibers after EVERY section. I find this to be very important so you get the best correction every pass.

I also found that after about 10 or 12 passes...your pad will start to get gummed up:



You can see especially around the center that the fibers start to stick together and gets kinda gummy....so this is where the pad washer investment really comes in handy.

A couple sprays of pad cleaner and and quick run in the pad washer really helps save time and in the long run...save money since you don't have to keep buying pads. I was able to do the whole car with this one pad...with the exception of the 1/2 of the hood my sister did with the 2nd pad. I did have to wash it out about 6 or 7 times at least...but as soon as i did it was back and ready to go.

I did have to re-prime parts of the pad after washing....but that was it...it was totally dry and ready to use

So as we kept on moving i kept on trying to have the patience to stop and do more pictures since this was such a big job and...admittedly...i wanted to show off lol...but it sure is time consuming

here is a 50/50 with a halogen light i did



Left side is done...right side is not.

Though the brightness of the halogens is great...they are kinda bulky...pull a LOT of power...and when 2 buffers and a fan are running...you dont want to pull even MORE power...so we used these guys on and off..and did much of our checking with the brinkmann light....until the battery died towards the end lol.

So after we compounded and polished..it was time to break out the Pinnacle Souveran Wax




The owner went with it due to it saying it could be applied and removed easily in extreme temperatures. Something to note is to be sure to wipe on...and then wipe off...I had a few spots that set and started to dry and they were a bit of a pain to remove...so if you use this wax...wax on...wax off Daniel son...


Aside from that note...this wax smells GREAT...spreads like butter and made the paint 'look wet'.....the neighbor came over and noted that right away lol.

So...i'll post up a few more before and after shots....and then time for my favorite....beauty shots

Rear quarter panel before:




Rear QP after:




Ive said this in other write ups but just to note again...I REALLY like and advise that if you're planning on doing before/after pictures...get as many of your pictures with sort of 'place markers'..and what i mean by that is...something in the picture that shows exactly where you took the photo...since often times we zoom in to show swirls...its not always easy to tell where the picture is at....so in this case...the gas lid served as my 'place marker' to show where on the car i took the picture just a tip

[Jenn1270]

No pics in there Wills.