I have seen a few different pads for ones random orbital buffer, included in those are ones with curved edges, what are the advantages to the curved edge as opposed to those with flat edges?

 

Don't know, but I'll post.

 

Why?

 

He was complaining to me on AIM how no-one would post. :-)
Just my little attempt at raising his emotions. :P

 

I see. I thought you were just trying to get your post count up.

 

Most of these attempts are to reduce splatter--to keep the products inside the pad and keep them from loading up in the center. Lake Country's newest pads are the CCS which have little circular pockets throughout the pad that are supposed to hold and redistribute product as it's being used.

Prior to that they had VC or Variable Contact pads--the Prima pads are like that--except for the white pad which is flat--the yellow, orange, and black pads are somewhat conical.

With the PC, splatter really isn't a problem, and pad loading isn't really a problem either if you frequently clean or wash the pads.

If you're talking about the pads with sharp edges like on the Edge 2000, these are supposed to make it easier to buff out narrower areas.

Personally, I use flat pads or the Prima VC pads--they get the job done just fine. As long as you understand the pad aggressiveness and how it works with the different chemicals, that's really all that matters--not the latest "advance" in pad shape design.

Richard

 

Sorry for the OT. But naw, I could care-less about post-counts. If it were up to me I'd be at 1 all the time.

 

I learned an important thing about the VC pads (the concave ones)...the pressure is distributed around the edges of the pad more than the center (duh, makes sense in terms of basic physics), so you have to sort of be careful when you are coming over a body edge or ridge. I failed to do this using the LC orange pad and ended up damn near burning a hole through a boot stripe.

Does anyone have a picture of the "new" LC pads with the little pockets? I'm curious to see what it looks like.

 

Yep! On the other hand, you should ALWAYS be careful about body edges/ridges regardless of pad or tool.

Picture from Amazon.com

 

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

I need new pads (my father-in-law tapped mine out polishing his plane ) but I've been holding out because I'd been realllly curious about the Edge 2000 pads and also because I won't need a set for another 4-5 months since I just polished not that long ago. But I like the looks of these - flat but have sort of the texture of the Edge pads without the scary hole in the center.

May have to orderrrrrr...

 

So, where can I get the red pad, of which you spoke on your DVD?

 

As OG added already, I'd agree that you should be careful on edges/ridges regardless of pad style.

Either way though, MLWagner is right on... the VC (variable contact or concave, as opposed to curved edge, where the edge of the pad is curved outward) pads do focus the pressure on the outer edge, at least in the case of the denser pads.

When using the orange and yellow LC (Lake Country) pads, this is a nice feature because if you're using this level of pad to begin with then it's likely you'd benefit from the additional "power" you get from the focused pressure. Since you cannot add much pressure to the PC with LC pads without bogging down the polisher, this allows you do effectively achieve the same goal.

The black finishing LC pad is also VC but this is for the purpose OctaneGuy mentioned- the potential splatter prevention. Basically, with the black pad, flat vs. VC really doesn't matter one way or another, IMO.



-Heather

 

Are you guys carrying the new CCS pads, Heather?

 

Probably not. Why?

Well, if it's not broken, don't fix it. Although in many areas we believe that as a manufacturer and retailer we should always been looking forward and staying on the cutting edge, this is an area in which we haven't yet been impressed enough to change.

Along the lines of what Richard posted earlier on this thread, none of the new styles of pads (we've tested them all!) have offered what we've seen as any advantage to the current pads we offer. So, rather than changing everything or offering both styles, we've decided to keep things simple. There are enough other topics out there that can be confusing! :impatient

BTW, we've found that the quick-change style of pads like the Edge system do make a big difference on the Cyclo... not because of the quick-change part but simply because, for some reason or another (we're not entirely sure why actually!), the Cyclo just works much better with these pads.
When we've tried them on the PC though, they seemed to work the same as our current Lake Country pads. But since they use a completely different color system, plus you can't mix and match between the LC system and the Edge system, we felt it would only confuse and possibly frustrate our customers to offer both. Needless to say, we didn't feel that switching from LC to the Edge exclusively would make sense either, as the LC system still remains the most common and is considered the industry standard by most.

BTW #2, we do like the CCS pads on the rotary because they seem to reduce the incidence of holograms. However, Richard has also tried them on his rotary and he found that they are difficult to clean as he works once they become saturated. He uses a rotary much more than we do, so I'd give his opinion more weight than ours.
We have not found any advantage whatsoever of the CCS pads on the PC.

That's the long answer to your question, but hopefully that sheds some light on why as well. (plus, have I ever let you down in being long-winded?! )

-Heather

 

FWIW, I'm using the Prima Orange and Prima White pads for most of my work these days. I use these same pads on my rotary buffer as well as on my PC. And I'm using Swirl for my main polish. My point is that I'm achieving the same results--actually better--than when I used Meguiar's.

The CCS pads haven't been all that beneficial to me, and actually for rotary work, the Orange Pad would be better as a flat pad like the white one. The white one is my favorite because it works great with the rotary--but it tends to disintegrate with use and when it does, it dusts like mad. The VC (Variable Contact) pads on the rotary are very difficult to maneuver on some curvy body styles--like the Cayman S I did today--I ended up using the white pad as much as I could, and switched to the VC Orange pad when the white wasn't aggressive enough--but on the PC--the pad style wasn't a hindrance at all--so it all depends on how you work.

There's no reason why any of you couldn't achieve the same results I do with the right amount of time invested, so using a different variation of the pad isn't necessary IMO--I kinda just wish we all used flat pads.