A day spent cleaning

[clive]

I'm still learning this detailing lark so any advice is appreciated.. I have lots of cleaning products in my garage (mostly autoglym & meguiars) which have gathered over the years and don't see much daylight so I decided to put them to use at the weekend.

Firstly she got hosed down to remove any loose dirt and then washed from top to bottom from a bucket of warm water containing some meguiars nxt car wash applied using a synthetic mitt (also meguiars i think).  I dryed her off with an autoglym chamois and not trusting the Northern Irish weather I cleared some room in the garage (is everyones garage this cluttered?) to start the real work.



I don't know the history of the paintwork as I only bought the car 2 months ago but it looks to be in fairly good nick to my untrained eyes.  Water wasn't beading up on the surface so I know she needed some protection from the elements.  A quick surface test with my hand showed there wasn't much bonded on contaminants so I decided not to break out the clay bar which I bought over a year ago and have yet to use

So I started to work, one panel at a time, with a coat of autoglym super resin polish applied with a foam applicator pad and removed with a microfibre cloth.  This was reasonably easy to apply and remove leaving a nice finish.  Next was a wax layer to protect the polished surface so I grabbed my trusty meguiars nxt wax and applied a generous coating to the entire car before grabbing a well earned cuppa.  After about 20 mins the residue was removed using a fresh microfibre cloth.

I know you guys like reflections so here's something to keep you interested


At this point I considered a coat of turtle wax gloss guard (i think this name is correct, its a clear liquid which is meant to seal in the wax) but it was getting late and my arms were tired enough at this point so I didn't bother.  Would this have been worth the extra effort?






The paint looks almost blue in this pic but the sky was dark after the heavens opened:


Any comments on the products or combination of products I used are welcome!

[stealthwolf]

Nice going. I don't know much either but this much I've gleaned:

- did you use two-bucket method of washing?
- synthetic mitts are, apparently, bad and you should be using lambswool mitts. I didn't know this until a month ago.
- clay it. Do it once every six months but do it. It gives you a prime surface to work with.
- am waiting for my polisher to arrive before I use SRP so can't comment on that but they say you should tape up edges and rubber to prevent the white crud from forming.
- what did you use on the alloys and wheels?

Looks nice otherwise.
Keep at it!

[clive]

Cheers for the comments..

- did you use two-bucket method of washing?

No, I will do in future though.

- synthetic mitts are, apparently, bad and you should be using lambswool mitts. I didn't know this until a month ago.

When I bought the synthetic mitt they were out of stock of the lambswool one so I got the next best.  Will invest in a lambswool one when its done.  Should be better then a sponge anyway?

- clay it. Do it once every six months but do it. It gives you a prime surface to work with.

Might practice with the clay on the wife's car this weekend

- am waiting for my polisher to arrive before I use SRP so can't comment on that but they say you should tape up edges and rubber to prevent the white crud from forming.

I was a bit worried about the unpainted plastics but the poilsh & wax dont seem to have contaminated them.

- what did you use on the alloys and wheels?

Forgot to mention them, I gave the wheels 2 coats of meguiars nxt tech wax and the rubber 2 coats of meguiars tyre gel (which smells great btw).

[NEWEY]

looks nice and clean

[Top Cat]

Nice little write up Clive and the motor is looking fine. 

[Greenouse]

We all start somewhere and from what I can see youv'e started well!  I have used gloss guard and found it a good finish once waxed. Iv'e since moved on to Collinite which is just amazing 

Nice work fella 

[Gene Hunt.]

As above looking good.

[Conker]

Looks great. Nothing better than a day spent cleaning the car, although a hot sunny day and a case of Corona's makes it perfect.

To be honest, very few of the "across the counter" waxes are that long lasting. You need to go start looking at Collinite, jetseal, dodo etc. to get long term protection. I use Collinite too and find it to be awesome, and very cheap in the long run.