Vandalized Ford Focus.... Before & After

[ChevyNick]

Hey guys. I thought this was pretty unusual, as far as seeing this type of thing here of Meguiars. Heck, I don't hear about it happening much out in the real world either, but hey, I guess this happens. Just 2 pictures, I was hoping the 2 girls (owner of car) would send me the pictures they took, but they haven't yet... so if they do I will add them in. I would have liked to get more pictures but these ladies were ready to scram as soon as my friend and I got the spray paint off. They were blown away by how much of a reflection there was after though, and they said I was hired, I guess its a success.

Process:
Clay (failed)
Lacquer Thinner, "Oops!" (Something like that), and some other paint stripper I forgot the name of.
Ultimate Compound
Ultimate Polish
Ultimate Wax

This car has excellent paint on it (after I did the 3 step to it) from the brief close look I took. There is a major difference from, say the hood to the side quarter panel (Whole drivers side of car is deep black now, rest is that almost grayish color you see on a typical neglected black car). I would have done the whole car but... they were ready to scram, so oh well.


Does anyone have any tips for removing spray paint from a car in case I have to do this again for someone (hopefully not myself!)?


Before:


After:

[Teak]

Re: Vandalized Ford Focus.... Before & After

Good work on the Focus.
As to how remove the spray paint, I would use heavy duty clay (red bar). Or try a product called Motsenbocker's Graffiti remover. I have used this to remove oil based paint from a car with no problems.

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Vandalized Ford Focus.... Before & After

In the future, and for anyone else reading this, you should be able to get this sort of spray paint off with a paint thinner found in the same isle as the spray cans themselves. You'll need to proceed slowly, of course, but the factory cured paint on a modern car should withstand a light treatment with such a product, but the spray paint won't survive it. Even if you don't get it all off that way, the balance should then come off with either C2100 Pro Aggessive red clay and/or some M105 either on a rotary or a DA. We've seen fairly light spray paint fully removed with nothing more than a rotary, M105 and a wool pad. On this car the spray paint was heavier, but the above processes ought to do the trick. But we can't stress enough the need to proceed with caution here, and select a paint thinner designed for spray paints. We don't anyone to read "paint thinner" and go grab some aircraft stripper - crazier things have happened!

[ChevyNick]

Re: Vandalized Ford Focus.... Before & After

Haha alright thanks Mike for the tip.

[Garage Troll]

Re: Vandalized Ford Focus.... Before & After

Great job! It makes me so sick to my stomach that people do this to other people's property.