I recently purchased this car and spent 9 hours detailing it last weekend. The only pics to write home about are the reflections, so I'll share. There are still tons of swirls on this car that I will have to address later.

Process:
wash
clay (sonus)
wash
sonus swirl buster LC yellow
sonus sfx1 sonus yellow
AIO sonus white
SG hand (acrylic spritz to help remove)

I also mixed in efforts with 3m machine glaze, poorboy's stuff, sfx 2, some maguires products, etc...

Anyhoozle, here's the reflection after one layer of SG (all I had time and patience for):





I tried to get a pic of the remaining swirls, but they were impossible to get in the light and with this silver color. At night under flourescent lighting they really pop out.

mb

 

You had remaining swirls after 2 passes with the yellow pad?!?! I guess it would depend on the aggresiveness of the polish, but still...

 

Yes. Don't know if it's poor technique (entirely possible) or that the scratches aren't swirls, but actual scratches that I can't get to instead.

I'm gonna do lots of practicing on this silver car (forgiving color) before I really try to tackle my black MCS roof.

mb

 

What kind of car is that? I can tell what the one is in the reflection but not the one you worked on... although I have some guesses (something German?).

I agree with mcbrendan... you should've been able to pull out all or at least most of the swirls with the yellow pads. Tell me more... what kind of car, what speed you ran the PC on, how much pressure you used (or didn't use), and how much time you spent per section (for the abrasives, not the others).

I can help you figure out what needs to be done. It's rare that you can't remove your swirls so let's figure out what needs to be changed in your technique.

-Heather

 

It's a BMW 5 series... I think?

 

e46 3 series. I had two 3 series there, one badly swirled/scratched, and this silver one. I started on the trunk of the blue car (no pics) with the LC yellow and Poorboy's SSR 2.5. It hazed the surface, and that scares me, so I stopped with it. Went to the Sonus Swirl buster, then SFX1, then a 3m machine glaze. The glaze covered up everything and made it look acceptable. The larger project was the silver car, so I moved on.

So I used the LC yellow with Sonus SB, then a sonus yellow with SFX 1, then I finished it off with AIO on an LC white.

As far as pressure, I used the weight of the PC plus a little. I spent about 3 minutes or less per section. That's prolly where I lost the results. The speed I used on the PC was 5 since 6 vibrated the hell out of my hands (I put on the 6" counter weight. The LC pads are 6.5" and the sonus are 6".

Thanks for your help! Wish I could get pics of the scratches on that silver, but I think we all know what they look like.

mb

 

6 is too high a setting. 5 should be alright, but even then, it's a little high. Heather had a great post that described the speed in relation aggresiveness of polish. It broke down to the higher the speed, the faster the diminishing abrasives in each polish broke down= less abrasive levels than that same polish at a speed settgin of 4 or 4.5. (I'm not sure if Sonus uses diminishing abrasives or not)

Also with the LC yellow, or any LC pad for that matter, no pressure is needed. Heather just told me this and I tried it last week and it makes a huge differance.

 

Great information - thanks so much.

mb

 

Haha don't thank me thank Heather. Good luck!

 

I just got the meguiar's #83 that was on backorder - will this help?

mb

 

The real problem here boils down to the simple fact you haven't chosen a system. Stop messing with all of these different products. Learn one of them, and use it for all it's worth. Since you're using the LC pads with Prima, stick with it. If you use the right techniques you will have decent results. Use bad technique and you're just spinning your..ahem...pads!

If you're going to try M83 DACP, then get a Meguiar's W8006 polishing pad and with 15 to 20 pounds of pressure, and follow my DVD you'll get results on speed 5 or 6. As I've said before, choose a system, and learn to use it well.

Richard