Tornado Red restoration & maintenance

[Andy-H]

Morning All,

Getting a Tornado Red motor today and wanting to get the best products I can to restore the paint but also to maintain the red when it's all shiney 

Cheers in advance,
Andy

[Wo-Wo]

What year is your car?

Any red car needs a bit more care to avoid paint marring so, decent wash mitt, drying towel and MF cloths. Then consider snow foam and perhaps a polish with a filler in it, seal and wax.

Some of the guys on here will recommend particular ones.

[Booth11]

Morning All,

Getting a Tornado Red motor today and wanting to get the best products I can to restore the paint but also to maintain the red when it's all shiney 

Cheers in advance,
Andy

Hi

When you say restoration, are you talking proper corrective action?   Has it got damage to the paintwork, swirls marring etc?  Or does it just need a really good decontamination and polish, followed by the usual protection?

Would help to know age of car as Neil says 

[Andy-H]

Sorry Guys,

it's a '91 Mk2. The baint is beyond a machine polish etc but just something to keep it looking as red as possible until I can get it booked in for new paint really.

Thanks

[Booth11]

Sorry Guys,

it's a '91 Mk2. The baint is beyond a machine polish etc but just something to keep it looking as red as possible until I can get it booked in for new paint really.

Thanks

Hi Andy

Don't know how familiar you are with detailing or what equipment i.e. DA polisher etc, or products you may already have, so can only give a generic tips.  Have never had a red car but the principles of a good washing and detailing regime apply to any colour.  Maybe someone with a Tornado Red car can recommend some specific products that have given good results.

If you want to mask marring and scratches till the respray, might be worth using something like a glaze which has fillers and can be applied by hand or machine.  Poorboys Black Hole Glaze is good and not just for dark cars but apparently very effective on red too.  Then you might want to finish with a colour charged wax, such as DoDo Juice Orange Crush.  Plenty of colour charged waxes etc, around so just have a look on a few websites (see below).  If exterior trim is faded then a product like Gtechniq C4 Trim Restorer may be a good option.

It may sound obvious but I'd start by giving it a really good 2 bucket hand wash first to see how it comes up.  Then you can decide if you want to do a more thorough detail which may include some or all of the following stages, some of which you may want to skip if it's going for a respray in the future.

A complete detailing process would go along these lines:

Optional Pre wash or Snow foam using lance or cannon
Wheels pre wash e.g Bilberry wheel cleaner
2 Bucket wash (with grit guards and wash mitt (no sponges!)
Rinse
Dry
Decontamination phase - Iron e.g. IronX and Tar remover e.g. Tardis or combined product such as TRIX
Wash/rinse/dry
Clay bar/clay cloth or clay pad (lube if required)
Wash again, rinse and dry
Optional Polish (DA or hand)
Seal/glaze/wax - can be all or just some of these but wax always last stage protection (LSP)
Dress tyres
Metal polish tailpipes
Dress exterior trim
Glass clean
Interior clean

Also visit Detailing World forum, there's a lot of info on there and some very useful guides.

Here's a few useful detailing links:

Various detailing guides
http://www.polishedbliss.co.uk/acatalog/car-care-advice.html
http://www.cleanyourcar.co.uk/index.php?_a=viewDoc&docId=5
http://www.detailingworld.co.uk/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=17
http://www.cleanyourcar.co.uk/generalImg/guide.gif.
http://www.detailingworld.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=63859

Good detailing product websites:

www.wo-wo.co.uk
www.cleanyourcar.co.uk
www.waxamomo.co.uk
www.polishedbliss.co.uk
www.theultimatefinish.co.uk
www.juicydetailing.co.uk
www.i4detaling.co.uk

 

[Booth11]

Also take a look in this thread for product recommendations, most of which are not exclusive to a black car.

http://www.golfgtiforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=273081.msg2498291#msg2498291

[Wo-Wo]

Take a look here too and get in touch with the author of the post:-

http://www.golfgtiforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=272711.0

Neil

[Andy-H]

Cheers for the tips & links guys 

I do use valet pro snow foam, lambswool mit etc. but this is my first red car as I always see older red cars as having many shades of red and this one hasn't disappointed 

I think maybe without too much outlay I might get the initial paint correction done by the proffessionals, then try and maintain myself 

[Wo-Wo]

Cheers for the tips & links guys 

I do use valet pro snow foam, lambswool mit etc. but this is my first red car as I always see older red cars as having many shades of red and this one hasn't disappointed 

I think maybe without too much outlay I might get the initial paint correction done by the proffessionals, then try and maintain myself 

It would be £100 well spent especially if your thinking it'll be a while before the repaint gets done.