This one is a doozy and sent Dan and I to the mental farm until we figured it all out... This 1996 Impala that has been in our circle of friends for umpteen years, but sat in storage for the last 10. A good friend of ours bought it from the owner as he was ready to move on. He returned it to running and driving condition then asked if we can do anything to bring the paint and interior back. We happily said we would certainly try...and that we did... After 30+ man hours we have to report we did all we could for it....:sorry: Over the course of the detail we learned quite a bit about the car's previous history and it isn't all good... It is easiest to tell the story with the pics so I will do that... But for those with ADD... Car is 80-85% after significant attempts at correcting... Boils down to 75% of the panels had been clear coated OVER the defects in the original layer of clear (I know makes no sense, I would have thought clearing over would have filled in the previous damage) and we are not able to remove them, though we tried until we figured it out! So the story starts... Car as picked up, CAKED with grime, took three washes to get it to the point we could pull it in to begin correction... And then we dried it...:yikes::yikes::yikes: HOLY CR@P BATMAN! We pulled it into see it under the lights but the sun already told us how bad it really is... Now we tried and tried different pad and compound combinations to no avail, we didn't appear to be making a dent in the defects present in the paint... We used a life line and called a friend who does paint work... He came up with a rotary in hand and gave it a shot in one spot... Considerable improvement but still not quite there, but Dan and I knew we now needed a rotary and at the time felt we could get the finish where we wanted it... So we ordered... And the beginning of us heading to the mental farm for several hours... We worked the hood and by worked I mean worked 6-8 passes of AGGRESSIVE rotary... WTF!:shead: What is this stuff? It won't correct but looking way better... Paint has this 3d scratch effect going on... This shows a bit about what we are fighting... Image is in thirds, far is uncorrected, close left 8 passes rotary, close right 2 passes rotary... You can see we don't seem to gain much by additional passes... More we say... Half the hood done and we are not overly pleased with the outcome but after so many aggressive passes we felt we had to move on... Finishing of the hood... Looks great with indirect light... And this is what sent us over the edge for several hours, then we put it all together... 10 passes with a rotary! AND NOTHIN' Then we had a thought... We had noticed some poor painting on the front passenger fender and more on the rear quarter.... What if the car was recleared? There was a spot over the driver side taillight that we thought when the sticker was pulled off it took the clear... If that was true if we compound on it we should see color transfer! So we did and you know what? No color transfer... The cleared over the sticker and pulling it off took the respray off and left the factory clear!!! SUM B*TCH!!! So any one notice back in the begining of this story there really isn't any pictures of the roof? Well because it wasn't nearly as bad as the hood and trunk lid... Well now we know why... It hadn't been recleared... One pass with the rotary and it was almost perfect!!! But there is more... We know what wasn't recleared too.... The roof, drivers side A pillar, and driver side front fender... We think the bumpers were replaced as they cleaned up very well with only a few passes... At this point we have performed all the correction and readying for sealing... This is a perfect example of what we were dealing with, why we went nuts for a bit, and all we can do for the car... Front Fender damn near perfect... Rest of the car looks like we did nothing to correct the paint, but alas we had! Well tackled the interior next, careful I think you might catch something... YUCK! This is just from the rear 3 windows! Buggy eggs, these were in every nook and cranie... Cleaned up... And the interior is all cleaned up and looking respectable now... And in conclusion... The car looks good in low and indirect light. It certainly is light years from perfect, but also from where it started. We had hoped for more but previous decisions years and years in the past ruined that for us... I do think you will find it was quite a turn around and the car looks respectable. :applause: Thanks for reading the story!
That looked like a painful detail. I had no idea something like that car would fight back so much. Sent from my mobile device
Thanks all. It was a very frustrating detail for Dan and I and not one we wish to repeat. Until we figured out what was going on we thought we had meet our match. I am chalking this one up as a draw though. In the end we got the better of the car and we know if it wasn't for the reclear we would have whipped it in to shape based on how the front fender came out... It still feels like someone set us up to fail with a nasty trick though. Sort waiting for people to jump out and tell us we were on some hidden camera show. Anytime now. Anytime... Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk 2
Thanks for all the hard work and patience with this. Did you measure the paint before you started and if so, what were the readings ? Glad you were able to use a Rotary - it is all I ever use. I have always had great success with Meguiars 105 once you get past its "I'm drying up and shutting down phase", and mist it and keep going. What kind of pressure were you putting on the pad and what speeds were you using? I sometimes have to put a lot of pressure on, enough to slow down the machine and almost stop it. Of course, if you do this, you have to be confident of a lot of things including the integrity of your backing plate, pad, and of course, the thickness and quality of the paint underneath. your equipment. Did you guys consider color sanding the paint first ? Did you each put in 30 hours or was that the total hours = 15 hours per man ? Thanks for sticking with this - I always thought the Corvettes had the hardest paint to deal with... Dan F
We wish we had a paint meter. That would certainly have told us right from the start what we were dealing with. It is hard for us at this point to justify the cost of one. We are very careful because of that and often do smaller less aggressive passes several times so we minimize finish removal as much as possible. Yeah we are Menzerna guys so Megs was new to us, although we have talked about trying it for years now LOL. It didnt dry out terrible for us as i thought it would. We misted it when it did dry a bit then removed, evaluated, and did more... We were applying pressure for sure not just the weight of the tool. Speeds were in the 1800 - 2200rpm range depending on the flatness of the panel. The Dewalt is nice in that it doesn't actually slow down when you apply pressure it compensates for the stalling. Because of that we had to becareful with high pressures because the tool was doing more work then a tool that stalls. Yup we did try wet sanding a few spots also with our life line. That actually seemed to do nothing for us vs the level of effort required. We appeared to get better results from the rotary in comparison. 15hrs+ per man, we lost count to be honest I think it was few more hours per guy... We have worked together for years and have a system worked out so we don't get in each others way during a detail. Often compounding at the same time. This was an exception as we only had one tool to do the major work. So we took turns correcting and doing other activities around the car to get it done. I agree on the Corvette paint it is some tough clear! This car I am not sure how tough the clear was really with how nice the factory clear corrected with one aggressive pass. The recleared parts were tough to tell because you struggled to decide what is a top level defect and what is a trapped defect. I suspect given the # of passes on the hood and rear deck with little improvement after the 1st or 2nd passes it is up there with how hard Corvette clear. Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk 2
You did a good job...when you figure in what you had to start with! Whoever re-cleared those panels without repairing the initial damage should not be in the car business. What a nightmare, who don't know whats correctible and what is not.
SilverGTV8 - Thanks for your reply ! I thought of something that might help you in future nightmares (which I dont wish upon anyone!) like this to help cut quickly and finish down nicely - Lake Country Purple Foam Wool Pads - I have used these on a few Airplanes that have that really hard Urethane airplane paint on them and combined with Meguiars 105 and a Rotary, I had great success in cutting down the rock hard, dirty, paintwork. These pads are not as wooly-messy-flying-all-around-you pads as normal wool or wool-blends would be and they really work great for me when all else fails. I have used them on softer paintwork that was really messed up (Lexus430 Black) and they worked fast and clean. Again, excellent, work given what you had to work with and the hidden challenges that surfaced as you got farther into this nightmare ! Am also a Menzerna guy for years ! Have narrowed it down to just a couple, but I have to tell you, the new Sonax Profiline Perfect Finish 4/6 has really been working out great for me and my Makita 9227C ! Dan F
Not a problem Stokdgs. Dan and I have been talking about getting some different style pads for the rotary. We got the most aggressive set-up we could but after using it for a bit, having some less aggressive options for pads would allow us to use it on rougher panels we would normally reserve for our FLEX. Sonax PPF huh? I do like the wheel cleaner they have, I do buy like 10 liters of it a year... Maybe we will give it try!
Great job man! Just thought I'd give you piece of mind here and let you know what you were dealing with, as a painter I see this happen a lot. By the looks of the photos that you put up those panels were re-cleared only, possibly spot repaired. In either case they were scuffed, and with the wrong pad. They've had a red scotch used on them instead of grey. Grey is for blend panels and sealed panels as well as factory primed bumpers, red is used on primer before sealing. A lot of guys opt to used scotch pads over sand paper to reduce the chance of their helpers cutting through edges. Personally I have always had my helpers use 800G and stay away from the edges, and hit the edges with a grey scotch. If you ever run in to this again, just accept that you won't win! What you did is stellar work given what you were dealt. You'll have to accept this one as the challenge you conquered as what you've done is beyond what I would expect to be able to accomplish with those sort of panels. Use that rotary to your advantage! I do almost every detail with a rotary. I only use the DA for final polishes and glazes, as well as sealants/waxes. Keep up the good work, and be sure to continue sharing!
Thanks Unique for the info! Very helpful. Once we figured it all out it made us feel better about the situation but still unhappy as we were unable to get the finish we always work towards for a very good client of ours. We plan on working more with the rotary with some coming cars, it is a great tool just needs to take some learning to use right. I have cleaned up countless cars where a rotary was used incorrectly and don't want to end up making a mess for another detailer to clean up!
Wow! That did look like a painful detail, I hope you guys were well compinsated for all your hard work? Great job, it's nite and day for that car! steve
