JohnS

iTrader: (1)

Here's a few photos taken from a classic & newage photoshoot done for a charity calendar.

The car hadn't been washed for 6 weeks, wheels had never been cleaned behind the spokes and the car had several thousand tar spots courtesy of Highland Region Council roadworks dept. No before photos I'm afraid!

Car was firstly powerwashed to remove most of the mud and grime from the car, before being washed using the two bucket method with a lambswool mitt and Poorboys Soper Soak n Suds shampoo. The car was dried with a waffle weave microfibre towel.

I then tackled the tar spots using the left overs of a bottle of Autoglym Tar Spot remover that I bought about 5 years ago. That ran out long before the tar did, so rummaging around the garage I found a bottle of white spirit. Tried it on a small area first and it seemed to do the job. Not quite as well, but much quicker than removing with your fingernails & elbow grease!

What remained I then tackled using a clay bar and some unknown "final finish" (plain white bottle and label) type product as a lubricant. Seemed to work well and removed the majority of the insect graveyard on the front of the car.

The car is 7 months old and done 10k miles, so there were a few minor swirls and scratches, but nothing too bad. In obvious areas, I used Menzerna intensive polish hand applied. Hard work and time consuming but it does the job. I then did the rest of the car using Blackfire Gloss Enhancing Polish and finished off with Blackfire Wet Diamond All Finish paint protection.

Then onto the wheels which were removed first before being powerwashed, quick wash with a microfibre mitt, excessive tar spot removed with the sharp edge of a pot scouring brush (some were several mm thick and would have taken hours to dissolve!) followed up by the white spirit. The wheels were then quickly polished and buffed before a layer of Poorboys Wheel Wax (lovely smell!) was applied for protection. I didn't have any tyre dressing, so improvised with Turtle Wax Exterior Trim Wax which was again many years old. This gave a nice sheen to the tyres that didn't look artificial and too shiny, but I know from previous experience it only lasts a few washes.

Tar spots, stones and dried in mud/cow waste were removed from the mudflaps again using the sharp edge of the brush and white spirit, before being "dressed" with Aerospace 303 protectant, which was then applied to all the exterior black trim at the same time.

Onto the windows. There was an annoying film on the windows with lots of water spots. I've tried various products over the years and the most effective so far was Autoglym Glass Polish, but it's hard work and creates vast amounts of blue dust everywhere. Whilst the Intensive Polish was nearby, I decided to try that, and I'm pleased to report it works a treat, removing the water spots and film from the exterior side of the glass. It does need a bit of effort though, and I needed to rinse the windows afterwards with a damp cloth and the waffle weave towel to remove the residue. The result was streak free shiny clear windows

Anyway, it took the best part of a day, interspersed with other activities and here's the results (click on the photos for a larger version):









Finally, a close up the paint flake



Full photoset can be viewed here, including the full size originals (click on the all sizes button above a photo when viewing and select Original):

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John

Rich @ PB

iTrader: (3)

Damn John, some slightly unorthadox methods, but the results are brilliant! Nice one, but how's your arms?!

JohnS

iTrader: (1)

Thanks Rich,

it's called improvisation with what you have available at the time

Arms are fine, but I think a machine polisher would make a sound investment in the future

John

Rich @ PB

iTrader: (3)

Roll on the new year then, we should have them by then (finally!).