Garage Life invades Meguiar's!

[Mike Phillips]

On Saturday, March 20th, members of Garage Life zoomed in on Meguiar's for a day of learning and fun! Not to mention some pizza, pop and goodie bags!



Typical of Saturday classes, members started showing up a t 8:30am sharp!



Bucky Lasek tagged along as well hoping for a chance to use Meguiar's new Tech Wax on his recently painted BMW now that enough time has gone by to allow the paint to fully cure.



After everyone arrived, a snagged a group photo...

[Mike Phillips]

After giving everyone a chance to stretch their legs


and get caught up on the latest shop talk,



It was time to start class...



Mike Pennington introduces Meguiar's new line of products... NXT Generation and share some information about each of the product with the class.

[Mike Phillips]

After the classroom session, it's time to go out into the Garage and start putting the things we learned into practice.

Members of Garage Life have great looking cars with lots of time, money, and work invested into them. Our goal today at Meguiar’s, was to hopefully show each member how with only a few products and the G-100a Dual Action Polisher, how they could easily remove light scratches and swirls and take there car's finish to it's maximum potential.

The first order of business was to show where the speed setting dial is on the G-100 and the importance of selecting the correct OPM Setting, (Oscillations Per Minute), for the specific pad, product and procedure.




The second order of business was to stress the importance of only turning the G-100 on, or off when the pad is in direct contact with the panel.



There are two reason for this,

1) To prevent the foam pad from spinning out of control and potentially flinging off the backing plate.

2) After you have been polishing for a while your pad will become wet with product. If you turn the G-100 on before applying direct contact with the pad to the panel, or you lift the foam pad off the panel before turning the G-100 off, you risk spraying little tiny dots of your polish or wax all over the car and your clothes!

The members of Garage Life were all very interested in learning how to use the G-100 Dual Action Polisher. It was great to have a full class of polite young men paying close attention and helping out with the demonstration.

[Mike Phillips]

As far as Technique goes with the G-100,

Always do your best to hold the pad flat against the panel. You want the entire surface of the foam pad in direct contact with your finish with equal pressure. As far as how much downward pressure you need to apply on the G-100, you want a little more than the weight of the polisher itself. The below picture shows one hand holding the body of the G-100, while the other hand is controlling and applying downward pressure to the head of the dual action polisher. This is the correct technique with the right amount of pressure.



Below is a picture of the G-100 with only the weight of the polisher. This is not enough pressure to produce good results when trying to remove light scratches and swirls using Meguiar's Meguiar's #83 Dual Action Cleaner Polish, and Meguiar's Soft Buff® Foam Polishing Pads.




The below picture shows too much downward pressure being applied. You don't want to push so hard that you can hear the motor bog down or you can see your backing plate depressed too far into your polishing pad.



The above picture is an example of pushing too hard. See how the backing plate is buried into the foam pad. This will cause premature failure of the foam pad and also not allow the combination of oscillating action of the G-100 together with the W-8006 and #83 DACP to work efficiently.





Above you can see a member of Garage Life rubbing some #83 DACP between his fingers in an attempt to feel for any abrasives. Because the diminishing abrasives used in the #83 DACP are microscopic in size, he is unable to feel anything that would resemble an abrasive. Most people think #83 feels more like a rich hand lotion, versus a traditional rubbing or polishing compound.

****************

Now it's time to start polishing... Because the G-100 oscillates in an eccentric motion while at the same time spinning in a circular motion, the polishing effect is very gentle to the finish and the risk of burning the paint, or inducing swirls is eliminated. While it doesn’t matter in which direction you move the G-100 over the finish, it is important to overlap each of your passes by 50% for efficient surface cleaning and polishing as well uniform and even results.

[Mike Phillips]

Now after demonstrating a few tips and techniques, it's time for Garage Life members to get their hands busy...

When first starting out, remember, don't hurry, make slow overlapping passes, and focus on the task at hand...



You could even say polishing your paint with the Meguiar's system is fun! At least that's what the expression oh this young gentleman's face says!



At least it's definitely not, what most people would consider hard work...

[Mike Phillips]

Deep in thought, this club member is imagining how awesome his paint is going to look once he applies everything he has learned here today to his car's finish...
(Or is he just wondering how much longer till the pizza arrives?



Either way, his buddies are all eager to take their turn practicing with the G-100.






Next...

[Mike Phillips]

Next...



After cleaning the paint with the #83 Dual Action Cleaner Polish, a couple of club members applied the new NXT Tech Wax using a new W-9006 foam finishing pad and then we all waited for approximately 10- 15 minutes for the wax to dry.




Unlike some products on the market, Meguiar’s chemist know how to make waxes like Tech Wax dry in a relatively short amount of time. This enables you to detail another component of your car like the interior or the wheels and tires, or to simply get back on the road where you can enjoy driving your car, as well as all the admiring looks and thumbs-up!


After about 12 minutes, a Garage Life club member demonstrates how easy the Tech Wax is to remove using a Meguiar’s plush microfiber Ultimate Wipe.

[Mike Phillips]

Now it's time to drive the car out into the sun and inspect our reults...



and inspect some more...

[Mike Phillips]

And here's what the results look like...

Below is a picture of the sun reflecting on the un-polished and un-waxed side. Note the cobweb-effect.




Below is a picture of the sun reflection on the polished and waxed side. Note, a majority of the cobweb-effect has been eliminated.




Below is a pictures of the sun reflection right down the demarcation line, (where the tape was applied to separate the before and after effect). Note the hazy look on the left side, and the more clear looking finish on the right side.




While it's hard to capture the real-life results with a camera on this red paint, the results were indeed dramatic and real. This demonstration taught these guys that with a few simple tools, they could easily take the finish on their cars to its maximum potential for show and display, not to mention the pride that comes with knowing you did it yourself!

[Mike Phillips]

Meanwhile, over on the other side of the Garage, Mike Pennington, Meguiar's Director of Training, instructs members how to correctly polish the uncoated aluminum rims on Bucky Lasek's BMW using Gold Class All Metal Restorer.



Here's Bucky removing the polishing residue with a microfiber polishing. The blue gloves are to prevent the oxidized aluminum from transferring to the skin on his hands. If you have ever polished uncoated aluminum you know how messy that can be.





Here two Garage Life members closely inspect the results from Bucky's hard work.




In the background you can see Mike Pennington removing some light dust using Meguiar's Quik Detailer and an Ultimate Wipe before claying the finish in preperation for an application of NXT Tech Wax using the G-100.

[Mike Phillips]

After applying and removing one coat of NXT Tech Wax, Mike and Bucky remove the blue painters tape from the car. Painters tape is a special tape painters use to mask off areas they don't want to risk spraying paint onto. In much the same way, painters tape is used to mask off areas you don't want to risk getting any polish or wax splatter while machine polishing. Places like vents and grills are good candidates for taping-off.

It was interesting to watch how quickly Bucky was able to professional tape off all the crucial areas. When I asked him where he learned to be so fast, he responded,

"From working in body shops and taping-off cars!"

No wonder he's fast...



Next, Bucky and Mike remove the NXT Tech Wax using microfiber polishing cloths...

[Mike Phillips]

Beauty shot inside the garage...





Beauty shot outside in the sun...

[Mike Phillips]

While Bucky's car was being detailed, a new project was pulled into Meguiar's Garage for some care and attention. Seems some time ago, a friendly bird left a little present on the front, passenger side of the roof.

Before massaging the etching left behind by the bird dropping, members of Garage Live gave the exterior a quick Quik Detailing to remove light dust and other contaminants.



Here is a close-up of the etching in the paint,




Here is an even closer, close-up shot of the etching. Notice how the etching is below the surface? This mean we will have to carefully machine clean the finish in an effort to level the highest point of the finish with the lowest points of the etching.



It was decided to go after this etching with the rotary buffer and a very light cleaner/polish, #83 Dual Action Cleaner Polish with a W-8006 foam polishing pad.



Meguiar's always says,

"Always use the least aggressive product to get the job done"

Because removing below surface defects like this etching from a bird dropping requires a certain amount of paint to be removed, it was determined that the G-100 would be to slow, (because it's so gentle), and the rotary buffers was selected instead for it’s ability to remove defects quickly and easily with the right products.

[Mike Phillips]

Here is the exact same etching after only a few passes with the rotary buffer using the W-8006 foam polishing pad and a little #83 DACP,




Here again is the same spot after even a few more passes,




And after going over the entire roof with the G-100 using a W-8006 foam polishing pad with the #83 DACP, followed with an application of Tech Wax, here are the results,




Noticeable with this powerful close-up lens, but barely visible to the naked-eye...

[Mike Phillips]

After working on these cars and others, then enjoying some pizza and some cold drinks, I captured a few photo's of some member's cars before they dissapeared!