Announcement: Commercial Detailing Services Discontinued

I am discontinuing my detailing services for the public because I could not fit all the requests into my schedule. This is also my final year and a half for my Bachelor of Business and Commerce degree and would prefer to have more time for it.

I want to thank those who have inquired for my services, they are very supportive and encouraging for me. Also to the owners of the cars which I have detailed, thank you for the great opportunity, each car helped me improve my technique.

I will occasionally detail cars that belong to relatives and close friends or special requests if the time fits. There will still be write-ups posted on this blog from time to time.

Thank You Read more!

Toyota Vios Metallic Black

I have about 9 hours for this car, and have to correct the paint as best as I could in that time.

Process as follow:

Cleaning

• Clean wheel face, tire and wheel well with Meguiar’s All Purpose Cleaner
• Pre-wash soak with Meguiar’s Hyper Wash
• Rinse at high pressure
• Wash with Meguiar’s Hyper Wash
• Ambersil Tar Remover wipe down on bumpers and lower panels of car
• Rinse, Clay with Perma Glass No.2 Clay using diluted Shampoo Plus as Clay lube.
• Re-wash

Polishing

• Meguiar’s #83 dual-action cleaner/polish with W-8006 polishing pad @ 1500 rpms
• Menzerna 106FF with W-9006 finishing pad @ 900 rpms

Protection

• Meguiar’s #21 Synthetic Sealant
• Meguiar’s #16 Paste Wax

Trim

• Dress plastic and rubber trim with Autoglym Bumper Care
• Polish exhaust and chrome grill with Meguiar’s NXT All Metal Polysh




















Here is a picture of a repainted door, which paint was much harder than the original paint. The defects would’ve to be compounded away but I only had limited time, so had to do with the following result. =(



Here are the after pictures, right after polishing and a coat of M21. The sun was going down, so I quickly took some shots before it went dark. Please pardon the undressed tire and some droplets of water on the car as it drizzled shortly after.







Lesson learned during this detail : I have to pay more to attention to detail as the owner pointed out some parts that I missed when he collected the car, in tight areas especially where the foam pad during machine polishing wouldn’t reach.

Thanks for looking and Happy Chinese New Year! =)

No more details for now as I have my exam soon. Next details would be after CNY. Read more!

Honda City Metallic Black

The owner of this car and I are members of a same forum, so he got to know me through there, and as you would expect from a car lover, he takes great care of his care by washing it and waxes it himself using Meguiar’s #21 Synthetic Sealant.

I also had a time allowance of two days on this car, it has been detailed by Hypercoat before. You can see shots after detailed photographed by Zey in this forum thread

http://www.meguiars.com.my/forum2/viewtopic.php?t=1818

Now the car is here to remove some very very light swirls, being soft paint, it was easy to marr with just wiping. I was going to make it as perfect as I could which I didn’t have a chance to do. The story soon to come.

Here are some before pictures of the car





The white residue was removed with clay and polish, but the outline is still there.

Process started with cleaning the wheels, wheel well and tire.



Meguiar’s All Purpose cleaner for the wells and tire. Meguiar’s Wheel Brightener for the wheels.

The car is then foamed with Hyper Wash and rinsed off with the pressure washer.



In the right picture, is after a foam and rinse, since it only had light dust on the surface before this, it was quite clean after the foam and rinse. M21 in action repelling water.

After drying, I performed a test spot on the bonnet. This is before anything was done.


So I sprayed some QD on to the pad for lubrication, and applied some Menzerna 106FF onto a Meguiar’s w-8006 polishing pad.



From here on, things start to go wrong. The Menzerna 106FF wasn’t spreading nicely, and it is not breaking down or turning clear properly either, usually the pad would just glide over the surface smoothly and you don’t require much or any strength at all to control the buffer, but here, I am fighting with it.

The picture below shows the 106FF after a few passes,



It is very difficult to buff off, the good news is that under than rock hard residue is a clear finish, with the light washing swirls gone.

So I tried again, and again, also same problem. I wiped down the car with M6000 Wax and Grease remover to remove any M21 on the surface to start with a clean surface, the problem still persists.

So I switched polishes, I tried M80, M82, M83, ALL OF THEM dried and clumped up before they could turn clear. I was so frustrated and I couldn’t figure out the problem, I tested different pads with different polishes at low and medium speeds also the problem persists.

I spent about 1-2 hours testing and finally gave up. So I switched to Optimum poli-seal with a w-8006 polishing Pad on the ROB speed 5.

I used lots of pressure and slow passes to make sure some of the swirls are gone. After an alcohol wipedown, I can only say 30% of the swirls are gone. So I told the owner the swirls are still there and only charged him minimal fee to cover the cost.

After polishing, the following is done:

• Apply Meguiar’s #21 Sealant
• Apply Meguiar’s #16 Paste Wax
• Vacuum interior
• Wipe down vinyls and plastics with Meguiar’s All Purpose Cleaner
• Clean Glass with Meguiar’s Glass Cleaner Concentrate
• Wipe door jambs with All Purpose Cleaner
• Wax door jambs with Meguiar’s #16 Paste Wax
• Dress exterior trim with Autogylm Bumper Care
• Dress tires with Meguair’s All Season Dressing
• Wipedown wheels with Meguiar’s Ultimate Quik Detailer
• Polish Exhaust with Meguiar’s NXT All Metal Polysh



Below are the after pictures, don’t be deceived by the sun shots, swirls are there, and mostly covered up.

















Lesson learned during this detail : Ambient temperature plays a role during polishing!

Thanks for looking and please feel free to ask if there are any questions =) Read more!