Swirls in my White BMW

[john16443]

Just introduced myself to the forum in the 'Introduce Yourself" area, now it's time to glean information from the community here. Last month I purchased a 2011 335i that spent the last 12 months as a service loaner. Sweet car, but they were not careful with how they washed or cleaned it. The Alpine White paint is full of swirls that you can easily see in proper lighting/daylight. There don't appear to be any deeper scratches, but there may be a bird dropping related defect on the hood. I want to remove these swirls/defects and have made the following purchases in the last 2 weeks to make this happen. Delivery of products will begin tomorrow, so I should be able to start this weekend. For the record, this will be my FIRST attempt using a machine and these types of products.

PC7424XP with multiple LC standard foam pads (blue fine finish, black finish, white polishing, pink very light cutting, and orange light cutting) The PC included a Meguiars W67DA backing plate
Ultimate Compound
SwirlX
Ultimate Polish
Clay kit with detail spray.

The plan is to do a 2 bucket wash, clay the trunk, divide it into sections. I've been reading that BMW paints are (or can be) harder. I have to believe this to be true because hand application of the UC and SwirlX didn't remove everything completely with a foam or terry cloth pad. Saw some improvement, but not enough or complete.

So after the clay process is completed on the trunk area, I'm thinking of doing the first test section with the 7424/white pad/SwirlX combo following the 'use the least agressive product first' mantra. Solid plan or should I go directly to UC and the white pad? The reason I'm starting with the white pad is my understanding that this is equivalent to the Meg softbuff polishing pad that's been suggested for use with UC. I've got the pink pad (next agressive to the white one) in reserve.

I've enjoyed Junkman2000's Mother of all How to Fix your Paint thread, and have a good feeling I can do this. Appreciate any input that would make my first attempt using a DA successful.

Thanks;

John

[ffboy]

Re: Swirls in my White BMW

I'd go the safer route first, so SwirlX and white pad. It's much easier to to move up the aggressiveness scale than to in correct any marks/swirls inflicted by an overly aggressive pad/compound combination. When you under-correct paint, the solutions can be simpler than having to find the right combo to correct the marks left by aggressive methods, you would have to dig deeper and try out alternatives rather than stick to the recommended combo.

[john16443]

Re: Swirls in my White BMW

Can't disagree with you ffboy. I guess that's the beauty of a test section. If the SwirlX and white pad don't do it, I can alway move up. If they do, I'll be using this for the remainder of the car.

Thanks

[Detailing by M]

Re: Swirls in my White BMW

Your taking on quite the project.
yes BMW by nature are harder to correct paint defects.
Myself I always use 105/205 or even D300 to remove defects.
With white paint you might not have to be really aggressive due to the fact you won't see alot of the defects.
Just start with a test spot, time yourself to see how long it will take you to correct a little area and adjust your product/technique.
You'll be fine and should do any damage to the paint.
The last BMW I polished was black and took me about 6 hrs to correct.

[john16443]

Swirls in my White BMW - 99% GONE

I had a chance to put the new PC to work this weekend on the horizontal surfaces of the white BMW. Ended up using the orange Lake Country pads with Ultimate Compound and finished with the white pads and UP. Topped that off with my remaining hand applied NXT.

I took my time since this was my first attempt at swirl removal, and 99% of the swirls are gone. There are a few random deeper defects, that are only visible under the best of lighting conditions, and on a white car, I can live with them at least for the time being. Now that I'm comfortable with the technique, I'll tackle the horizontal surfaces next weekend.

In all honesty, this was much easier than I thought it would be. I wasted some time working my test spot to find the most effective pad/material combo, but once dialed in, away I went.

[davey g-force]

Re: Swirls in my White BMW

Great work!

It really isn't that hard once you're armed with the right products and some knowledge obtained from sites like this one.

[ffboy]

Re: Swirls in my White BMW

Post some pics, looks like everything worked out much better for you. For the deeper scratches, you can just spot remove the deeper ones using a foam applicator or if needed, a microfiber applicator and rewax the area.

Doing a test spot can be time consuming. You do have to try different tecnhinques, combinations, but yes when you find the ideal combination things will go a lot smoother and easier. That's also the beauty of light colored cars, some swirls that are horrible on black or dark colors can sometimes be only barely visible on light colors, but it still has the same challenge (keeping it shiny and swirl free).

[imz4n]

Re: Swirls in my White BMW

Great story. I love it when directions are found and applied correctly. Good job. A test spot is never a waste of time, doing the whole car with the wrong setup is a waste of time. LOL

[john16443]

Re: Swirls in my White BMW

So far as posting pics, I tried to take them to show the before and after, but just didn't work out in the sun on a white car, sorry. Will work on the vertical panels one at a time after work this week. These should be a piece of cake now that I know what to expect from the UC/orange pad combination and the 7424XP.

[ffboy]

Re: Swirls in my White BMW

What wax do you plan to use after full paint correction?