apreading Posted September 11, 2005 Report Share Posted September 11, 2005 Washed the car friday night (partially in the rain, partially in the dark!) so that I could get up on Saturday and get straight to it with the PC. Y Reg Polo: Gold class trim detailer left on during the following and removed at the end. SSR2.5 on the Edge yellow pad (speed 5) SSR2.5 on the Edge green pad SSR1 on the Edge green SSR1 on the Edge blue Autoglym SRP on blue Then had to take the family bowling Saturday afternoon so after kiddies bedtime: Colinite 845IW on the Edge white pad left for 30 mins before buff Then sunday morning: Collinite again left for an hour before buff followed by Nattys Blue with the white pad. Used the PAkshak cloths and they seem very good. Definately better than the megs ones I have, and much cheaper! Phew - time for the pics. Too late for outdoor shots, but I think these give the idea: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 11, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 11, 2005 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 11, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 11, 2005 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 11, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 11, 2005 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 11, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 11, 2005 Bit of dust settled but shows the flake! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NewNiceMrMe Posted September 12, 2005 Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 Very impressive indeed! The shot showing the roof timbers of the garage on the bonnet is superb and demonstrates the depth of shine well. Makes you feel oh so proud doesn't it? I gave mine a quick wash yesterday but after 2 coats of Pinnacle Souveran recently it was still looking gleaming.....so I was devastated when en route to work this morning a filthy old AstraMax Van spat oil and diesel and crap all over it. That's the problem with getting cars looking as nice as people on TSN do - invariably you take them out and some b*stard ruins it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cleanimage Posted September 12, 2005 Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 [ QUOTE ] That's the problem with getting cars looking as nice as people on TSN do - invariably you take them out and some b*stard ruins it! [/ QUOTE ] And the more perfect you get the car looking, the more it shows up any imperfections.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NeilScarrott Posted September 12, 2005 Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 very very nice, great job! How did you find the Collinite? I'm defo going to get some, most probably the Marque D'Elegance, but the 845 looks good too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 12, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 Forgot to comment on this. The Collinite gave a fabulous shine. In the cold weather yesterday it was a bit thick, and this made it harder to get our of the bottle and apply thinly - meaning I used more than expected. But wow - REALLY shiny. Great finish and so good in fact that I think I have my future product of choice there. Topping with Nattys showed how much easier that was to apply, but the Collinite should have the durability to more than counter this. Interesting to see when it rains - which hopefully it will today so that England can win the ashes! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 12, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 The Edge pads were great too. 400% better than the Sonus ones. Feel so much more robust, real easy to swap pads, and great to work with. Definately seem to have more cut than the Sonus ones too. You do have to apply a little more pressure with these pads as they are not entirely flat unless you do. Good recommendation from Clean Image there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stewarta13wsb Posted September 12, 2005 Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 Words fail me.... having just spent the day working on mine (and thinking it looked not bad!!) I'm stunned at the pics of your efforts - trully amazing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rommel Posted September 12, 2005 Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 I'm sure that's a photoshop job! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rommel Posted September 12, 2005 Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 Seriously though, that's an outstanding reflection in the roof top shots. I'm glad I don't park next to your car in the car park at work! Can I ask, did you have much problem of swirls before you started? And how would you rate all the products you used there for treating defects? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 12, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 Yeah - MEGA swirls on that one. There are still some to be honest, and some slight marring in some places that I will have to go back to next time. At the time we got that I knew naff all about how to look after it and just washed and SRP'd it every now and then - with nothing over the top to really protect it. Gets load of abuse from the wife and kids too (point of contention there!)... I found all the products really easy to use, with the Collinite being the only one being a little more difficult. The SSR2.5 stage took alot of work though, not because the product was at all difficult just because the clearcoat it quite hard I think and it took several applications to really have a significant effect. The Collinite did not stain the trim the way that many sealants do though, like EX-P and like my SRP does. SRP was great at polishing to a gloss and filling/hiding any imperfections left behind. Nattys was absolutely fantastic to use - that and the Collinite are my current faves. Putting the trim detailer on before working on the paint and only removing after was an inspired suggestion too - saves loads of hassle. Deffo recommend the Edge 2000 pads to anyone - just a shame you cannot UK source them as far as I know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Johnnyopolis Posted September 12, 2005 Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 There will be a UK source soon.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 12, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 12, 2005 Ooooh - Music to my ears (but not to my wallet)! Even more glad I went down this route if you start selling them Johnny - no more velcro for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rommel Posted September 13, 2005 Report Share Posted September 13, 2005 [ QUOTE ] Yeah - MEGA swirls on that one. There are still some to be honest, and some slight marring in some places that I will have to go back to next time. At the time we got that I knew naff all about how to look after it and just washed and SRP'd it every now and then - with nothing over the top to really protect it. Gets load of abuse from the wife and kids too (point of contention there!)... I found all the products really easy to use, with the Collinite being the only one being a little more difficult. The SSR2.5 stage took alot of work though, not because the product was at all difficult just because the clearcoat it quite hard I think and it took several applications to really have a significant effect. The Collinite did not stain the trim the way that many sealants do though, like EX-P and like my SRP does. SRP was great at polishing to a gloss and filling/hiding any imperfections left behind. Nattys was absolutely fantastic to use - that and the Collinite are my current faves. Putting the trim detailer on before working on the paint and only removing after was an inspired suggestion too - saves loads of hassle. Deffo recommend the Edge 2000 pads to anyone - just a shame you cannot UK source them as far as I know. [/ QUOTE ] Cheers for the review there, there's so many products out there to try it's really useful getting feedback from other users. Edge pads - are they the ones you can tilt slightly to get a more aggressive cut, like these...? http://www.properautocare.com./grgipopadfor.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 13, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 13, 2005 Nope - this is what I am referring to: http://www.edgepads.com/videoBB.htm Clean Image use them (called snap-fix pads to them in the UK I believe). Got them from Autogeek in the states, but I think Cleanandshiny might be about to start selling them! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rommel Posted September 13, 2005 Report Share Posted September 13, 2005 Dam, they look really good. Wish I'd seen them before I bought the others. The video's pretty cheesy at the intro though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 13, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 13, 2005 As long as you got the SFX of Lake Country pads you should do fine - I believe the velcro is attached to the foam during the molding process so is pretty secure - unlike the glued velcro on the Sonus DAS pads which fecked two pads after first use, and in fact I found by just holding the corner of the velcro I could strip it away from the glue. Cant be bothered with that, so took the easy option! The double sided part also means your pads take up half the shelf space. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rommel Posted September 14, 2005 Report Share Posted September 14, 2005 I like the way with those ones you can just flip it over to switch to another pad - saves you having to put one pad somewhere safe whilst using the other, and with the bevelled edges on them they work the same as the edged pads at properautocare too. Ah well, next time maybe I'll switch to these. Need to use the ones I've got a bit more really to justify the outlay. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy_PC Posted September 14, 2005 Report Share Posted September 14, 2005 Excellent work mate - glad you're liking the PC! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cleanimage Posted September 14, 2005 Report Share Posted September 14, 2005 [ QUOTE ] Nope - this is what I am referring to: http://www.edgepads.com/videoBB.htm Clean Image use them (called snap-fix pads to them in the UK I believe). Got them from Autogeek in the states, but I think Cleanandshiny might be about to start selling them! [/ QUOTE ] It's true, we do use them. but you make it sound like "It's what Clean Image use", when in fact it's just one kind we use. I do know that all sorts of suppliers and manufacturers do searches for their own products - and even searches for me so I better clarify this. In cases anybody is wondering what we do use, mostly we use the AllPad system now, these are 8" pads and cost around £20, at the moment we get our 6" and 4" through the same distributor/manufacturer, but they are too expensive and so the distributor is looking to get a european manufacturer to make them to their spec. The truth is that we are switching from physical buffing to chemical buffing and this requires the right pads - though the chem buffing pads work exceptionally well with compounds. I hear on the grape vine that megs and 3m are developing chem buffing systems, so it's something you will be hearing more about in the future. But it's not something you can do with a 6" pad. AllPad is still in development and we are one of the first companies to have access to it - I believe that they will be available from next tuesday. Anyway, we do use the 6" Edge pads on both our rotarys and Porter Cable, and they are very good. We haven't go into the shaped ones, we just used the normal ones - what we like is that they are very firm and flat. The built in plastic disk makes them very solid - you have to try them to get what I mean. we have various makes floating about, but I think that in future we will only be buying Allpad and Edge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
apreading Posted September 14, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 14, 2005 Sorry if I gave that impression - its obvious from your postings that you use alot of different products, although I do get the impession that they are one of your current products of choice (at least products of your 'Autosmart guy's choice). This chemical buffing sounds interesting. Will have to look on your site to see if you have any articles on it yet. What does the process do exactly? How are your guys getting on with the PC? You always used to wax lyrical about the Cyclo - how would they compare the two now they have experience of both? I am sure the cyclo will still be better but if they are using the PC then does that mean it has some advantages in its favour? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cleanimage Posted September 14, 2005 Report Share Posted September 14, 2005 It's not a problem, We do like the edge pads, and although I shouldn't name drop, Aaron Krause from Edge contacted me a while back and he seems like a nice guy, the company seems very professional and they constantly develop for different distributors and markets. I have certainly added them to my address book. The chemical buffing system is mind blowing... I mean it is very difficult to get your head around! You can use compounds with it in the early stages, but for the most part it is all about the specially developed foam pads doing the cutting, then doing the polishing. The pads work by getting the surface of the paintwork really hot - the polishes are used to help increase or decrease heat or friction. Obviously this can't be done with a random orbital, it requires a rotary at speeds of 3000rpm+ We had Willy Winterfalk demonstrate the system and do some training with our guys for the last 7 working days and the results are amazing. But it is a huge leap from what we are currently doing with buffing machines... a whole different league. Anybody using this method realy would have to be at the peak of the profession - however, you could charge top dollar for this and do it full time. The advantage is that because it doesn't use compounds you remove very little paint, And in theory it will also make the paintwork stronger, although this is yet to be scientifically tested. The disadvantage is that it is very hard to do, hard to learn, takes a long time to do, it's complicated and there is a risk of burning the paint. As for the PC, you probably won't like what I have to say! We took a black Porsche that had just been buffed with the above system... I kid-you-not when I say that this method leaves the paintwork so good that the stage before last will leave a car better than you can manage with physical buffing, so if the final stage isn't done right it will make the car look worse. So we in order to test the various machines we did a shootout on the final stage on the bonet of the Porsche. We used black pads on all the machines. First we used the rotary at high speed, and this performed okay. Not Great - it was hard to see any improvement over the green pad, but it did make a diference. Next we used a cyclo with black pads from the same manufacturer. Then we used the PC. Both machines actually put swirls into the paintwork which had to be removed with the rotary. Bare in mind that we are talking about paintwork which is approaching near perfection and will show up anything - especially as it was black. We found that the PC gave more swirls than they cyclo but there wasn't a huge amount in it. Now we don't use the cyclo that you hear the Americans talking about... I hate those machines. They are heavy and unbalanced, plus they sound like a train! Ours are plastic copies made under licence in China. They don't last as long but are easy to repair, and the plastic construction means they are quieter, lighter and far better balanced. By contrast the PC is also badly balanced and too heavy. having a twin head certainly does help with the balance of the machine when it is in motion, the PC wobbles in use which can cause buffer marks. I guess the advantage of the PC over the cyclo is that it can take edge pads... but we haven't finished playing with it yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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