Fall 350Z detail day in Virginia

[Aurora40]

These guys got together last spring for some detailing action: http://www.meguiarsonline.com/forums...highlight=350z

Well, they just did it again today. About 13 cars showed up, and we got through 6 that wanted to get worked on (from 11am to about 8:45pm!)

It was mostly new faces, and a couple of folks from the last time. It was a lot of fun and I think a lot of information for some people.

There were a few corrections of major scuffs, and there was one black Z that had very noticable swirling that got corrected pretty well with some #82, a polishing pad, and good use of the Porter Cable. While it still had some marring all over, it was orders of magnitude less. Then the rest were mostly some claying with Quik Clay and some waxing with NXT to spiff them up.

I didn't bring my camera, so I'll add some pictures once some other people make them available. Unfortunately there weren't any befores on that black car (that I know of).

I did manage to sample out my whole gallon of Last Touch, and people tried out some MPPP and Gold Class Trim Detailer (which produced great results on the 350Z mirror housings).

I'm beat, I'll try to add picts tomorrow.

[Aurora40]

Here's what the owner of that black Z had to say. His was really swirly when he showed up, and looked much much better after the #82:

Thanks to everyone else for hanging out, and for everyone who helped me on my car. I was damn proud to have the cleanest black 350Z on the planet for the next 30 minutes.

Suggestion for next time, a DUST FREE parking lot

They did group pictures in a local park that had a gravel lot, that's what the "dust free" comment is about. His car was all covered in gravel dust after just having it looking great...

On this car, we also hit an area on the hood with DACP and a yellow pad for comparison (all by PC). What we noticed was that the DACP in this case didn't improve on the swirl removing over #82. That most of the swirls were real light, but the ones that weren't were deep enough DACP and a PC wouldn't take them out. And on this particular paint, there was a slight hazing of the paint that would be left by it. A pass with #82 again removed that slight haze and left a beautiful black finish. This car was probably the most educational one we worked on for everyone.

No one has put their picts up, but I'll share them once someone does.

[Aurora40]

Ok, here's some pictures:

The swirls you see in this picture were on the black Z we spent a fair bit of time on. The panel to the left of the swirl shot was polished with #82 (then #83 then #82 again, but I don't know when this photo was taken):



Here's a poor shot of the panel next to it that only really highlights that the polish hasn't been buffed off fully yet:



I apologize for the poor pictures, but the main thing was people who were there learned from it. The lighting in the garage was also not very good, we were using a trouble-light to check our work. Here's the garage, and me looking like an idiot:



While the car still had swirling visible, it was greatly reduced. It went from the kind of car where you can see the swirls from any angle without even getting close to it, to a car with minor swirls visible only at the right angles and right around sun reflections:

[Aurora40]

It was getting dark out when we started trying out the Gold Class Trim Detailer, so these picts are a bit dark. However, all the 350Zs, from the newest one to the oldest one, had greyish coloring on the side mirror post/housings. This before/after (actually a side-by-side as they are different mirrors on the same car) was on a 2005MY car, only a few months off the assembly line:

grey:

black:

[Aurora40]

Here's some scratch reduction courtesy of DACP, and a yellow polishing pad. This was as aggressive as the polishing got at this event. I feel that with my Cyclo and orange pads and some DACP, that a few defects that we couldn't remove would have been further reduced if not completely removed.

Anyway, here is a nice progression series of photos that came out fairly well:









This car also had some scratching behind the door handle on the passenger side. DACP removed these completely.

Here are folks putting the last touches on the car to wrap up the day (evening by this point):

[Aurora40]

Here are the cars that showed up:



And their happy owners:

[Aurora40]

A few random shots of some of the cars:

http://members.aol.com/man/fall_detail_day/P1010004.jpg

http://members.aol.com/man/fall_detail_day/P1010007.jpg

http://members.aol.com/man/fall_detail_day/P1010010.jpg

http://members.aol.com/man/fall_detail_day/P1010024.jpg

http://members.aol.com/man/fall_detail_day/P1010031.jpg

http://members.aol.com/man/fall_detail_day/P1010036.jpg

http://members.aol.com/man/fall_detail_day/P1010037.jpg

[Ranger72]

D'oh the guy on the end is leaning on his car!!! arghhh
Looks like a lot of fun!

[Aurora40]

Just some random thoughts. There were several people who were either afraid of clay on their car, or had bad experiences with it. It's amazing how about 5 minutes of explanation of how it works and how to use it can change that. The difference in the surface before and after clay can really be startling.

I was also surprised at the caliber of towels people use! This is all stuff we own that we are using (except that guy with the Meguiar's Z who was able to score some clay kits, NXT, and some polishing pads couresty of Meguiar's). So I brought in a pack of my Ultimate Wipes, and people brought in whatever. Lots of folks had towels that were stained all over with dirt, and some had lint, grass and other material stuck in the fibers in spite of being "clean". I went through all my towels, and ended up giving them away to people afterwards. I figure this way maybe they'll have some cleanliness standard to compare their other towels to? This might be an area where focused education might pay off a lot, just like with polishing, claying, and most importantly surface evaluation. Polishing your paint with flawless technique won't matter much if you wipe it off with a microfiber you dropped in the garden last week.

I'd thought I could post up a link, on the 350Z board that did the event, to the Ultimate Wipes on the eBay store, so folks who liked them could buy some at a great price, but I see that is closed now. Does Meguiar's ever sell that kind of stuff in an "outlet" type fashion? Or will it get used at your detail days or just sit on a shelf until the space is needed? I can't find any online stores that still sell the 20-pack.

[Aurora40]

Originally posted by Ranger72
D'oh the guy on the end is leaning on his car!!! arghhh
Looks like a lot of fun!

LOL, yeah. We hadn't gotten to his car yet. Maybe he figured it would buff right out...

[Aurora40]

A few action shots:

[Snowman]

That scratch removal on the orange car is just amazing and without Scratch X none the less.

[Aurora40]

I've never actually used Scratch-X. DACP is a great product for scratches and swirls by machine, though.