Rich @ PB

iTrader: (3)

Posted on behalf of Clark, who did this car last week...

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Right, first of all, apologies for the eleventy million pics in this thread, i got a bit snappy happy during this detail (over 200 were taken) and couldnt really edit them all down to a sensible number

Now onto the car, in this rather nice chrome orange colour (well it looked nice under the dirt).....



This is the latest customer to sign up to one of our monthly Vintage maintainance contracts and he drove up from Edinburgh and left the car with us over Wednesday and Thursday afternoon.

Although the car was only a couple of months old, it had what looked like a couple of years worth of dirt and grime stuck to it:









So, onto the Wash Process:

Firstly, the arches/shuts etc were soaked in APC and the car was then foamed with a Safe Degreaser through the Foam Gun and left to dwell for 5 mins:



The car was then rinsed at high pressure, (taking care around the edges of the armour-fend which was applied to the front end and rear arches) foamed again and then washed with the 2 bucket method and lambswool mitts. The wheels were badly covered in brake dust and obviously had no protection from new as they were almost starting to pitt already - a non acidic tyre and wheel gel were used for the faces but the inner rims needed an acidic cleaner cut 4:1 to remove every last bit of dirt.

Once the car was rinsed i could see a large amount of tar and rubber that was stuck to the majority of the bottom half of the car - this was sprayed with Tar and Glue remover and left for a few minutes and then wiped off with a MF.

The pic below shows the T&G remover in action, i couldnt be without this product as it saves a huge amount of time:



I could just manage to fit my hand in with a MF mitt to remove the tar from the inner arches too:



The paintwork and glass was then clayed with Zymöl Lehm Clay and the car was given a final rinse off before being dried with the leaf blower (i keep forgetting to get a picture of this in action, will try to remember next time)

Total Wash Time: 2 hours

Polishing Stage:

The car was then rolled (literally! i found it too much of a pain to get in and out to drive it so i pushed the car back and forward for the duration of the detail, just as well its such a light car ) inside and taped up.

Under the halogens you can just about see the defects i was faced with:



The entire car was covered in rotary holograms too: :sadlike:



As the cars bodywork is entirely composite material i decided to use the good old PC for this detail, mainly because i wanted to keep heat to a mimimum and i figured it would actually be quicker due to the complex lines and curves of the car. The defects werent too bad either so i was confident the PC would provide enough punch for the job

I first tried out the finishing polishes but these didnt provide quite enough defect removal for my liking so i went for the usual cerami-clear compound on an orange LC Pad, spread at speed 2 then worked at speed 6 untill fully broken down.

Rear quarter before:



Rear quarter after:



Drivers door before:



Door after:



50/50 shot on the bootlid:



Passenger door before:



door after:



All the smaller/complicated areas such as the rear bumper/engine cover etc were done with a 4" LC pad.

Total Polish Time: 5 hours

LSP:

As mentioned at the start of the post, this customer had signed up for a monthly Vintage maintainance plan, so LSP of choice was obviously Zymöl Vintage - this time applied by applicator pad after the HD Cleanse step, this made it a doddle to apply and buff off with next to no smears visible before the final buff several hours later

Rich @ PB

iTrader: (3)

Interior:

While the Wax was curing i set about the interior, which like the exterior was a little bit grubby:









I firstly removed the carpets and gave them a quick brush/hoover, then cleaned the grubby bits with APC and extracted with Charles (our wet and dry machine )



I then thoroughly hoovered and dusted down the interior before cleaning with a mild APC solution. The metal "grills" on the floor were cleaned with a mild metal polish after i'd removed all the dirt and mud from them and the Glass was cleaned with HD Cleanse inside and out.

I then dressed the trim with Zymöl Vinyl.....



....Fed the leather with Zymöl Treat.....



....And applied HD Cleanse to all the painted sections including the door shuts etc...



Interior afters:













Next thing on the list was to apply Zymöl Carbon to all the exterior trim and rubbers:



This not only helps protect them but leaves a nice finish too:

before:



after:



The exhausts were pretty dirty, i actually thought they were meant to be black to start with!:



These were cleaned with a heavy cut metal compound on a german applicator pad and then followed up with a fine metal polish:



Despite being cleaned with the safe de-greaser during the wash stage, the rear diffuser was still dirty:



I cleaned this with neat APC on a MF and then dressed with an All Season Dressing which was buffed off 30 mins later:

Rich @ PB

iTrader: (3)

Once that was all done, the car was given a final dust down with a Zymöl duster and wiped down with Field Glaze.

The fabric hood was "de-fluffed" with some masking tape, simple yet effective :icon_thumright:



Last job was to re-apply the front number plate as it was squint when the car arrived, then the final pics were taken....they're shown in no particular order! enjoy



































Total Work Time: 12 hours-ish

Although it was a small car there were ALOT of details to pay attention too, but both myself and the owner were chuffed with the results

Great car, great colour, pain in the a$$ to get in and out of! :yes:

Thanks for looking!

Terminator X

iTrader: (7)

He seems to look after his car well, not! You did a great job there as it looks awesome when finished. Can you PM me a price to spend the day on mine? Details as per View My Scoob. Ta.

TX.

[edit - ****, just noticed your location! Probably 500 miles away ...]

V4JDMSTi

iTrader: (2)

wow that was one filthy elise! looks stunning now though. i hope that the owner is letting you look after it on a maintenance programme - they'd be made not to!

renny

iTrader: (2)

Blimey,that looks tops.

Must have been very satisfying afterwards

But,what are those 'cook's matches' all about ?

WUZ

iTrader: (14)

Just goes to show that you really are worth the money you charge. Once again, another excellent job!

Russell

CrisPDuk

I'm probably the only one, but I do like to see a weekend toy in this condition, it kind of proves the thing isn't a trailer queen

Also, if this is what the car looked like at only a couple of months old, this owner is obviously the guy to talk to if you want to know what these cars are like to use on a daily basis


Once again full marks on the polishing fellas