Nightshifter

Many people are confused as what to use on their corvette. Wax or Polish ? Which Tire dressing ? How about for chrome ? Everyone will most likely tell you go with Zaino. Zaino makes some great products, but none that I know for using with a circular polisher (maybe the Fusion product).

As some of you already know, the secret to getting your paint up to par
is mainly a 5 step process.

1) Wash with Dawn (use a microfiber mit, start top to sides, use another mit for the bottom), 2 buckets. Some people like to do their tires first with seperate everything, that's my choice. Also, if you want to spend a little more money, wash using TFR (traffic film remover) and then use Japanese Natural clay and Allbrite's clay bar lubricant to remove contaminants such as metal particles, concrete dust and other forms of industrial fallout. Japanese clay is more expensive that other brands, but it is the original and the inspiration for plastic detailing clay, although it has never been bettered. It's a far superior product that removes fallout efficiently without causing scratches.



2) As stated above, Clay the car. Clay is not an abrasive, it actually pulls contaminents off the paint without scratching. Although, clay can scratch if you get grit in there, then it becomes sandpaper !

3) Depending on how bad your paint is, you would use a Compound or Polish for this step. Medium to Light swirls and hairline scratches are what ruins the reflection because the light doesn't reflect properly off the car. Compounds & Polishes fall into many catagories.
You have chemical cleaners and abrasive cleaners. I don't like chemical cleaners for this part because all they do is hide the swirls by rounding the edges of the scratches and or filling them in. Nevertheless, if you're a pro with a circular polisher, you can use a Chemical polish which contains no abrasives, and works by helping with the friction and holding the heat so that the wool pad does all the cutting. You could also go with Zaino products and do it by hand which is much safer for most of you, but again, doesn't remove the swirls, just hides and or fills them in. Menzerna makes a great Intensive polish that's an abrasive yet doesn't produce a haze. Allbrite makes some awesome products also! http://63.138.33.51/allbriteOrder/Order.asp You could go right to waxing after using Menzerna Intensive Polish product with a Yellow Pad (not wool... wool is for heavy cutting and def. would require a fine abrasive polish phase).
This is what i had used for this step and it removed all the fine swirls, and most of the scratches. The scratches that were deep (all the way to the paint) were still there, but much less noticable than before.
Forget using a DA Polisher, it just doesn't generate enough heat to get the compound to work properly. Now don't forget, it isn't easy to get a mirror reflection from metallic silver paint. Dark glossy paints are much more reflective. I used a circular polisher 6" Plate 7.5" Pad.

4) Final Polishing and or Glazing. Now it's time to fine tune from the compound phase. I used Menzernas Final Polish II, because it's a fine abrasive and not chemical. Switched to a white pad for use with this product. A true glaze is a pure polish. It's has no abrasive. You could go over with a glaze like meguiar's #7 after you final polish. I would not apply a glaze or wax with a circular polisher. A DA polisher or by hand is fine for those two. So you could say 4A Fine polishing 4B: Glazing. I just did the fine polishing.
Now as i looked the panels over, and compared the adjacent panel to the one i polished, i could see most of those swirl marks were gone and the reflection was not dull and hazy anymore. It much looked like my window reflection now.

5) Waxing. Do you want Carnuba or Sealent ? If you drive your vette often, use a poly sealent. If it's garage queen, go with Carnuba. One problem I found with Carnuba, when it gets warm, and you go driving, it's magnet for dust, grit and other unwanting scratch critters. These adhere to the wax and then you got scratch city the next time you wash your car (hmmm.. now i know why my car is all scratched up, even though i was used extreme caution, proper towels...). So I went with Meguiar's NXT Paste. Best damn stuff i used for the money and easy to apply. Just apply to the whole car at once, then buff off from the beginning to end. Remember, wax is just protectant, it has nothing really to do with polishing. So if you see that question, "wax or polish", now you know!


Now if your paint is in good shape, then i would just clay if needed, use a paint cleaner like P21S ( i found this one works real well for GM Clearcoats), then apply your Wax !

WHEELS

I tried a few products and did a little research on what chemicals work the best here. Best chemical to clean your tires is Sodium Metasilicate Pentahydrate. Why ? Because it doesn't harm your chome ! Wesley's (which contains metasilcate and orthosilicate is a bit stronger and it not recommended on any wheel finishes, that is overspray onto the wheel could be a problem with this if you aren't careful enough). The best one i found was Eagle 1 Tire & Wheel Cleaner. I like this because it'll do the entire Wheel ! Spray on the Tire, it just melts away that old brown (bloom) and silicones from previous inferior products you may or may not had used ! Scrub those tires until no more residue will show on the white glove test ! Then you're ready to apply the dressing.
Dressing ? Meguiar's Hot Tire Shine works wonders here in making your tire look like it was painted. Serious folks, this product does not contain harmful products that will ruin the rubber. In fact, it has some products that put back compounds into the tire (antiozonants). It contains Hexane, but this won't crack the rubber. I called meguiar's because i was concerned about this Petroleum Distillate. This is one that won't harm the tire. Hot Tire Shine is really a great product because it lasts and goes on so even, you would swear your tire was painted. It isn't that glossy, but makes your tire shine. In otherwords, you don't get that tacky, candy looking armor all look yet it isn't that dull look. If you want dull, then apply 303 or Zaino (2 or 3 coats for more shine). These are water based and don't last long, especially in Florida. Those 2 products are great, but again they don't last and the shine isn't quite as nice, and not as even.

Well that's about it for now. Here are some pics without the wax phase, just polishing.

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Notice the window reflection and paint (very close).



before the paint was swirlmark city, and noway reflected like this, especially for metallic pewter.



These tires just came out sweet after using Eagle1 and Meguiars. Not that uneven look, but a nice new tire sheen. Cleaning the tire properly is a must to achieve that even clean shine. Good luck detailing your vette, i hoped this helped some people!

*Note: this car has over 100,000 miles on it, not garage kept all the time and was in the sun a lot. Tires have about 15000 miles on them.

Nightshifter

And the hood while it was in progress. This is without wax (or i would use a polymer sealent for the final which helps bring out the shine done by the polishing).

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FloydSummerOf68

Looks great

Nightshifter

Thanks man ! Can't wait till i finish the entire car The paint was somewhat bad before this. Gritty, full of little black knubs, dull reflection... Funny, i told my friend, feel the paint now, smooth as a baby's *** ! While he was feeling he said, "a baby's *** ain't this smooth" !

FloydSummerOf68

I just got my porter cable in the mail a few days ago...time for a detailing session of my own

I appreciated your "walkthrough" and your likes dislikes...I've been trying to absorb as many opinions as possible the last week or so.

gmblack3

Car looks very nice.

You "might" get away with this on a lighter color, but in most cases you are going to leave micro marring with a yellow foam pad especially on darker colors. Even after an orange pad, I would follow with a white pad using FPII or ZPC.

Also when using a rotary, I much prefer using a wool pad for the initital cut rather then a yellow foam pad. Wool runs cooler then foam and cuts quicker. There are different grades of wool and you can reduce the cut of wool by using a milder polish. Wool will always have to be followed by foam.

Nightshifter

Oh i agree with you 100% there ! Darker colors would. def. require FPII and a white pad! Although, there are some techniques (even used on black cars) which allow the dim. abrasives to work to the point of a high gloss thus not requiring a fine polishing stage. If the abrasives break down properly, it removes all the maring and reveals a nice mirror finish. These very fine abrasives will finally reduce the micro scratches as small as they will go, while the speed and heat generated by the buffing pad will finally smooth over the peaks. I don't use this method myself, but it can be done. Wool will always have to be followed by ! Although you can chemical polish after using wool, (another technique, although not for the inexperienced). Chemical buffing generates heat (at the proper rpm)which softens the paintwork and allows the peaks of these scratches(created by the wool), to be smoothed over thus changing the shape of the paints surface.

I was tempted to use wool to get some of the deeper scratches out, but i can live with those since they are hardly noticable even to the trained eye. Also, you can use a Chemical Compound! It uses no abrasives but instead uses natural oils which hold heat and help the pad which you use to do the work of cutting.

Nightshifter

Good Luck there ! I also hear that 3M products work really well. I never tried any, but a few detail freaks i know in Europe swear by them.
Opinions; I know... there are so many approaches.