Spring Clean 2016 Plans!?

Curran

What are your detailing plans for early 2016?

Are you planning a good clean and re-application of your LSP or you going for more??

Really hope I can find some time early on this year, and I want to get out and give the car a lot of TLC, as its been a bit neglected lately. Mrs. Curran had been using the car the past few months, and with building work going on in our estate and where she works, the car is absolutely bogging!! That combo'd with the fact that the car hasnt been polished since a few days after purchace, almost 6 years ago :eek:, it really could do with some polishing attention!

Plan is....
- Give the paintwork a good compounding
- Sort a bit of rust on the rear arch, and get the bumpers painted at the same time
- Protect with a nano coating when all the paintwork is sorted, as time for waxing, etc is at a minimum lately
- Refurbish the wheels due to kerbing
- Enjoy it for another 12k miles...unless something tempting appears!

Foxhole Norman

- Get the Bodywork repaired
- 3 Stage Polish again, properly
- Ceramic Coat with CQUK
- New Wheels and Refurb current ones

Curran

Damn BMW E39s - exact same plans!

Foxhole Norman

Curran wrote: »

Damn BMW E39s - exact same plans!

They're worth it :cool:

vectra

Tou wont regret using CQUK.
Best move I ever made.

Senecio

Get myself a DA polisher and give the car a proper correction. The car is only 2.5yrs old but I swear the previous owner drove it through an automatic car wash every week.

I have a white car, what sort of results can I expect? It's obviously not going to come up as well as a dark metallic car.

vectra

Senecio wrote: »

Get myself a DA polisher and give the car a proper correction. The car is only 2.5yrs old but I swear the previous owner drove it through an automatic car wash every week.

I have a white car, what sort of results can I expect? It's obviously not going to come up as well as a dark metallic car.

As Tesco put it
"Every little helps"

How good can you get it?
Provided thee are no deep scratches and you are only dealing with swirls.
Park it beside a new on of the same model and color.
It should look extremely similar to the new one once you finsih.

mik_da_man

Audi: The winter wax is still holding its own in fairness

On the list would be a wheel refurb when i stick the winter wheels on.

Pug:
Needs a new coat of 845, and am looking to get a set of original steel wheels. Bumper could do with a respray, well the front end really

Senecio

vectra wrote: »

As Tesco put it
"Every little helps"

How good can you get it?
Provided thee are no deep scratches and you are only dealing with swirls.
Park it beside a new on of the same model and color.
It should look extremely similar to the new one once you finsih.

Cheers for that. No deep scratches, just many swirls and a dull appearance. When I bought it I gave it a good spring clean and a going over with SRP/EGP by hand. Provided good enough protection but didn't touch the swirls.

ianobrien

My plans are;

1. Get a DAS-6 (or even a -6 Pro), pads and relevant chemicals.
2. Figure out how to use it. That will be fun.....
3. Use it on the father's Octavia (black) and my own Leon (silver)
4. Seal the cars with Collinite (or a matching seal/wax to the chemicals in #1)
5. Use Collinite on the Parents motorhome and my new one. Mine will have to get a claying and strip back first as I don't know what's on it.

I'm hoping that Collinite won't effect the graphics on the motorhomes.

Newtown90

Give both cars Ford Focus and Skoda Octavia a polish with Evo 3 and 1 and a few coats of Fusso to seal the paint!

Take off the alloys, and seal with Krystal Kleen R-Evolve X.

Bought a Henry and a Black Tornado for Christmas so looking forward to giving the interiors a decent clean!

Curran

ianobrien wrote: »

I'm hoping that Collinite won't effect the graphics on the motorhomes.

Will have no effect on the graphics - using a machine polisher over them, on the other hand, would!

Curran

Senecio wrote: »

I have a white car, what sort of results can I expect? It's obviously not going to come up as well as a dark metallic car.

You get what you put into it - as Vectra said, you should be able to match a showroom finish provided there are no deep scratches, and if you were willing to put the time in, you could get a better finish than factory! But that would be a slog with a DA, but achievable!

Granted the difference in the overall appearance may be more dramatic when polishing up a black swirled car over a white swirled car...but its knowing the paintwork is in good condition again and not seeing those dreaded swirls (even though you are probably the only one who takes any notice of them :P)

ianobrien

Curran wrote: »

Will have no effect on the graphics - using a machine polisher over them, on the other hand, would!

I had guessed that. What I don't want is to damage them. I hate looking at 10 year old ones with very faded graphics. I suspect they were being washed with Traffic Film Revmover to get rid of the black streaks. The streaks usually are from water running off the roof in the same spots all the time (and reaching the roof to give them a proper scrub can be fun)

Curran

I would be confident that your suspensions are correct!

Sure there are products that will get a job done, but the right product for the right job will always ensure a car / van / motorhome, etc will always look its best for many years, as intended when they were produced!

MuppetCheck

The civic: Might take out the DA, some pointless dent removal and a few new interior trim bits. It's close to bring chopped in though at the moment so it depends on what herself wants to do.

The VRS: I fancy getting a ceramic coating on it, had it on the last couple of cars and it worked well. Won't be doing that myself though, MX or D&D most likely as getting it up to spirit is going to be hard.

*Kol*

ianobrien wrote: »

I had guessed that. What I don't want is to damage them. I hate looking at 10 year old ones with very faded graphics. I suspect they were being washed with Traffic Film Revmover to get rid of the black streaks. The streaks usually are from water running off the roof in the same spots all the time (and reaching the roof to give them a proper scrub can be fun)

Even by hand colour transfers off the graphics on my camper so I try to avoid them. I always feel that the paint on the camper body is not to the same standard as the cab ( on mine anyway) so I would never go at it with a machine.

ianobrien

*Kol* wrote: »

Even by hand colour transfers off the graphics on my camper so I try to avoid them. I always feel that the paint on the camper body is not to the same standard as the cab ( on mine anyway) so I would never go at it with a machine.

At the moment, its washed by hand with dilute Mud-Buster Caravan and Motorhome cleaner. We dont even snowfoam it. I was thinking the Collinite would seal, rather than cut as the Collinite is designed for the marine environment also.

I'm not even considering any polish of any kind, hand applied or not!

Noccy_Mondy

Curran wrote: »

What are your detailing plans for early 2016?

That combo'd with the fact that the car hasnt been polished since a few days after purchace, almost 6 years ago :eek:, it really could do with some polishing attention!

Hold up there, with all your talk and advice, you haven't even got to your own car in 6 years :eek: It's bad when a man can't get a chance to do his own car!

Curran

I only ever gave the car a light enhancement detail - it had 63k miles on it at the time and to be honest, up until recently, it was still in pretty decent shape, and its at 128k now! Now dont get me wrong - it's had plenty of decontaminations, claying, and re-application of LSPs, but it hasnt seen any polish in near 6 years!

Noccy_Mondy wrote: »

Hold up there, with all your talk and advice, you haven't even got to your own car in 6 years :eek:

Yeah, I practice what I preach - prevention is better than cure! And it hasnt really needed any polishing in that time!

If I dont have enough time to give it a decent wash, I dont! And you should see it now - its not been washed in a few months, and there is building work going on nearby my estate and the roads are three times as bad as regular winter roads.
Wash it using the proper techniques and give it the time it deserves or not at all...rushing a job will end up in inflicting some sort of minor damage. As I always say, a good wash mitt, drying towel, shampoo and two buckets will keep a car with good paintwork, in good condition for many years!! Minor damage over that time is inevitable and lately my car is starting to suffer from the accumulation of that minor damage and the black is starting to look a bit grey-ish, due to light refracting off the swirls in a non-uniform direction.
If I gave it a full decontamination, and waxed it, it would look still look very well, but under harsh light, it just annoys me seeing them!! :P

Noccy_Mondy

What do you drive?

Curran

BMW 525i

Back when it would have been looking like this most weeks!





It often looks like this lately.....


But underneath it all, and after a decent wash...



After the last wash, at a guess, it was probably back in June/July!!


Now dont be fooled by that shine - the car has plenty of swirls - if you were to shine a bright light on the paintwork directly the view would be a hell of a lot differnt....its quite easy to trick the appearance with light coming from a different angle!

MetzgerMeister

All I have on my list in the short term is a wheel detail. Need to get a bottle of Gtechniq C1 for that but haven't gotten around to it. Once that's cured and I have time, they'll be coming off again for CG Wheel Guard and Fusso. The easier the wheels are to clean, the happier I am!

Long term I want a week or two off work to focus on a correction. It won't be intense as the paint is already in very good condition but I want to be able to take my time with it. Possibly a C1/EXO application afterwards but I'm not fully decided on that yet.

I did have plans to bring the car to the UK to get Crystal Serum applied but it's not worth it.

For the time being I'm very happy to apply Fusso when it needs it. Excellent stuff altogether!

Curran

Is a wheel refurb not on the cars too?? :pac:

vectra

MetzgerMeister wrote: »

I did have plans to bring the car to the UK to get Crystal Serum applied but it's not worth it.

For the time being I'm very happy to apply Fusso when it needs it. Excellent stuff altogether!

Why bring it to the UK ?

Curran wrote: »

Is a wheel refurb not on the cars too?? :pac:

LOL :pac::pac:

Curran

vectra wrote: »

Why bring it to the UK ?

Crystal Serum is a Detailer only product - you have to be accredited by gtechniq to be supplied with it; the public cant purchase it.

MetzgerMeister

Curran wrote: »

Is a wheel refurb not on the cars too?? :pac:

Lol It is but it's not something I'm in a hurry to get done. Not a full refurb, just a diamond cut so it'll be done within a day.

vectra

Curran wrote: »

Crystal Serum is a Detailer only product - you have to be accredited by gtechniq to be supplied with it; the public cant purchase it.

Can Brian not get it in and do it for you?



Wherre do you plan on getting the wheel done?

Curran

You have to go to gtechniq and prove you know what you are doing! They won't just give it out to anyone, nor even if you are a 'detailer', nor if you've years of experience with nano products...they have to see you perform the prep and application before giving the accreditation.

MetzgerMeister

They're very strict with the Crystal Serum because once it cures it has to be sanded off if you mess up the application, polishing just won't work as it's an incredibly solid layer. Products like C1, EXO, CQUK etc. can all be machine polished off.

Going to get the wheel done by Rim Solutions. They did a superb job on sk8board's 420 GC after he kerbed his diamond cut alloy.

crasy dash

Well overall I want to remove the swirl damage on the car and give it some TLC.

Due to lack of time and weather this week.
1.Detar the car
2.Clay bar the car never done this before so its a first for me.

That's my plan now but probably will change by the time I get up in the morning

Spike Witwicky

E39s are a gorgeous looking car especially in black. IMO best looking 5 series.

Plans for 2016

Full decon, detar and clay
Polish. FG400 and SF4500
Wax. CG Blacklight, Sealant and Petes 53. Though this will be on lighter paint (BMW Arctic Metallic) just to see how it looks

New wheels. Well second hand. Trying to find a set of 17" Style 161 staggered as the 16" on mine are too small imo
Replace Headlights and tail lights. Headlamps from an LCI E90 for the halogen angel eyes and clear indicator type tail lights

Mc Love

The usual - de-iron, de-tar and clay followed by a wash/polish and wax. I've ordered Blacklight (i'll be interested to see the results)

Curran

Just be sure to wax or seal over the Blacklight - its not a stand alone product!
It will give you a very nice deep, warm, wet look!

Mc Love

Collinite 845 to be sure, to be sure

edburg

No plans for my 2 at minute other than quick wash's for insignia, the new stuff is working well and still holding well since winter protection in October, Astra not moved in months as I don't use it in winter.

Probably around March both cars will get a thorough session of sorts and protected for summer. If can afford getting the clear coat sorted on Astra I may well be having a cutting session and try remove as much orange peel as I dare.