clear bra :)

[capt. dan]

Originally Posted by Mystical_Ice

what part of it would i post? how should i phrase it? just that i'm looking for a good detailer?
i'm in Houston, TX

I would post under the southwest section that you are looking for a good detailer in the area. Post some pics and explain what happened. You might be able to find someone with a heart and give you a break too.

[Mystical_Ice]

OK i posted in that suggested forum...

still waiting

[Mystical_Ice]

http://autopia.org/forum/southwest-u...n-tx-area.html

[capt. dan]

Good luck and I hope you can get it taken care of. Make sure you keep us updated and post the finished pics.

[Mystical_Ice]

OK i went to a guy in Houston that was highly recommended. Wil from A Finer Detail. He's got a couple of mobile detailing trucks that go out to the car and do the work. He spent 10 minutes on a part of the hood, polishing with a couple of compounds. He removed probably 80% of the 'halo's, but you can still see them there when you shine a light on it. not as large, but nonetheless they're there. He said it would be impossible to remove all of them, and if it were his car, he'd just spend 8 hours on it and get most of the swirl marks out.

he did say that spraying another layer of clearcoat on would allow me to get the car the way it was when i got it - with absolutely no swirl marks or halos on it whatsoever, but he suggested against doing that because he said it's just one more thing that could go wrong, could not be done correctly, etc.

So what should i do? should i 'settle' for getting MOST of the halos/swirls removed? Or should i start going to body shops now and getting quotes on clearcoat/wetsand/thewholebit from them, and i could then take it to a detailer to get it polished.

what think. i'm getting so tired and depressed over this incident i don't know what to do

[lunarx]

Wow this whole incident sucks.

See if you can get the new detailer to document in writing that your car was severely dammaged by the other shop.
That will serve as ammunition in your battle to get them to compensate you for the necessary repairs.

[capt. dan]

I hate to hear that. I would try to get another detailer to look at it. Can you feel any of the swirls with your fingernail? If you cannot I would think that they could be removed, just a matter of how much time it would take. I can tell you from doing my car that this paint is not easy to work with and takes several passes to get it looking good. It might be worth it to you to get the equipment and do it yourself. You could do a panel at a time when you can. To keep black swirl free is difficult. I am guessing that I will have to do a light polish at least once but probably twice a year to keep it looking good.

As for dealing with the body shop I would guess your best option is to take a couple of estimates to them and try to get some money out of them. I think they have proven that you dont want them doing any more work on your car.

Let me know if I can help at all. Dont get depressed over it. I know how hard it is to work for something and want to keep it nice. Its good to take pride in what you have accomplished and I have no doubt you will get this sorted out in time. Just give it time. I hope its sooner than later.

[Mystical_Ice]

no swirls you can't feel with your fingernail. they're very light. inf act i'm going to go take a few pictures of them right now.

[bpitas]

That 3M "Dark Paint swirl remover" is pretty good stuff - used to use it on my black C5. But even though it says it's a "polish" it was still just filling in the swirls like a wax, it's NOT fixing the scratches like Griotts or another true polish. It looks good, but it's not a permanent solution and won't help Ice because he'll have everything removed from the areas where the clear bra is going, which will re-expose the swirls.

I've used Griotts too, and while it works well on some paints (like the C5) it also didn't work very well on my ex-wive's black Tahoe. I guess maybe some paints are just softer than others, so what works well on one car might not work as well on another car. When I used Griotts 3 on my C5 it smoothed out the halos nicely, but on the tahoe it *created* more super-fine swirl marks and made the paint almost cloudy. In retrospect it was probably user error because I should have started at the finest polish first, but I was just doing what I always did and going 2-3 like I did on the C5. Surface prep was the same too - basically I just wash the car with Dawn before doing any polishing to make sure everything is off the car (wax, polish, etc).

I'll have to try some new waxes - I've been a Zaino user since I had a Mystic Cobra back in 1996, and it was the only wax at the time that would make the color change really obvious. ("Mystic" was a Ford factory flip-flop paint that went from green to purple to rootbeer depending on the angle you were looking at the paint). I've tried tons of different waxes since then, but haven't found anything that looks deeper than Zaino, but Zaino doesn't seem to last very long...

-B

[Mystical_Ice]

OK so i looked at the car again yesterday, under the parking lot lights at IHOP, and it looks freaking terrible.

now when i took it to the guy at Finer Detail, he worked for 10 minutes, using multiple chemicals and buffers, on about a 2 foot square section of my hood. He said that was the "best he could get it to look", and it looked good with a little light he shone on it (although you could still see the swirls), but under the big flourescent lights in the IHOP parking lot, this is what it looked like...

ORIGINALLY DAMAGED AREA, NO FLASH:


ORIGINALLY DAMAGED AREA, WITH FLASH:



Now this is what got me. Note the area he spent 10 minutes on with two different buffers and a few different buffing/polishing compounds:
TOUCHED UP SURFACE, NO FLASH:


TOUCHED UP SURFACE, WITH FLASH:


Please tell me that's not the best that can be done... i honestly don't see a difference between the worked on surface, and the original surface. This guy comes with recommendations inside and out

i want to just get rid of the car. this upsets me so much

[capt. dan]

If you cannot feel them with your fingernail you should be able to rub them out. Go to your local autoparts store and buy a tube of Meguiars scratch X and a foam applicator pad. Put a dime size squirt on the pad and rub a small spot about 6 inch square with alot of passion going in a straight line until the product almost dries. Wipe it off and see how it looks. You may need to do this in the same spot a few times. This would be alot of work to do the whole car but if you see an improvement trying this I would think you could get it back to pre disaster condition. I will be on the road tonight until about midnight. I will send a pm with my phone number. Call if you can tonight and I can walk you through this if you have time.

Dan

[lunarx]

Wow, that does look bad.
Whatever you do to get that out needs to be shared.
It looks like you will need a stronger cutting compound to work thru those swirls.
There are so many at varying depths that it will take lots of cutting to get them all.
What is the strongest compound used so far?

[Mystical_Ice]

OK update:

here's what the body shop says... first off, the guy's really nice. he said he knows they messed up, but i need to give them a chance to FIX their mistake. i need to leave the car with them, and they'll take better care this time, and they'll wetsand it and fix the problem. if they gauge the clear coat and see that it's not good enough, then they'll apply a new clear coat. he said he wants to keep me as a customer, but he can't pay an outsider to do the work, not when he hasn't even had a chance to try to fix his problem. he said it's got a lifetime warranty, and if something ever happens in the future i just bring it back and he'll fix it.

what should i do...

it's a) bring it to him and get him to try to fix it, or b) find someone else to do it, and pay it out of my pocket.

need answers urgently. i have Josh, a WELL KNOWN and HIGHLY RESPECTED detailer coming down from Dallas to be at my house 6:30AM on Thursday morning. he says it's going to take a good 10 hours to fix this problem.

WHAT DO I DO?

[lunarx]

I vote to let Josh (detailer) take a shot at it.

If he fixes it, you got of easy.

If he says you need a repaint, then back to the body shop you go.

Good Luck

[Mystical_Ice]

good idea... yeah i spoke to Josh on the phone for half an hour, and that's definately the way i'm going to go