Advice needed on paint correction

[KeithIndy]

This week, while I have some time off work for the holidays, I decided to break out the PC and give my car a quick mid winter detail. I have a 2008 "Nighthawk Black Pearl" Acura TL that I have owned since new, it has never been through a car wash, always hand washed and regularly maintained with Megs polish's and NXT. It is a daily driver that I put about 25-30K / year on so perfection is unreasonable with this car, but I try to make sure it looks good.

Soooo, yesterday I was doing my typical #9 with a CMA white constant pressure pad when I decided to experiment a little on the rear quarter that had a couple scratches that the #9 wasn't touching.
I put on a yellow CMA pad and broke out the #80 and made about 5-6 passes - it took out the scratches but left tiny scratches that I could tell were from the pad. So I put back on my white pad and hit it with #9 - It wouldn't get the marring out from the #80/yellow pad.
I then got a fresh white CMA pad, put some #80 on it and made 5-7 passes - a little better.
Then back to my original white CMA pad and #9 - a little better but not gone.
Speeds were 5-6 on all these applications.

My question is what am I doing wrong that I can't get the marring out from #80 and a yellow CMA pad?

Is it my pad selection?
Should I work the #80 longer?

I need some new pads anyway and am thinking of getting the Megs - any advice?

Thanks in advance!

[dave93761]

Re: Advice needed on paint correction

I'm assuming you're referring to the Lake Country pads here...there's nothing wrong with these pads, just understand how they compare to each other and you can't go wrong!

The #9 Swirl Remover 2.0 & LC white pad combination is not a very strong one at all. It would be best served for removing hazing left behind by a more aggressive polish & pad combination if you were working on soft paint. I also sometimes use it as a final step in a multi-stage correction to give the paint a little more gloss after using something like #83 or SwirlX as a previous step.

The LC Yellow pad is the most aggressive foam pad that they make - #80 Speed Glaze should be used with a 'polishing' or 'finishing' pad (in LC this means green, white, black, or even blue). If you used a more aggressive product than #80, you would not have needed to make 5-6 passes to achieve your result. Plus as you discovered, the yellow pad can sometimes leave marring of its own.

Do you refer to a 'pass' as moving across the area once, or the entire process of applying, working in the polish until virtually transparent and almost dry, then buffing? The latter is what a 'pass' is usually referred to as.

Do you have any other products in your arsenal? You should probably get yourself something stronger!

Given you're using a PC, try the Ultimate Compound on an orange pad. The Orange pad has around 85-90% of the 'cut' of the yellow pad, but you'll find it won't leave any marring (or if it does, it's VERY minimal). Then follow this with your bottle of #80 on a white pad if you have it. Then follow with the #9 on a white or green pad!

Hope this helps!

[KeithIndy]

Re: Advice needed on paint correction

The #9 Swirl Remover 2.0 & LC white pad combination is not a very strong one at all. It would be best served for removing hazing left behind by a more aggressive polish & pad combination if you were working on soft paint. I also sometimes use it as a final step in a multi-stage correction to give the paint a little more gloss after using something like #83 or SwirlX as a previous step.
I agree, the #9 / white pad combo is not very aggressive. All I am wanting to do when I use this combo is "clean up" up the paint and remove any micro marring from washing.

The LC Yellow pad is the most aggressive foam pad that they make - #80 Speed Glaze should be used with a 'polishing' or 'finishing' pad (in LC this means green, white, black, or even blue). If you used a more aggressive product than #80, you would not have needed to make 5-6 passes to achieve your result. Plus as you discovered, the yellow pad can sometimes leave marring of its own.

Do you refer to a 'pass' as moving across the area once, or the entire process of applying, working in the polish until virtually transparent and almost dry, then buffing? The latter is what a 'pass' is usually referred to as.
What I am calling a pass is one time over the area.

Do you have any other products in your arsenal? You should probably get yourself something stronger!
I have been wanting to pick up some Ultimate Compound. But, for the most part, the #9 or #80 with a white pad has been all I needed to maintain a couple newer cars. Now that they are getting older I need to step it up a bit to remove some defects.
Shouldn't I have been able to remove the marring from #80 / yellow pad with what I have?

Does anyone have a recomendation as to what Meguiars pad to us with UC?

[KeithIndy]

Re: Advice needed on paint correction

Did a little digging this morning and found the Sticky product / pad recommendation. I don't see the 7207 red pad on this chart, why?

[wifpd4]

Re: Advice needed on paint correction

Did a little digging this morning and found the Sticky product / pad recommendation. I don't see the 7207 red pad on this chart, why?

I'll try and find a couple of references, but the red pad has too much cut for use on a DA. I believe one of the concerns is heat generated, not so much on the pad to car surface, but at the juncture of the backing plate and hook and loop of the pad. I'll see what I can find. Be back shortly...

[wifpd4]

Re: Advice needed on paint correction

Keith the information you need from the expert:


http://meguiarsonline.com/forums/sho...hlight=red+pad

Re: Meg red pad Q'

We really don't recommend using our W7XXX cutting pads with a D/A and what is often a closely related topic, the use of speed 6 with any pad. Now, we know you didn't specifically ask about speed 6, but eventually the topic comes up so we thought we'd address both points here and now.

First of all, though, any hazing of the paint that may occur with this pad on a D/A is usually pretty minor, really, and can be cleaned up quickly with a W8xxx pad and a mild paint cleaner. But this is a very stiff and aggressive pad and you may find yourself running into other issues with it because of this. Trim, plastics, etc don't like this pad very much, for example.

But the real issue is that the hook and loop attachment system comes under tremendous stress when a D/A is run at speed 6. If you've ever turned one of these tools on at max speed without having the pad firmly on the paint and had the pad fly off, you know that the tool is always trying to throw the pad. That's because of the "random orbital" action of a D/A - it's constantly changing direction and the pad is hanging on for dear life in the process. At speed 6 this means the hook & loop mechanism is being pulled on with surprising force, and a lot of heat is being generated. We've measure temperatures in excess of 200F at the backing plate/back of the pad when doing this. And that is just something these pads are not designed for. Nobody's pads are, really, as you can find threads of pad failures from other companies when they're used like this.

Now, when you add the extra drag created by the aggressive foam of a cutting pad, the forces are just magnified and the heat can really spike up. This can even happen with prolonged running at speed 5 with a cutting pad, due to that extra drag. So now that pad is really hot (not the part that touches the paint, mind you, but on the back side) and then you're using a lot of pressure - and something is likely to go wrong. Not always, but there is a high probability of it.

What we see too often is problems arising because people are under the impression that it is impossible to do any damage with a D/A, and that simply is not true. While it is very rare that we do see any issues with damage, when it does happen it's almost always from very aggressive use of the tool. The above scenarios constitute very aggressive use.

Now, with all that said, you'll notice that we don't state that you can never use a cutting pad with a D/A. But we want you to be very aware of the potential downside and only use it for very specific situations, and just for short term use if no other option is available. No other option means you don't have a rotary, you can't step up to a more aggressive liquid, even repeated passes with a lot of pressure and slow speed (watch the heat!!!) aren't removing the defects, etc.

Quite honestly, if you can get rid of 95% of the defects using a yellow pad, odds are you really don't need to step up to a cutting pad. It probably won't really save you any time since you'll have hazing to get rid of with a follow up step, and it does open you up to some potential pitfalls.
__________________
Michael Stoops
Internet Technical Specialist
Meguiar's Inc.
(800) 854-8073 xt 175
mstoops@meguiars.com

[KeithIndy]

Re: Advice needed on paint correction

Thanks David.
The yellow LC pad I already have is aggressive enough, doesn't look like I need the red pad.

Let's say I go with Megs 8207 pad and UC. Would I need to follow up with 205 or will my #9 or #80 be enough?

[dave93761]

Re: Advice needed on paint correction

Do you already have #205? If yes, then use that and then maybe even follow with #80!
But also #80 followed by #9 would be fine.
#205 may be a little better with regards to clarity, but #80 & #9 will give a nice gloss to the finish!

[KeithIndy]

Re: Advice needed on paint correction

No 205 as of now, but I could pick some up as I need to order some new pads anyway.

Thanks for the help!