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This one had a fun story behind it. We received a call from the owner about a month back...drove out about 50 miles to go bid 4 cars all within 2 miles of eachother...what are the chances!
Anyway, this Vette was our last bid...pretty clean car for a former daily driver..but super swirled and definitely needed our touch. We were talking with the owner...he mentioned this USE to be his DD, so then he popped open the garage and showed us his NEW daily driver...a Tesla Roadster...nice!
Well the funny part was...the weekend before the owner dropped off his Vette for us to work on, he went to cali in his Tesla and a buddy of ours, Wes with Elite Finish (should call him MR Finest) polished and applied Finest to his Tesla...he also mentioned us to the owner. The owner went on to say he had already contacted us and was going to have us do his Vette the following weekend...small world!
I've already talked to Wes and told him next time WE get to do the pretty NEW car and he can do the beat up, black...former daily driver with over 80k miles on it!
But...making older cars look better than new is what we do!
Here she is...the morning of day 1:
Not too bad from a distance...as usual, but lets take it on in for a closer look...
Splatto!
Uh oh whats that peeking out there?
Ouch..
But wait...theres more!
To the back...
Roof wanted in on the swirl action too:
Hurt me hurt me!
Tips were dirty but not BLACK like you'd expect to see on most 80k mile cars that have the power of something like a Vette:
Behind the license plate hadn't seen water in about...8 years i think lol:
Now these weren't the only things we had to work on..these millions of swirls...there were other things that needed attention...like a TON of wax on weather stripping, plastic and body lines:
Wheels needed some love for sure...again, not horrible but definitely needed a good cleaning:
1Z Colour Tech...is my new fav. wheel cleaner. Its thick so has decent dwell time...works similar to iron-X (and smells like it too...blah)...cleans VERY well...and the price is right! I like it very much
Oh and its safe on any surface too, big plus
And then there were more of these:
Look closely and you can see some water spotting as well...
After the tires, rims and tips were all done...we went around with APC and a detail brush to get all the dirt out of the seams all over the car and clean the tight areas...then rinsed...washed, clayed and dried. There was still tons of wax in the cracks that we had to go after the old fashion way (a towel and our fingers!) but 50% ipa worked real well to help break it down.
The paint however was what we'd be working on first...under LED lights it was especially scary lol:
The rear hatch made us speak many expletives ...
After compounding...it was a hazy mess...but it was on the way to becoming beautiful:
Now how did i get it THAT hazy? Well...i had used foam...and microfiber pads...and they worked well on the hood and upper parts of the front QP...but when i got to the roof...and the rear hatch...i needed to up the cut or else i'd be compounding everything 5x's over... so i went a little unconventional :
Wool on the Rupes 21....hey...a bit crazy but it was worth a shot. After compounding (as seen above)...we went with HD Polish and a LC blue...super soft pad i know but...it ended up being what worked best...check it out
Yes, there was pitting...80k miles on a black car does that! And there was a RID here n' there that was too deep to go after...but it was a drastic improvement.
On the sides where pitting wasn't so bad it looked even better...
Before:
After compounding on this side:
After polishing:
BIG difference.
On day 1 we got the whole car compounded and almost all of it polished (all but the front bumper). Day two we jumped to finish the bumper first thing in the morning:
She was ready shortly there after to be prepped for coating:
Ah yeah..thats nice!
Dani worked the tight areas by hand...i worked the bigger areas by machine. Then while she started to work on coating the wheels, dressing the tires and dressing the wells...i started getting the paint prepped.
First Eraser with a super soft towel my buddy Aaron sent me! LOVE this towel for Eraser...apparently he bought it from Corey @ CarPro-US.com. You'd have to be very unlucky to mar the paint up at all with this towel during a wipe down with eraser.
Then it was time for CQuartz Finest:
While i got started on that, Dani was working away coating the wheels:
Lookin' good!
I was busy laying down the 1st coat of Finest to cure:
After removing the 1st coat..it was time to circle the car again...applying coat #2...let it set up and then started wiping it down:
Had to rock the tank top today...was a nice 107 or so..not too bad!
Dani by that time had finished her wheels and was working on the interior...it wasn't horrible...but needed a good steaming and vac...she actually pulled a good amount of dirt up with the steamer...which was good cause we planned to put CQuartz Fabric & Leather on the seats and carpets for some serious INTERIOR protection.
While she wrapped up cleaning in there..i applied Dlux to all the exterior plastic trim and Flyby30 to all the glass (had JUST enough to finish!)
Then i helped Dani coat the seats and carpets...after that she wiped down door jambs and i did a final clean on the tips and polished them up...then it was time for some fun...after pics.
The interior was looking SO nice in the garage we grabbed a few pics of it right away:
Awesome pic:
All opened up!
Now THAT is a cockpit!
I love how the CQuarts F&L leaves the leather looking natural..it looks a bit wet when first applying and buffing down...but then it dries to a nice natural look:
And of course after that..it was time for some exterior pics!
Whoaaa yeah now THATS a black car right there!
Swirls were a thing of the past:
Those horrible rear hatch swirls were eliminated ...all that was left was a super glossy and highly protected finish....
Only white stuff on the car now was cloud reflection...all that old wax on the weather stripping had been cleaned away (talk about tedious)
If you're gonna polish you gotta polish the small areas too:
Yes, this is the roof...brings a new meaning to the term "Glass coating" doesnt it
And the full side shot was to die for:
Tips were looking sharp..they added a nice accent to the black paint and looked great against the plastic trim that was treated with Dlux:
When you can't tell where the glass ends..and the paint begins...that means its a job well done lol:
Gloss and clarity ...very nice:
That nasty area behind the license plate even cleaned up well:
Our mom even took a sec to come check out the Vette!
Turned out the owner was going to be a bit later so we pulled it back in the garage for a couple more hours till he came to pick up:
Ready and waiting!
Hope you guys enjoyed the write up and the pictures....another fun detail..was nice to be able to coat the inside to match the beauty of the outside.
Thanks as always for checking it out!
Anyway, this Vette was our last bid...pretty clean car for a former daily driver..but super swirled and definitely needed our touch. We were talking with the owner...he mentioned this USE to be his DD, so then he popped open the garage and showed us his NEW daily driver...a Tesla Roadster...nice!
Well the funny part was...the weekend before the owner dropped off his Vette for us to work on, he went to cali in his Tesla and a buddy of ours, Wes with Elite Finish (should call him MR Finest) polished and applied Finest to his Tesla...he also mentioned us to the owner. The owner went on to say he had already contacted us and was going to have us do his Vette the following weekend...small world!
I've already talked to Wes and told him next time WE get to do the pretty NEW car and he can do the beat up, black...former daily driver with over 80k miles on it!
But...making older cars look better than new is what we do!
Here she is...the morning of day 1:
Not too bad from a distance...as usual, but lets take it on in for a closer look...
Splatto!
Uh oh whats that peeking out there?
Ouch..
But wait...theres more!
To the back...
Roof wanted in on the swirl action too:
Hurt me hurt me!
Tips were dirty but not BLACK like you'd expect to see on most 80k mile cars that have the power of something like a Vette:
Behind the license plate hadn't seen water in about...8 years i think lol:
Now these weren't the only things we had to work on..these millions of swirls...there were other things that needed attention...like a TON of wax on weather stripping, plastic and body lines:
Wheels needed some love for sure...again, not horrible but definitely needed a good cleaning:
1Z Colour Tech...is my new fav. wheel cleaner. Its thick so has decent dwell time...works similar to iron-X (and smells like it too...blah)...cleans VERY well...and the price is right! I like it very much
Oh and its safe on any surface too, big plus
And then there were more of these:
Look closely and you can see some water spotting as well...
After the tires, rims and tips were all done...we went around with APC and a detail brush to get all the dirt out of the seams all over the car and clean the tight areas...then rinsed...washed, clayed and dried. There was still tons of wax in the cracks that we had to go after the old fashion way (a towel and our fingers!) but 50% ipa worked real well to help break it down.
The paint however was what we'd be working on first...under LED lights it was especially scary lol:
The rear hatch made us speak many expletives ...
After compounding...it was a hazy mess...but it was on the way to becoming beautiful:
Now how did i get it THAT hazy? Well...i had used foam...and microfiber pads...and they worked well on the hood and upper parts of the front QP...but when i got to the roof...and the rear hatch...i needed to up the cut or else i'd be compounding everything 5x's over... so i went a little unconventional :
Wool on the Rupes 21....hey...a bit crazy but it was worth a shot. After compounding (as seen above)...we went with HD Polish and a LC blue...super soft pad i know but...it ended up being what worked best...check it out
Yes, there was pitting...80k miles on a black car does that! And there was a RID here n' there that was too deep to go after...but it was a drastic improvement.
On the sides where pitting wasn't so bad it looked even better...
Before:
After compounding on this side:
After polishing:
BIG difference.
On day 1 we got the whole car compounded and almost all of it polished (all but the front bumper). Day two we jumped to finish the bumper first thing in the morning:
She was ready shortly there after to be prepped for coating:
Ah yeah..thats nice!
Dani worked the tight areas by hand...i worked the bigger areas by machine. Then while she started to work on coating the wheels, dressing the tires and dressing the wells...i started getting the paint prepped.
First Eraser with a super soft towel my buddy Aaron sent me! LOVE this towel for Eraser...apparently he bought it from Corey @ CarPro-US.com. You'd have to be very unlucky to mar the paint up at all with this towel during a wipe down with eraser.
Then it was time for CQuartz Finest:
While i got started on that, Dani was working away coating the wheels:
Lookin' good!
I was busy laying down the 1st coat of Finest to cure:
After removing the 1st coat..it was time to circle the car again...applying coat #2...let it set up and then started wiping it down:
Had to rock the tank top today...was a nice 107 or so..not too bad!
Dani by that time had finished her wheels and was working on the interior...it wasn't horrible...but needed a good steaming and vac...she actually pulled a good amount of dirt up with the steamer...which was good cause we planned to put CQuartz Fabric & Leather on the seats and carpets for some serious INTERIOR protection.
While she wrapped up cleaning in there..i applied Dlux to all the exterior plastic trim and Flyby30 to all the glass (had JUST enough to finish!)
Then i helped Dani coat the seats and carpets...after that she wiped down door jambs and i did a final clean on the tips and polished them up...then it was time for some fun...after pics.
The interior was looking SO nice in the garage we grabbed a few pics of it right away:
Awesome pic:
All opened up!
Now THAT is a cockpit!
I love how the CQuarts F&L leaves the leather looking natural..it looks a bit wet when first applying and buffing down...but then it dries to a nice natural look:
And of course after that..it was time for some exterior pics!
Whoaaa yeah now THATS a black car right there!
Swirls were a thing of the past:
Those horrible rear hatch swirls were eliminated ...all that was left was a super glossy and highly protected finish....
Only white stuff on the car now was cloud reflection...all that old wax on the weather stripping had been cleaned away (talk about tedious)
If you're gonna polish you gotta polish the small areas too:
Yes, this is the roof...brings a new meaning to the term "Glass coating" doesnt it
And the full side shot was to die for:
Tips were looking sharp..they added a nice accent to the black paint and looked great against the plastic trim that was treated with Dlux:
When you can't tell where the glass ends..and the paint begins...that means its a job well done lol:
Gloss and clarity ...very nice:
That nasty area behind the license plate even cleaned up well:
Our mom even took a sec to come check out the Vette!
Turned out the owner was going to be a bit later so we pulled it back in the garage for a couple more hours till he came to pick up:
Ready and waiting!
Hope you guys enjoyed the write up and the pictures....another fun detail..was nice to be able to coat the inside to match the beauty of the outside.
Thanks as always for checking it out!
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