[vancitymike]

I just purchased my car used, and unfortunately, a "detailer" left some slight holograms, probably with a rotary polisher... I'm pretty sure this will require a full cut and polish to repair, however, I'm a bit nervous because I'll need to do a fair bit of correction and don't own a paint thickness gauge.

From what I know, black German cars generally have a thick layer of paint/clearcoat - has anyone measured the paint on their black 2 series? Ever heard of anyone complaining of thin clearcoat on their cars?


(if this sounds crazy, go to youtube and watch all the Ammo NYC videos)

[overcoil]

What kind of compound were you going to use?

Or were you going to use a light duty polish then finishing polish ?

random orbital polisher ?

If your were wet sanding or trying to eliminate orange peel then paint thickness will come into play. But if your using consumer grade ( which probably should be the first line of products to use) and random orbital then u won’t (shouldn’t) remove the complete layer of clearcost.

Other things like polishes with fillers ( I wouldn’t use ) or wax strippers ( I would use ).

You should first attempt to use the least aggressive sequence on a out of the way section first to see how the correction goes.

If you have black paint and do a wash and dry with a mild correcting polish and random orbital and not transferring any paint to the pad then u know you have a good clear coat layer.

[vancitymike]

Originally Posted by ScottSinger

What kind of compound were you going to use?

Or were you going to use a light duty polish then finishing polish ?

random orbital polisher ?

If your were wet sanding or trying to eliminate orange peel then paint thickness will come into play. But if your using consumer grade ( which probably should be the first line of products to use) and random orbital then u won’t (shouldn’t) remove the complete layer of clearcost.

Other things like polishes with fillers ( I wouldn’t use ) or wax strippers ( I would use ).

You should first attempt to use the least aggressive sequence on a out of the way section first to see how the correction goes.

If you have black paint and do a wash and dry with a mild correcting polish and random orbital and not transferring any paint to the pad then u know you have a good clear coat layer.

I've got a plan for all the different compounds/polishers/pads, I just want to know how my paint hardness compares to other black cars - Certain cars are known for having thicker coatings than others (I think I heard Ferraris generally have thin paint) and I was kinda hoping someone here, who's polished a lot of different cars, could tell me if the paint is hard or soft, relatively easy or difficult to polish... that kind of thing. The last black car I polished (Acura RSX) had really hard paint, it took a long time and didn't come out that well compared to the Audi I did before. If I were doing the RSX again, I'd move up to a rotary...

I'll first try removing the swirls with my lightest option (MF polish pad and finishing compound) and move up the compounds/pads if I need to.. it really should be fine, unless the someone tells me BMW paint is really soft, and the holograms are deep (I'll post pics in a few weeks, its still a bit too cold here to polish)

[overcoil]

http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=688039

[vancitymike]

Originally Posted by ScottSinger

http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=688039

wow, huge thanks .. terrible, but very glad to know - I'll be extra careful with everything from now on, especially washing

[kivyee]

I'll be doing likely a full compound and polish on the car soon in preparation for ceramic coating...Not that I have a lot of detailing experience but I will share my experience assuming you haven't polished your car yet

[kivyee]

Ok, finally got the car and got some compounding in...the paint is definitely not soft - at least not as soft as the paint on a Hyundai. I don't know how hard it is relative to the spectrum of other cars, but similar corrections take almost twice as long. But the Hyundai has super soft paint - it swirls if you just look at it wrong.
Using lake country yellow pad with Ultimate compound with a PC 74??. Works well - can't complain .
Oh, and given that there was not one iota of wax on the car, the paint has help up pretty well.
Paint prep is taking more time but at least I know it should be relatively resistant to future swirling etc...