Color-X made my paint look worse?

[Durango]

I recently purchased a used dodge durango, The vehicle is immaculate except for the paint as I do not believe the previous owner ever waxed it. The paint is slightly oxidized and dull so after so reading I decided Color-X was the right product to restore my paint. After applying it it showed every swirl made by the applicator and no matter how easy or hard I buffed it never improved, I re-applied the product with the same result. Is this common? Should I Claybar it first?

Which is better Liquid claybar or the traditional claybar?

Any suggestions are appreciated.

[Eddie6th]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

Hi.You should always start with a clean surface.

Someone did a review of the 'liquid clay' before and basically it stinks.

Get your self a proper clay kit.You'll have more options than me,but the Meg's 'Clay Bar Kit' is a good choice.It comes with QD,which you're going to need anyway.Use plenty of QD.You'll probably find you'll go through 3/4's of it or more.

This vid will help:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfEfLGL59GI

Anyway,start again.Wash/dry your car.Clay it,then use the colorX.

[Don]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

It sounds like you may be moving too fast & pushing too hard with your fingertips. You really need to 'work' an area before moving onto the next.

[Tuck91]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

It might help to finish out gently, not rough motions.

[3Fitty]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

Personally I think if you move away from working by hand and move to a G110, you get much more "even" result, a lot faster and with a few precautions, it is relatively simple.

I'd pretty much advise anyone who is a hobbyist or above, should have some type of D/A. Working by hand is just too hard, too long and too inconsistent for my liking.

[akimel]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

Durango, what kind of applicator did you use and how hard were you bearing down on the paint? Properly applied, ColorX should not be scratching your paint.

If you can find them, get yourself some foam applicators. Unfortunately, most auto stores do not seem to carry foam applicators, though I have been told that they can be found at some marine stores. You can also order them online, though if that is the only item you are ordering, the shipping cost will make it prohibitively expensive.

As already mentioned, you need a clean surface. The car should be washed well and clayed, if necessary. From what you have described, claying this vehicle certainly sounds like it would be helpful.

Then do a TEST SPOT. Put a quarter size dollop of ColorX onto the applicator and work the wax into the paint in a 12"x12" square. You want to apply a bit more pressure than you would with an ordinary wax, but you don't want to press too hard. Massage it into the paint as if you were applying a skin lotion into your skin. If you need to, add more wax. Allow it to haze. Do the Swipe Test. When it is dry, remove with a clean microfiber towel. Now inspect the surface. If it looks good, then go ahead and ColorX the rest of the car; but if you still don't see any improvement, then come back to the this thread and tell us what you are seeing. We'll make sure one of the MOL experts help you to get things right.

[Underdawg736]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

If you don't think that the previous owner waxed it then that may be the source of alot of those swirls. As the other folks said, have a cleaned and prepped car so that you won't pick up the crud and do more harm then good.
Have you invested in Ultimate Compound, SwirlX, or ScratchX? If not try to grab some as they will help rid you of your trucks swirlitis.

IMO I would stay away from the liquid clay as it doesn't do the job as a real clay bar. Also keep in mind to have several clean applicator pads on hand, once they start getting dirty I would swap out with a fresh clean one to minimize additional swirling. Also using fresh clean MF towels with their tags removed will prevent the user induced defects.

I hope this helps you a bit!

[Durango]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

Thanks for all the tips... I went out today and bought the Meguiar's Smooth Surface clay kit it included the QD, 2 - 50gm clay bars, 4oz sample of cleaner wax and Supreme Shine MF cloth. I'll report back on my progress.

[Murr1525]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

As mentioned, I think you found swirls under the dirt.

However, ColorX would not be my choice for dealing with them. I would look into some SwirlX at least, if not something stronger as mentioned above.

[Calais]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

ColorX is great for oxidized paint but you must, must have a properly prepped surface. You're digging bonded materials out of/off of the paint with a an abrasive and grinding them into your paint surface.

[ColonelCash]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

This is usually when Mike Phillips would chime in and bring the voice of reason to the situation. Let me see if I can find some of his "working by hand" posts.

[DarkBlue]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

ColorX is great for oxidized paint but you must, must have a properly prepped surface. You're digging bonded materials out of/off of the paint with a an abrasive and grinding them into your paint surface.

According to Meguiars'

ColorX^® - ColorX is Meguiar's newest addition to the Cleaner/Wax family. ColorX is like Meguiar's traditional Cleaner/Wax, (A1216), on steroids. It's more effective at cleaning neglected finishes, restoring optimum clarity and leaving behind an incredibly long lasting synthetic polymer paint protectant than Meguiar's Cleaner/Wax, (A12), without having to resort to harsh abrasives and without giving up the kind of stellar results you have come to expect from Meguiar's products. ColorX can be applied by hand, dual-action polisher and orbital buffers.


Other than claying, do you even need to prep it ? I thought it is an AIO.

[Murr1525]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

Claying would be the appropriate prep. As mentioned, you dont want to drag stuff around on the paint.

However, like I said, it is more likely the swirls were just uncovered and cleaned out.

[TH0001]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

Is it possible the swirls where the there, but now the paint shines, you can see them?

[Markus Kleis]

Re: Color-X made my paint look worse?

If the vehicle was never waxed than I can say with 100% certainty that it is swirled, because it was already swirled. What do I mean by that?

A couple things, for starters: washing a vehicle on a regular basis is going to put swirls into the paint (even if they are incredibly faint) regardless of how careful you are. It's inevitable.

Then you factor in that without wax things stick and cling to the paint more, causing you to scrub with more force in order to wash the vehicle, which in turn greatly increases the chance and depth of swirls.

Then a little common sense tells me that if they didn't know or care enough about the paint to wax it, I doubt they used a 2 bucket method with proper top to bottom rinsing and a soft drying towel or chamois.

Like others said, what you have done is removed a light haze (from washing) and exposed the swirls that were underneath.

If you want to get rid of those you will need to consider something like SwirlX, or possibly Ultimate Compound.