Ferrari Detail Day at Meguiar’s!

[Mike Phillips]

Meguiar's is proud to host a Ferrari Detail Day at Meguiar’s for local area Ferrari owners!

It’s early Saturday morning and you can hear the roar of Ferraris rolling in for a full day of hands-on fun and learning...




The first thing that happens at a Detail Day at Meguiar's clinic is a classroom session that covers the basics of detailing such as The 5-Step Paint Care Cycle. After that, it's out to the Training Garage for some hands-on demonstration showing tips and techniques for using Meguiar's G-100 dual action polisher with different types of cleaners, polishes and waxes to create a show car shine!



Afterwards, club members are invited to bring their cars into the garage to put into action the things they have learned so far. Below is Jamie Araya, Meguiar's head Trainer for our Dealership Program and a Professional Detailer with over 20 years of experience teaching the owner of this Ferrari how to remove swirls and scratches to restore a brilliant, high gloss finish.



After some hands-on training, the owner of this Ferrari jumps right in and begins applying Meguiar's new NXT Generation Tech Wax using Meguiar’s G-100 Porter Cable Dual Action Polisher.

[Dom]

Mike, I want to thank you for hosting this event for us. It was a great event, and we all enjoyed ourselves and learned alot about the Meguiars products and about how to keep our autos in spectacular shape.

Kudos to you and Meguiars for setting up these events that bring together us car fanatics. If any of you out there have not attended one of these events, you are really missing out on something special. There is nothing like hands on instruction, and Mike is a true pro. I also want to give thanks to Jaime Araya of Meguiars for his help and guidance as well.

I've posted some photos of the event at Ferrarichat.com, and to eliminate wasted bandwith, I will post the link below:

http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=15058

Thanks again Mike.

Dom

[Dom]

Uh oh, Thanks Lynn for pointing out that you need to be registered at Ferrarichat for to view the photos. So, I guess I'll post some here:

[gb387]

I will take one of the yellow ones!

Now there are some cars!

[Mike Phillips]

Although it rained that morning, (which had a dampening-effect on the event), after the classroom session ended we adjourned to the Training Garage for some hands-on paint polishing.

First up, a Ferrari F40 for a side-by-side before and after test of NXT Tech Wax.

Before starting the demonstration, the light dust was first wiped off from the roof using Meguiar’s Quik Detailer, then we clayed the roof using Meguiar's *New* Quik Clay System. After cleaning and claying the finish on the roof, one half of the roof was taped-off.



First, the exposed finish was cleaned and polished using #83 Dual Action Cleaner Polish on a W-8006 foam polishing pad with the G-100a on the 5.0 setting. This removed a majority of the light defects and the mild oxidation, which resulted in a crystal clear finish.

Next, a thin coating of NXT Tech Wax was applied also using the G100 but for the Tech Wax we swapped out the W-8006 foam polishing pad for a W-9006 Finishing pad and turned the speed of the G100 down to the 2.0 setting.



After allowing the NXT Tech Wax to set-up for between 10 to 15 minutes, it was then removed using Meguiar's Ultimate Bonnet, (A microfiber polishing bonnet), over the top of a new, clean, dry W-8006 foam polishing pad on the 4.0 setting. (You need to use Meguiar's Ultimate Bonnet over a dry foam pad or the polish and/or wax inside the foam pad will soak into the Ultimate Bonnet and reduce it's effectiveness).



Afterwards, the towel was removed and everyone was encouraged to inspect the results closely.

[Mike Phillips]

Next up, Jamie discusses the importance of taping of high points, like the body lines on the front of this Ferrari,



and hard to detail areas using simple painters tape which can be purchased at most home improvement stores as well as PBE stores.

(Paint, Body & Equipment stores are the auto parts stores that also sell painting supplies to your local body shops and new car dealerships).



Like this,



Then Jamie shares some tips and techniques for using the G-100 like

* How much pressure to apply
* How fast to move the G-100
* The pattern in which to move the G-100 when polishing paint
* What speed to set the G-100
* How to handle small panels and tight areas



Jamie has been detailing cars professionally for over 20 years... because like me, he already knows how to use the G-100 dual action polisher, the most important thing we can do at these hands-on clinics is to put the G-100 Porter Cable Dual Action Polisher into the hands of the people there to learn new skills. For example, the owner of this Ferrari F40!

[Mike Phillips]

The F40 Ferarri is a very exotic looking car, some of the other Ferarri owners just had to see what the view was like from the inside while the car was here.

Here's Dom getting comfortable...



This Car Crazy Ferarri owner from Canada appears to be right at home in the cockpit of this Ferarri!

[Mike Phillips]

Here the owner uses Meguiar's Quik Detailer to clean and shine the painted wheels.



Here are some final shots,





And here's a shot of the owner going home to get his Z06 Corvette to see if we can remove the etching instilled into his car's clear coat finish from a bird dropping...



Life's tough... go put the Ferrari away to bring out the Corvette!

[DETLMAN]

Life's tough... go put the Ferrari away to bring out the Corvette!

and not just a vette but a Z06 ! life must be rough. looks like you had fun on Saturday !

[Superior Shine]

and look at his plates.... they look like Oregon plates. With that car I guess you can be "right back" even if you live in Oregon!!!!!!!!

[Mike Phillips]

Next up is a claying procedure followed by application of NXT Tech Wax to this beautiful silver metallic Ferrari,





While this Ferrari is garage kept, a quick Surface Evaluation using the palm of my clean hand after cleaning the surface with some Meguiar’s' Quik Detailer and a microfiber polishing cloth revealed some very light build-up of bonded contaminants. To remove these above surface defects, the owner and I clayed the finish using Meguiar's *NEW* clay bar found in the Meguiar's Quik Clay System.



After claying the finish, it's important to carefully and completely wipe down the finish using a premium quality microfiber polishing cloth like the Meguiar's Ultimate Wipe, or a 100% cotton terry cloth towel.

Here's the owner following me around the car carefully wiping the finish down after I clay it.



After we have clayed the entire car, it's time to apply Meguiar's Tech Wax. Our surface evaluation revealed that the finish was in excellent condition except for some very, very fine scratches, probably accumulated from normal day to day wear and tear.

The most important thing to learn about using the G-100 is how fast to move it, (you actually want to move it slowly), how much pressure to apply, which foam pad to use, and the speed to set the variable speed setting for the product being applied.

For this procedure on this car's finish, we used a W-8006 foam polishing pad with the G-100 set to the 3.0 setting.

To help the owner get the hang of it right off the bat, I gently show him through hands-on demonstration how much pressure to apply and how fast to move the polisher across the surface.



The owner discovers that because of the G-100's light weight and simple to use design, that the G-100 is easy to use and dramatically faster and better than applying products like the Tech Wax by hand.



The owner quickly acquires the skills to use the G-100 and continues to move around the car applying a nice, even thin coat of Meguiar's Tech Wax.



After applying NXT Tech Wax to the entire car, the owner easily and quickly removes the now dry coating of Tech Wax using Meguiar's microfiber Ultimate Wipe.



Check out these after shots



Check out the reflection of the passing clouds off of the roof!


Check out the crystal clear reflections from the hood after just one coat of Tech Wax!



Wet paint anyone?

[Mike Phillips]

Next up...

A beautiful yellow Ferrari Mondino. The owner of this car had never used a Porter Cable Dual Action Polisher until this day. After a few quick hands-on demonstrations, he picked up the technique right away and then went to town on his Ferrari's finish. While this is a car that is never driven in the rain and only washed by the owner, it still had some fine scratches and swirls in the finish.

[Mike Phillips]

After applying and removing the Tech Wax to the entire finish, the owner pointed out a very deep scratch in the passenger side rear view mirror.



Here's a close-up of the scratch.



Here's another close-up. This is actually a full size, raw photo.



On hand at Meguiar’s today for this event is one of the most highly skilled professionals behind a rotary buffer that I have ever seen, Jamie Araya.

After closely inspecting the scratch, Jamie carefully wet-sands the scratch and the surrounding paint in order to level the finish before machine compounding with a rotary buffer. To do this he uses some Meguiar's #2000 Unigrit Finishing Papers.




The unique characteristics to these finishing papers is that they are made using Unigrit Construction. This insures all of your sanding marks are of a uniform depth to avoid tracers in the finish. It also insures that the sanding marks buff out quickly and easily. Best of all, it leave more paint behind on the car because of the tight control over particle size.

For working on small scratches, it works best to just tear a small piece of finishing paper from the original half-sheet.



After sanding, Jamie removes his sanding marks using a wool cutting pad on a rotary buffer with some M-85 Diamond Cut Compound.





The really great thing about Meguiar's Professional compounds is because the diminishing abrasives are buffered, or cushioned in a rich lubricating base, instead of scouring the finish like most compounds, they leave the paint looking highly polished with rich gloss.

Here's a shot of the finish after compounding!

[JGV]

Yeap! That must be fun.....Wet sand and buff a Ferrari!

Keep it coming Mike

[Elite M.D.]

Oh man those cars are just to sweet. Kinda makes me still want to live in So Cal so I could go to the detail days. The Yellow Ferrari scratch turned out great. All the other ones are just amazing.