Advice on Mercedes E320

[DogParkGuy]

This is my neighbor's car; about 4 to 5 years old. Owner has only occasionally washed the car. Finish appears to be in good condition. Looking for any advice on proceeding. Will use M80 or M83 with DAPC. Any special concerns working on Mercedes? Here are some pics:

[Ol' Red]

Re: Advice on Mercedes E320

Most people talk about mercedes (maybe not all of them) having hard clear coats, called ceramiclear, that is very hard to correct due to its hardness. I myself have no idea though.

[the_invisible]

Re: Advice on Mercedes E320

Many years ago, I had a 1994 Acura legend repainted using the 1997 Meredes SL500 pearl white paint. I decided to go with that particular paint and color because the bodyshop owner told me that the paint was pretty much maintenance free. To demonstrate the durability of the paint being used on my car, the bodyshop owner took a coin to scrape against the hood of a Benz that was in his shop. A few attempts of striking the coin against the hood did the surface no harm whatsoever.

My Legend with the new Mercedes white paint had experienced a few scrapes from many vehicles that resulted in some very obvious paint transfers. All of those scrapes were easily removeable with Turtle Wax Rubbing Compound. The Merecedes paint on the Legend was literally unharmed by the other cars that hit it. I don't recall having ever polished that car. All I did on that car was claying and waxing with Mother's products. That should give you an idea of how tough the Mecedes paint is. Whenever there were scuffs, the only product capable of removing them was the Turtle Wax Rubbing Compound. None of the Meguiar's products available at the time in retail stores worked.

[Megafast13]

Re: Advice on Mercedes E320

Yeah, MB is known for having hard paint for sure.

They are almost as bad as BMW IMO.

M83/M80 might work, but if you don't like the results, try stepping up to M105 or Ultimate Compound.

[the_invisible]

Re: Advice on Mercedes E320

If I recall, a bloke on MOL was having good success using Ultimate Compound with a cutting pad using the G110 to remove swirls from his Mercedes GL.

[mis3]

Re: Advice on Mercedes E320

Yeah, MB is known for having hard paint for sure.
They are almost as bad as BMW IMO.

Not sure I understand, is hard paint a bad thing?

[Ol' Red]

Re: Advice on Mercedes E320

Not a bad thing, just hard to remove swirl marks or scratches if you are car crazy like most of the guys on the board.

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Advice on Mercedes E320

Not sure I understand, is hard paint a bad thing?

When people refer to a paint being "hard" or "soft" they are generally referring to the "workability" of the paint, or how easy or difficult it is to remove defects from the paint. This is not necessarily the same as "scratch resistant" because the mechanical action of putting a scratch into the paint is quite different from the action needed to level the paint, which is essentially what you're doing when removing a scratch. (See What it means to remove a scratch out of anything... for more info on scratch removal)

Whether hard paint or soft paint is "bad" is sort of up to the person working on it. Both can be difficult to correct, but for different reasons.

The hard paint is very resistant to the leveling action so you find yourself going after it repeatedly, or stepping up to very aggressive products to remove defects. Sometimes these very aggressive products require slightly different technique for application, or they remove the defects but don't leave a perfect finish so they need to be followed with something a bit less aggressive. Essentially they are more work, which can be an inconvenience or a total pain, depending on your point of view.

The soft paint is very prone to marring while you remove the defects - often times you eliminate one problem only to cause another. This often leads people to think they're working on a hard paint because, visually, it seems no matter what they do they can't achieve a perfect (or near perfect) finish. People don't always realize they are inflicting a fresh set of defects so they tend to step up to an even more aggressive product, whether pad, liquid or both, which just makes things even worse. These paints generally require a very delicate approach to correct, and it can seem counter intuitive to someone with minimal experience working this type of paint.

Of course, there are varying degrees of hard and soft, so this topic is full of shades of gray rather than just being black or white.

As for the Mercedes that DogParkGuy is going to be working on, you don't really know for sure what you're dealing with until you start working on it. We've seen some newer BMW paint that responds beautifully to M83 (better than to M80 even), so that wouldn't necessarily be classified as "hard" paint, or harder than what some have experienced with MB paints. Using the concept of "use the least aggressive approach to get the job done", you may want to start with M80 or M205, depending on what you have on hand. Since a test spot is always recommended, you could test M80 and M83 side by side and then re-evaluate in good, direct lighting. If you need to step up from there, M105 is an excellent choice, but if you can get the job done without it, so be it.

[Megafast13]

Re: Advice on Mercedes E320



Nicely said Mike!

[DogParkGuy]

Re: Advice on Mercedes E320

When people refer to a paint being "hard" or "soft" they are generally referring to the "workability" of the paint, or how easy or difficult it is to remove defects from the paint. This is not necessarily the same as "scratch resistant" because the mechanical action of putting a scratch into the paint is quite different from the action needed to level the paint, which is essentially what you're doing when removing a scratch. (See What it means to remove a scratch out of anything... for more info on scratch removal)

Whether hard paint or soft paint is "bad" is sort of up to the person working on it. Both can be difficult to correct, but for different reasons.

The hard paint is very resistant to the leveling action so you find yourself going after it repeatedly, or stepping up to very aggressive products to remove defects. Sometimes these very aggressive products require slightly different technique for application, or they remove the defects but don't leave a perfect finish so they need to be followed with something a bit less aggressive. Essentially they are more work, which can be an inconvenience or a total pain, depending on your point of view.

The soft paint is very prone to marring while you remove the defects - often times you eliminate one problem only to cause another. This often leads people to think they're working on a hard paint because, visually, it seems no matter what they do they can't achieve a perfect (or near perfect) finish. People don't always realize they are inflicting a fresh set of defects so they tend to step up to an even more aggressive product, whether pad, liquid or both, which just makes things even worse. These paints generally require a very delicate approach to correct, and it can seem counter intuitive to someone with minimal experience working this type of paint.

Of course, there are varying degrees of hard and soft, so this topic is full of shades of gray rather than just being black or white.

As for the Mercedes that DogParkGuy is going to be working on, you don't really know for sure what you're dealing with until you start working on it. We've seen some newer BMW paint that responds beautifully to M83 (better than to M80 even), so that wouldn't necessarily be classified as "hard" paint, or harder than what some have experienced with MB paints. Using the concept of "use the least aggressive approach to get the job done", you may want to start with M80 or M205, depending on what you have on hand. Since a test spot is always recommended, you could test M80 and M83 side by side and then re-evaluate in good, direct lighting. If you need to step up from there, M105 is an excellent choice, but if you can get the job done without it, so be it.

Thanks for reminding me about doing a spot check. I know that my neighbor's car will be improved no matter what I do, but I want to make it pop! And after that a BMW X5.