i've been looking into the whole detailing thing. i've ordered a PC and bundle from DP and i want to make sure i clay before i polish and wax. so i've been looking and Meg's and others have more than one type. there is fine and mild and medium and others... what should i use?
so whats my car like?
i've had it for 1 year and have not applied wax, we just bought a house and i work full time and go to school full time so not a lot of free time. but i'm at the point where i am not ok with anymore. i looked into how to fix paint chips with the langka products and what have you but i do have some minor swirls which i can post later today if you want/need for evaluation. . i was thinking of buying medium grit clay since i'll be polishing right after. is that a good idea?
is this the right process?
Hand Wash with lambswool mitt and 2 buckets with grit guard
Clay Surface
hand wash again
photo
Paint Repair
let cure
photo
next day
Hand wash
Swirl with orange pad
Finish with white
Amigo with black?
Epic with black
take more photos

please help i've read a lot of these threads and i think this is the right way to go. i'm gonna do it this weekend or next based on weather. Friday (the family guy weather man Olly's voice) "It's gone Rain"

recap
what clay should i use?
am i following the right process for wash and wax?

thanks

 

What are using for a lubricant when you clay? I use a soapy water mixture that I rinse off and dry as I finish each area.

Mark

 

i bought glide but i also have meg's QD which i guess would also work.

 

Do the baggie test and see how much work the paint needs. Probably not much. Baggie test is after washing put a plastic sandwich bag on your hand, and lightly rub the paint. You will likely feel some roughness. This tells you you need to clay.

If the roughness is not bad, get fine clay. Otherwise get medium. As long as you are getting a consumer grade of clay you should be fine.
Be careful if you get into professional clay as there are some much more abrasive levels that most owners should not be using.

 

heres more looks

 

you can see in the last photo that the car looks pretty good from 5-10 ft. even though it rained all day yesterday in PHILTHadelphia

 

I'm NO expert but I am a newbie to detailing now and I think Amigo would be better used the step BEFORE Epic and AFTER Finish. Also, Orange Pad with Amigo is probably too strong. I would suggest talking to DP or Octane Guy on this.

 

thats helpful. i need more info
i think you're right so i'll change the OP
thanks

 

Yep Amigo is a fine polish that's used before going to Epic. You shouldn't use it with anything more aggressive than a white pad.


To determine what clay to use, you basically can define it as consumer grade clay or Professional Mild clay. Anything else is generally for body shop use and what that means is--the emphasis is placed on speed, not gentleness to your paint.

Take a look at this car, before using red aggressive clay


Take some red Aggressive Clay from Meguiar's


and now it looks like this


To the consumer, this would be frightening to see. To the professional, this is just business as usual.

I sell the Professional Mild clay because it's just as safe as the consumer clay but works about twice as fast as the off the shelf stuff. Also I like the consistency. It's not too sticky, or soft, or hard to knead.

As for your process:

Hand Wash with lambswool mitt and 2 buckets with grit guard (AND DAWN liquid soap)

Clay Surface
hand wash again (DELETE THIS STEP)
photo
Paint Repair
let cure
photo
next day

Hand wash
Swirl with orange pad
Swirl with White pad


Finish with white (optional and probably not needed)
Amigo with white (optional)
Epic with black
take more photos

 

i'm getting giddy with excitement now. i'm going to practice all my steps with the PC on an old project car i own. its getting a respray when i have money/time to play with it again so i could care less if i ruin it.

does the red clay make it look like that because it is lfting out the fillers and etc.?

thanks for your post octaneguy

 

No it's physically hazing the surface. You need a rotary buffer to correct that. A PC won't do it. I used the red clay because there were rusted metal welding shavings embedded in the paint, and it was shredding up my blue clay. It worked great for this old truck, but I use it very rarely because of the scouring it causes.

Btw, clay doesn't lift--it shears. It shears the contaminants above the paint surface until it's level with the paint.

A mild clay won't affect the paint, but an aggressive one will as seen above.

Richard

 

very cool to know

 

Holy crap!! I'm starting to rethink this claying business. If I get those kind of swirls in my new paint and can't get them out, I'll be very upset!!

I ordered Z-18 clay from Zaino...but I just don't know if I want to risk it. I certainly wasn't thinking about doing all those steps. I was going to follow the directions Zaino provides: Wash/Clay/Wash/Polish.

 

Please read what I said. I was demoing what Professional Body Shop Aggressive clay will do to your finish. The Zaino clay is a consumer clay and not something you have to worry about. The same goes true for any of the clays available from Autozone, Pepboys, Griots, DetailersParadise, etc..

Richard

 

OK, but the clay I got from Zaino is red...like what you were using. I hadn't seen such a terrible outcome before and it's daunting to think about. I don't have an electric buffer, so everything will be done by hand.

 

The color doesn't matter. Everybody makes a different colored clay--purple, grey, white, yellow, blue. What matters is what clay was intended for. The Meguiar's Professional Red Clay states on the jar it's for body shop use and says Aggressive. Zaino doesn't sell an aggressive clay, so don't worry.

As long you clay with good technique you won't be marring the paint. Bad technique would be like dropping the clay, and getting a piece of rock there, then continuing to clay and now you scoured the surface with contaminated clay...

Richard

 

That's a relief. I read on the instructions that if you drop it, throw the piece you're working with away...or use it only on glass.

Also, I bought the Zaino polish. Should I polish and then wax, or is the polish sufficient?

 

I don't think the color itself determines the agressivness of the clay. Suppliers can make the different clays they sell whatever color they want. I've used the Zaino clay many times without any problems. It's mild.

 

Zaino has a terminology problem.
All of their products that they call polishes are what everyone else calls synthetic wax or sealants. The only product they sell that polishes is Z-PC.

 

That's kind of what I gathered from their description. Which begs the question, should I only use their "polish" after the clay bar or do I need an additional product?

 

If you're working by hand, use the Zaino polish after the claybar.

Richard

 

this is all great info. i like my thread.

 

Thread starting is an art. Some threads quickly drift off to the depths of NAM, some stick around a day or two, and the good ones get lots of on-going traffic.

Mark

 

I agree with OctaneGuy's revision of your process with a slight preferential variation.

In this case, the only thing I *might* change is to do the Amigo and the white pad step, not optionally. I just think all dark paints enjoy a coat of Amigo! Technically though, if you're able to reach perfection prior to the Amigo optional step then I'd agree it is optional. It's just difficult (unless you're OctaneGuy himself! ) to achieve 100% perfection... especially if you're new to using the PC. Realistically, I would aim for 80-95% perfection your first time with the PC and abrasives.

Amigo's benefit is that it will fill and conceal any minor paint imperfections you have remaining in the paint after polishing. This ultimately adds to the gloss and beauty of the final result.

I also want to emphasize his advice about Finish and the white pad as being optional- very true in your situation. As long as you work Swirl long enough per ~2'x2' section (start with at least 2 minutes/section), it will correct and finish the work with one product. In some cases you can even skip the Swirl and white pad step, but probably not. The white pad tones Swirl down from the level it's at with the orange pad... effectively becoming similar to Finish.

That said, you may be asking what you're supposed to do with Finish then, right? Finish will be great for future mini-polishes (no, not that MINI... miniature!) when you don't need to work the paint as much as you do this time. A quick run of Finish and the white pad at your semi-annual (or annual, since you're tight on time and if the paint keeps up well until a year from now) will be a nice pre-wax step (or pre-Amigo step).

BTW, I like how you included photography in your process!

-Heather

 

As OctaneGuy already said, just avoid the body shop/professional clay. Don't worry though... this level of clay is actually rather difficult to find unless you're buying from a professional supplier or a paint/body shop supplier. None of the enthusiast retailers (Detailers Paradise, Griots, Zaino, etc) sell the professional level clay.

As for the rest of it (fine or medium grade), it really doesn't matter much. In my experience, the only real difference between the two is the time it takes to reach the same results. Fine grade clay takes just a bit more time and medium takes a bit less time... and that's really only if you're timing it. In other words, buy either one and you'll be fine.

Note that any grade of clay can scuff your paint. Certainly not at the level of the aggressive professional clay as OG demonstrated in his photos though! In fact, normal clay scuffing is very fine superficial level scratches that will come out with just about any abrasive, by hand or machine, with a blind-fold on.

So, if you're claying before abrasive polishing don't even worry if you cause a little bit of scuffing. It will come out easily and quickly when you polish anyway.

If you're claying without abrasive polishing afterwards, just be sure to use light-medium pressure (and no more) and use ample lubricant spray as you go. If you do happen to get some scuffing anyway, just grab a hand-applied-appropriate abrasive (Swirl, Scratch-X, etc) and gently polish it out.

It's not something to worry about- even for the newbie! Honest.

-Heather