Mobile-Image : Big Cat Diaries...

[Carn]

It's been a while since I have contributed to the Show & Shine outpost but work amongst other things has been keeping me tied up. Thankfully now that I am on leave I can catch up on a few things

Righty then, this particular car came to me after the owner was unsatisfied with the condition it was delivered in. It was booked in for a 2 day paint correction detail which was completed in a little over 19 hours or so.

First up, some pics of the vehicle as it arrived...











Bug guts all over the front end


Front grille would be interesting to clean up




Exhaust all carbon'd up


Small stone stuck between the bumper and rear lights


Some muck in all the cracks and crevices








Wheels were filthy as well





With the intial inspection over it was time to get the car washed up and cleaned. First as usual was the wheels which were seen to with Sonax Xtreme rim cleaner and various brushes...

Sonax doing it's thing


Ez-Detail brush in action. I find I usually turn to the Ez before going for the Daytona. I think the more densely packed bristles are better suited for more soiled wheels IMO


Caliper and lug nuts cleaned with MI detail brushes





With the wheels and arches sorted I set about rinsing the car thoroughly before cleaning all the panel gaps, emblems, etc with 5:1 APC.

Trim & panel gaps








Front grille was scrubbed 3 times with APC to try and shift some of the calcium deposits



With all the small details cleaned the vehicle was re-rinsed and washed using the 2BM before being clayed and dried.

Clay came up pretty clean which was surprising



With the vehicle clean and dry I could now properly inspect the paintwork to see what we were dealing with...

Lots of light swirling and marring















Having seen the paint defects out in the sunlight I moved the car inside to take a closer look under the halogens before getting started on the paint correction stage...
















Overall the paintwork was in quite a sorry state considering the vehicle was only a few months old. Just goes to show the level of damage that can be caused through poor washing techniques

I taped up a small test section on the bonnet to try and find a suitable combo for this one. Needless to say this car had some nasty sticky paint and I wound up shredding a nearly new 3M compounding pad along with a 3M polishing pad. At the end of the day I settled on a combo of FA + FCP for the more deeply swirled bits, with FA & SIP being used on the remainder of the vehicle.

Before


50/50


And after



Center of the bonnet corrected with the 50/50 section in the top half of the photo







Paintwork nicely cleaned up and swirl free






Flake coming back to life



Some random shots from around the car





Mirror before


And after



A-Pillar before


And after



Rear fender before




After





Rear C-Pillar before


After



With the paintwork corrected I got stuck into the plastic B-pillars...Let's just say they were trashed!










Due the condition these were in I opted to hit them with FCP before refining with SIP and finally FA

Afters









With all the correction completed I rewashed the car to remove all the polishing dust before tackling all the smaller details.

Exhausts were cleaned up and shined


Missus gave me a hand with the front grille (small fingers FTW). Overall it came up pretty well IMO






LSP for the day (iirc) was Poor-Boys EX sealant topped with a layer of Pete's 53 for some added protection. Trim got 303 Aerospace, tires got Meg's Endurance Gel and windows were cleaned with AG Fast Glass.

Some afters












Some reflection shots






Final one



As always thanks for looking

[mr. MO]

Excellent turnaround.. Great work!
A stunning car, im sure it was a pleasure detailing this big cat

FCP, SIP, FA?
Sorry im not clued up on these products, please elaborate..

Thanks

[calypso]

Car looks slick. Look forward to see more work now that your on leave

[onyx]

Looks Great!
From the 'before' shots can't believe shes only a few months old!!!
Poorboys sealant got some great reviews, what's your take on it David?

[Carn]

(20-12-2009 04:27 PM)mr. MO Wrote:  Excellent turnaround.. Great work!
A stunning car, im sure it was a pleasure detailing this big cat

FCP, SIP, FA?
Sorry im not clued up on these products, please elaborate..

Thanks

Thanks Mr MO

FCP = 3M Fast Cut Plus, my favourite compound to date. Can be worked long or short and delivers some excellent correction when used at higher (1800-2000) rpm's

SIP = Menzerna Super Intensive Polish. Falls between a finishing polish and a compound. Delivers some excellent correction and can finish down LSP ready. Must have polish IMHO although it can be 'finicky' at times.

FA = Menzerna 106FA (Final Action also known as Final Finish in some markets iirc). Excellent finishing polish with a light 'bite' on harder ceramiclear paints. 106FA delivers a slightly crisper finish than SIP due to it's finer cut. Very similar to Meguiars M205 although on some softer paints I have seen the FA to finish down that bit better than M205 (Woodie and Siya can attest to this having seen it in the flesh a few weeks back)

(20-12-2009 04:32 PM)calypso Wrote:  Car looks slick. Look forward to see more work now that your on leave

Thanks dude...Got one or 2 bits and pieces to post but no more full write-ups I'm afraid. The past month or 2 I have been really lazy and just wanted to get the jobs done so I didn't bother much with detailed pics. Have a few before and afters to post though when I get around to it

(20-12-2009 06:52 PM)onyx Wrote:  Looks Great!
From the 'before' shots can't believe shes only a few months old!!!
Poorboys sealant got some great reviews, what's your take on it David?

Thanks bud!

I was surprised as well being an 'X' reg with under 10k km on the clock. The owner seemed highly peeved at the condition considering the $$$ he paid for the car

The Poorboys EX is a decent product IMHO, goes on and comes off really easily and leaves a nice finish. I haven't really monitored durability with it though so I can't compare it to some of the other sealants I have in that regard. Given the choice however, I would have to say that there are other sealants I prefer over the EX and it is not something I would buy myself (I was given this bottle by JL so I use it simply because I have it).

Hope that helps

[Rich]

Very, Very nice. Nice work, nice write up. Respect Dood. The owner must have had a huge smile on his face.

[Woodie]

Nice work as usual Dave.

Is this one of your father's new cars? I know he's a Jag slut.

[Carn]

Thanks Sean

Not my old mans no...Coincidently I am going with him to look at a new one later this afternoon

[springbok]

Great write-up and what a turnaround.

I hope the owner was well chuffed.

[mbl]

Nice work Carn, car looks amazing and as it should be.Job well done.