What is your average working time you've experience with 106FA to break down? I almost think I'm working it too long but was also told it takes longer than 106FF.
When the polish is broken down properly you should have a clear surface (somewhat like Vaseline) the polish will become clear but still barely visible on the pant surface. If it is oily (Menzerna uses both oil and wax for paint surface lubrication) then either too much polish was used or the diminishing abrasives were not sufficiently broken down, if you don’t allow the polish to haze as it diminishes the abrasives, stopping to soon, is like rubbing sand paper across the paint
Diminishing Abrasives Technology A non-linear abrasive that require friction - while the majority of polishes on the market use a form of diminishing (non- linear) abrasive, which you polish until it turns translucent; when a polish "flashes" from a liquid paste to a light semi-dry haze, much like a coating of Vaseline® the diminishing polish has then broken down and is ready for removal. Diminishing abrasives, as the name suggests; t he abrasives become smaller with friction, and therefore go from removing paint defects to polishing the paint, which produces the shine. If you don't break them down sufficiently, you are just grinding those abrasive particles into your paint, without polishing it, which can leave behind marring and other paint surface imperfections. It is important to know when a polish has broken down because if you take it too far you will re-introduce surface marring. During the polishing process, trace amounts of paint and / or oxidation is removed; this can cause the debris and the polish to “clump” together. This can cause a haze to the paint surface, a wipe-down or a paint cleaning product will eliminate this.
In my opinion, you can never over work a finer Menzerna polish. Even if you work it past when the diminishing abrasives have effectively broken down, the lubricants will still be present so you won't be causing any damage and you know that you have used the diminishing abrasives to their fullest extent to leave as sharp a paint finish as possible.
Well said Jon! Also, 106FA uses high-viscosity oils so you'll need to create a little heat for it to work "smoother" (referring to using it with a finishing pad). It does take a bit longer to break down then most polishes, because it was designed for ceramic clears and well, ceramics take more time to finish . Here's a visual of the "breaking down" process that I made using Scholl S03+, which has a similar working time to 106FA. This is my "Jesse's one-step" technique . On to the polishing. So after Flexcalibur and I Rambo'd the door with a Scholl wool pad and Scholl S17 to remove all the scratches, I went with a finishing pad and Scholl S03+ (fan-friggin'-tastic polish this is!!). Now if you have to use a wool pad on most cars to remove the scratches you're going to be left with (in most cases) some ugly holograms. After that it usually takes 2 sometimes even 3 steps to clear those up, especially if it's a ceramic finish like this one. Here's how I did it in 1 step with a %100 hologram-free finish. After spreading the S03+ at 600 RPM I bumped it up to about 1,500-1,800 and worked in the polish (S03+ has a pretty good working time) with a pretty good amount of pressure (this will vary depending on the paint type). After I saw that the polish was starting to flash (you can see it turn from a milky color to almost clear) I stopped to clean the pad. What the polish looked like just after being spread at 600 This is what it looked like when I stopped, but it wasn't broken down well enough and you'll see why in the next pics. Before cleaning the pad After cleaning. Notice that there's still polish inside the pad. This means it's still got some medium cutting power. So, I went back for a few more passes. After a few more passes the polish was broken down properly and after cleaning the pad it looked like this: Now after you've cleaned the pad, you have to resume polishing at the same speed and pressure that you used before you cleaned it. Once you've made a couple of passes like that you can start to work your way down to the jeweling process. Here's what the polish looks like after being broken down properly: And here's what it looks like after being completely broken down and after numerous passes in the jeweling process: And here's what the Crime Light has to say about the whole process: Jesse wins, flawless victory! So far I've only tested this method with Scholl polishes, but I'm pretty sure it will work with other diminishing polishes, as well.
This is what Menzerna PO87mc looks like when fully broken down. If you overwork the polish, you will see the vaseline line oily film start to disappear but you will have broken down the polish well before you reach this point:
