Silver Audi A8 Detail

[Lambros]

Hi all,

First Show Room post ... here we go.

I finally had some ‘alone’ time with my car on Friday and Saturday where I put many of the forums recommendations to good use. I did plan on using my wifes car to test my abilities and show better results due to the dark colour, but she would not let me near it after she heard the DAS6 spool up!

I prepped the weapons of choice I would be using from a couple of days before. All cloth's were given a clean, a quick run through the dryer on a warm setting to remove any loose fibres and the tags were also removed:


Some before pics:






Pulled the car into the shade and let it cool before attending to the wheels. A quick spray with Sonax Full Effect and pressure cleaned:


I also gave the wheel arch's a quick brush and clean:


Gave the car a pre-foam with the K3 using a mix of CG Maxi-Suds II and Blade APC:


Followed with a standard cleaning using the same dilution and mix, paying special attention to all the badges and panel gaps with a soft brush. This was followed by a quick claying using the Megs Smooth Surface kit:


This is what the damage looked like using a normal incandescent bulb. I never would have noticed this if was not for the forum ! The boot, roof and bonnet were bad while the rest of the car had minor swirls and a few scratches:






Some scuffs on the rear doors (black mark is a bug-in-flight):


Taped-up car and got ready to try a pad/polish combo on this paint:




Before polishing, I spot buffed out some deeper scratches with a combo of ScratchX then SwirlX by hand, each followed with a clean with alcohol/water mix to clean out any possible fillers.

I went with the Menzerna Power Polish on an orange then green LC pad and followed with Power Finish for the boot, bonnet and roof. The rest of the car was worked with Power Finish / green LC pad and completed with Final Finish on a yellow 3M polishing pad.

Here's a pic of the rear quarter panel after a few passes with the Power Finish, I could not believe the difference in colour (less yellow) compared with the unpolished rear door:


I finally finished the polishing and managed to achieve about a 60 or 70% correction - I found the clear coat to be quite hard. Here are the afters:




I used an orange spot pad with Menzerna Final Finish for the bumpers and pillars:


I then gave the car another wash and dry before applying a coat of Poor Boy's White Diamond glaze. This was followed with Wolfgang Deep Gloss paint sealant 3.0 (no cleaners) and left to cure overnight.

While the sealant was curing, I gave the exhaust tips and rear boxes a once-over with Autoglym Metal Polish - I sped things up by wrapping an old wool bonnet around a drill bit for cleaning inside the tips.


The following morning, I uncovered the car and tried my hand at applying my first paste wax, the Collinite Marque de Elegance. My initial priority was always to put down as much protection as possible - the Collinite came highly recommended.

Application with a foam applicator was easy, buffing off was difficult. I probably only used half a teaspoon of the wax for the entire car. I now get what most people talk about when applying wax on a light colour car - the hard popping silver colour seemed to adopt a very slight gold 'halo'. I'll admit that I liked the finish with only the sealant but prefer the extra protection.

Here are the full after pics:


I also applied the Wolfgang sealant to the rims (rims have a circular brushed-finish on the spokes) and Megs Endurance tire gel:


Rear lenses were polished with Megs PlastX by hand:


Engine was wiped-down with APC dilution and dressed with Megs Engine Dressing:


Finally, the interior plastic trim and 3M CF wrap was given a quick wipe-down with Sonax matt cockpit cleaner and windows cleaned with Sonax anti-mist spray. By this stage I was too tired to even think about vacuming or treating the leather (last treatment was 2 months ago anyway):


Thanks for looking and all your great advise.