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Another special project in the garage last night - a 2015 Porsche 911 Targa in, of course, non metallic black. This car just moved to California from New Jersey with it's owner and former Meguiar's employee, Eric Thompson. Eric called me a few weeks ago and said he was moving back to Cali and wanted my opinion on a detailer for his 911. I suggested he bring it down for a TNOG and, being the smart guy he is, he jumped at the chance.
Porsche paint can be a bit finicky and black is obviously going to be the toughest color to dial in. We love a challenge!
Here's the car before we started. Looks pretty good, right?
Well, get closer and throw some light on it, and this is what we were up against.
Doesn't look so good now, does it?
We fully expected this paint to haze during correction, and it did. On the left is the untouched side, on the right is after M205 on a microfiber finishing disc at 4800 OPM. The swirls are gone but the paint is hazed and doesn't look as rich and black as it should. That's OK, we can fix that easy enough.
Again, the left side is untouched so it's swirled; the upper right is hazed but the lower right is a nice glossy, deep black - just what we want! This was accomplished by blowing out the microfiber disc very, very thoroughly and then, without adding any more product, giving the paint a short cycle pass to remove the haze. While that was our initial plan, we altered it as the night progressed. As these things go, the microfiber discs sort of "season" as you use them, becoming well and truly primed with product, and the haze diminishes as you continue working around the car. In the end, all we needed was a very quick pass of M205 on black foam at 4800 OPM to eliminate all the haze.
The crew attacking the Porsche.
Using 3" pads to work the small areas, like the louvers over the engine cover.
Again, 3" microfiber discs for the smaller, tighter areas. We also used 3" microfiber for the windshield surround and side mirrors.
At one point someone tested with a foam pad instead of the microfiber, with interesting results; while there was less haze with the foam, the level of correction was greatly lessened compared to microfiber. So, you have a choice of multiple passes with foam pads but you'll still need a finishing polish step, or just one slightly aggressive pass with microfiber and then a very quick finish polish pass. We opted to stick with the faster process, knowing it would still yield a result equal to or better than the slower process. It's all about trade offs.
Reflection shot of M205 and MT300 after finish polishing. The distortion at the bottom is due to the tight radius curvature of the lower door panel.
Yours truly and the car owner, Eric, after polishing. Yeah he's happy.... wouldn't you be?!?!?
Time to protect that finish - Ultimate Wax paste, applied with 4" foam pad on the MT300.
The 4" foam pads fit perfectly inside the can.
Wipe off was a group effort.
UWWA doing it's magic on the wheels. Well, with a little help from Nick.
The same UWWA is great for cleaning up the door jambs after the final wipe down.
A few different body panels with some serious swirl finding light action. Except it couldn't find any swirls after we obliterated them all!
That's what we're talkin' 'bout!
Beautiful!!
The swirl killing, gloss making team!
Parting shot.
Porsche paint can be a bit finicky and black is obviously going to be the toughest color to dial in. We love a challenge!
Here's the car before we started. Looks pretty good, right?
Well, get closer and throw some light on it, and this is what we were up against.
Doesn't look so good now, does it?
We fully expected this paint to haze during correction, and it did. On the left is the untouched side, on the right is after M205 on a microfiber finishing disc at 4800 OPM. The swirls are gone but the paint is hazed and doesn't look as rich and black as it should. That's OK, we can fix that easy enough.
Again, the left side is untouched so it's swirled; the upper right is hazed but the lower right is a nice glossy, deep black - just what we want! This was accomplished by blowing out the microfiber disc very, very thoroughly and then, without adding any more product, giving the paint a short cycle pass to remove the haze. While that was our initial plan, we altered it as the night progressed. As these things go, the microfiber discs sort of "season" as you use them, becoming well and truly primed with product, and the haze diminishes as you continue working around the car. In the end, all we needed was a very quick pass of M205 on black foam at 4800 OPM to eliminate all the haze.
The crew attacking the Porsche.
Using 3" pads to work the small areas, like the louvers over the engine cover.
Again, 3" microfiber discs for the smaller, tighter areas. We also used 3" microfiber for the windshield surround and side mirrors.
At one point someone tested with a foam pad instead of the microfiber, with interesting results; while there was less haze with the foam, the level of correction was greatly lessened compared to microfiber. So, you have a choice of multiple passes with foam pads but you'll still need a finishing polish step, or just one slightly aggressive pass with microfiber and then a very quick finish polish pass. We opted to stick with the faster process, knowing it would still yield a result equal to or better than the slower process. It's all about trade offs.
Reflection shot of M205 and MT300 after finish polishing. The distortion at the bottom is due to the tight radius curvature of the lower door panel.
Yours truly and the car owner, Eric, after polishing. Yeah he's happy.... wouldn't you be?!?!?
Time to protect that finish - Ultimate Wax paste, applied with 4" foam pad on the MT300.
The 4" foam pads fit perfectly inside the can.
Wipe off was a group effort.
UWWA doing it's magic on the wheels. Well, with a little help from Nick.
The same UWWA is great for cleaning up the door jambs after the final wipe down.
A few different body panels with some serious swirl finding light action. Except it couldn't find any swirls after we obliterated them all!
That's what we're talkin' 'bout!
Beautiful!!
The swirl killing, gloss making team!
Parting shot.
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